This is a general problem with - not sure exactly the correct term - “shared or decentralized” third party software development - when there are lots of individual levels, and layers, and APIs, and different companies & programmers involved in a particular piece of software working correctly, and any problems that arise can get passed around as “not our fault, its the other software/companies fault”.
In this case we have PLEX, NVidia, Google, Dolby and who knows who else (MakeMKV, Denon/Marantz, HDMI consortium?) involved in code layers, functions and APIs, and it seems each finds that the problem is caused by something one of the other companies did, and so they can’t fix it themselves.
As a developer myself I can fix bugs in our own code, but clients have a nasty habit of finding bugs in third party code packages we decided to use to save ourselves the bother of reinventing the wheel and they can be impossible to fix as we don’t know their code or have access to it.
While I always believe in being courteous and grateful to the individuals trying to help and working on a fix (@sixones), the fact remains, it has been two and a half years. I certainly also don’t begrudge people their disgruntlement over that fact. Even if we’re now, finally, being told that they’re working on a fix (albeit three months ago).
There’s room for both understanding towards the people trying to help, and outrage that that it has taken this long. I lean towards the former. But I’m not going to castigate outbursts of the latter.
@sixones (plex team member) said they are working on a fix that is effective but also had bugs/side-effects that needed worked out… So it is apparently possible to work around or address the issue on Plex’s end. That was back in June though and there has been no word since.
I tried Kodi, Jellyfin, and others a while back. I’d still much prefer Plex natively.
Native plex app sucks really bad, borderline unusable. I have no idea what is going on there with devs and management, but development turned to useless features like streaming random TV channels that nobody asked for and writing your own reviews. Amazing stuff!!!
You still can’t adjust .srt or any subtitle position so it is completely useless for someone who has home theater projector and screen masking. Subs now show on black velvet when masking, or black bars. This is not even a power user feature. I would love to adjust subtitle position on TV as well. Also, obviously, you still can’t play seamless branching 4k discs without audio delay.
All of this is fixed with Kodi and PM4K addon. I am not exaggerating when I say that I would not use Plex at all, if it were not for Kodi + PM4K. Pretty much the only reason.
People were asking for subtitle position adjustment in that useless “plex feature request forum” topic for 5 years, but nobody is listening. Mods are just deleting and closing duplicates. This was first reported 5 years ago. It is still not present. Work for this feature would take extremely small time, probably not even a day. Just add a height %, because “bottom” is too low, but they don’t care.
And this seamless branching issue is 100 times more complex. It is an issue with ExoPlayer, Dolby and who knows what else. This will never be fixed. Or if it will, expect waiting 5 years or more. I suggest you switch to PM4K with Kodi or start searching for new media server.
Yeah I am venting, yeah I am mad, but it had to be said.
I also use masking on a 2.40:1 screen and subtitle positioning is also something (which seems very basic) that I would have liked instead of all the expanded crap that nobody wants or asked for - but I guess things like basic functionally improvements don’t make the investors/management enough money eh…
Anyway regarding this branching problem… I have one of the problem movies M3gan on both Bluray and 4K UHD disc and I have been experimenting with it recently because I noticed that I wasn’t getting any sound dropouts on the new 4K version I watched - whereas the previous 1080P version did have many dropouts. So I was trying to figure out why.
Turns out there is two versions of the movie on both discs - the Original Theatrical cut, and a more extreme “Unrated cut” (I wouldn’t call it Extended because strangely enough this version is a few seconds shorter than Original cut - M3GAN (Comparison: Theatrical Version - Unrated) - Movie-Censorship.com)
So it turned out I had originally ripped the Unrated cut of the Bluray… but mistakenly ripped the Theatrical cut of the 4K
So I went back and re-ripped the Unrated cut of the 4K and watched that again - and sure enough, the sound dropouts were back,
So its seems… the sound dropouts only occur on the versions of the movie where they use the branch edits, and not the original version where you don’t branch!
I’m sure someone else can confirm with other movies which have similar optional branched versions on disc.
Both the discs have exactly the same Atmos track.
p.s. you’ll know if you have Unrated cut of movie if you can see blood splattered all over the guy in elevator when she kills the boss… in Theatrical there is no blood in elevator at all.
I checked on Hellboy, and it does seem like the theatrical mkv copy I just made does mitigate the audio blips on the atmos track. This looks like a promising find Still not a fix, as I prefer the Dir cut. Would love if it this were ultimately resolved
Good that you confirmed this on another movie… seems at least one version of each movie doesn’t have to branch - its the “default” branch through the movie… and in that case the bug doesn’t happen. Bug only happens when player has to take the “alternate” branch points.
But as you said, the alternate/extended/director cuts are usually the ones we actually want to play.
Looking at makemkv, for UHDs of “Hellboy” and “Conan the Barbarian”, it appears that the title listed first (top most) may be the one that is unaffected by the branching dropouts.
So glad this happens to be the extended edition for Conan!
Granted, this is only two examples. Can anyone else validate in makemkv that the first/top title is “safe” from this issue?
Would makes sense - one title has to be the default non-branching one - all other titles then are branching from the default… but which one this is might be random per disc. I will be checking more yes.
Is it fixed? Until now I only had sound up to the branch and then it was silent. But now I have a new AVR, the Sony TA-AN1000, and now I have a small interruption on the branch, but the sound comes back immediately and it continues without my intervention.
With respect, since when is a “small interruption” in the soundtrack in the middle of a movie considered acceptable or “fixed?” That’s how this issue has always presented for me. Glitch/Interruption, then a small gap, then sound gradually comes back, though often out of sync or missing fidelity.
Ah, okay. For me the sound stopped completely and didn’t come back. Only when I fast forwarded or rewound did the sound continue. I thought they had worked on the problem, then probably not, what a shame.
Branching doesn’t work that way. Branched titles normally consist out of many segments, that are stitched together. Depending on the cuts, there are segments inserted, removed and/or swapped out. So EVERY edition will have branching points where the sound drops.
I just tested with the UHDs of Halloween Kills (11 segements) and Hellboy (32 segments). Theatrical Cut as well as Directors Cut both have the TrueHD audio drop outs with the sound being asynchronous afterwards.
Talking hellboy, my dir cut audio blips at the point in the beginning shortly after 3 min mark, where the American GI looks over the fence and says “sweet jeebus”… In my mkv of the theatrical, same spot, no audio blip… Both mkvs are from the same uhd, both on the atmos track.
This is during playback off my shield as the client. Are you also using the shield as a client and see the blip in the same spot, both versions?
Still not a fix, as I prefer the Dir cut. Would love if it this were ultimately resolved 