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More => Old Versions => JRiver Media Center 18 for Windows => Topic started by: laerm on October 05, 2012, 12:57:51 pm

Title: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: laerm on October 05, 2012, 12:57:51 pm
Hi all --

So I finally got involved in Blu-rays. I had held off for so long, not really seeing the point, until I saw that Amazon had that new James Bond BD box set on sale for half off last week, and said "well, the time has come".  ;D

So I've had a few discs in so far and none of them have shown any menus in MC. I downloaded the DVDFab free codec and that's what I've got for MC. I installed the PowerDVD package that came with the BD drive (an LG UH12LS29) and that plays the discs fine. Put it in, hit play, goes to main menu. MC goes right to the first title on the disc and then doesn't give me any way to go the disc menu.

a) is this normal behaviour for BDs?
b) is this what you get with the free version of DVDFab?
c) am I a dingbat who can't seem to find the "menu" option under the right-click menu when playing BDs in MC?

Thanks!
Micah
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: fitbrit on October 05, 2012, 04:32:54 pm
Hi Micah

Currently, the only way to get Blu-Ray menus is with software that has a licence to do so. Said licence costs many tens of thousands of dollars, and JRiver does not have one. No DirectShow player has one, although there may be some individuals or teams out there who are working on the menu capability. The only way to get the full menus is to use the mainstream players: Cyberlink's PDVD, Arcsoft's TMT, and Corel's WinDVD Pro or an OEM implementation of one of these.
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: Snookboy on October 06, 2012, 04:39:34 pm
On a disc with multiple episodes, i.e. a TV series disc, is there anyway to get to the second episode? 
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: laerm on October 06, 2012, 04:42:22 pm
Currently, the only way to get Blu-Ray menus is with software that has a licence to do so. Said licence costs many tens of thousands of dollars, and JRiver does not have one. No DirectShow player has one, although there may be some individuals or teams out there who are working on the menu capability. The only way to get the full menus is to use the mainstream players: Cyberlink's PDVD, Arcsoft's TMT, and Corel's WinDVD Pro or an OEM implementation of one of these.

Aha, thanks for the info. So it's a BD thing, interesting. Silly licensing issues. :P Now I understand why so many people rip BDs here!

Micah
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: billkru on October 06, 2012, 06:18:12 pm
Since you mention DVDFab, which I use, it's worth mentioning that DVDFab now offers a blu-ray player of their own.

It costs about $50.  It's separate and apart from all the other DVDFab software as well. So, even if you bought the full meal deal from DVDFab, you have to purchase their blu-ray player app separately.
Title: Re: Re: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: audunth on October 07, 2012, 07:05:08 am
On a disc with multiple episodes, i.e. a TV series disc, is there anyway to get to the second episode? 

Right clicking, you should be able to select the title to play.
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: BartMan01 on October 08, 2012, 03:30:23 am
There is really no need for menus in MC, unless you want some of the 'special feature' functionality that requires the Java based menuing system.  To get all of the tracks loaded as separate entries to MC:  right click > stacks > advanced > auto create BD/DVD title particles.

Now you have an entry for every title on the disk, you can label the ones you care about and 'remove from library' the ones you don't.  For TV shows, each episode is a separate title so you will now have all episodes as separate entries in MC to choose from.
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: laerm on October 08, 2012, 08:03:31 am
BartMan01 --

Thanks for this. Does this work on discs as well as ripped files?

Micah
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: mojave on October 08, 2012, 09:47:35 am
For discs you can just down arrow to bring up the OSD and go to Settings and then Title and select the title. You can also right click on the movie and click Title and then select the title. The time of each title is shown which helps when picking them.
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: laerm on October 08, 2012, 10:02:00 am
For discs you can just down arrow to bring up the OSD and go to Settings and then Title and select the title. You can also right click on the movie and click Title and then select the title. The time of each title is shown which helps when picking them.

Yeah...that's sorta ok, unless you've got a disc with 25-30 3-5 minute chapters on it. I'll stick with PowerDVD for now, thanks.

Micah
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: mojave on October 08, 2012, 10:14:49 am
Yeah...that's sorta ok, unless you've got a disc with 25-30 3-5 minute chapters on it. I'll stick with PowerDVD for now, thanks.

Micah
Do you mean titles or chapters? I use anyDVD and have it set to remove video sequences shorter than 10 minutes. I can set the time less than 10 minutes, too. This way I only get a few titles and don't have all the previews. Most extras on a Blu-ray that I want to see are longer than 10 minutes.
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: BartMan01 on October 08, 2012, 03:39:13 pm
Yeah...that's sorta ok, unless you've got a disc with 25-30 3-5 minute chapters on it. I'll stick with PowerDVD for now, thanks.

Micah

For disk based usage (pop in the disk and watch), PowerDVD is probably a better solution for now if you need access to the title data.  Trying to guess which is which (even with run time indicated) is kind of a clunky way to go, especially for the spouse.

Create particles works great when you have a copy of the disk on a network share or local drive.
Title: Re: Blu-ray menus not available?
Post by: Sparks67 on October 08, 2012, 04:42:30 pm
Sony BDP-CX7000ES Blu-ray Disc changer is the best way.  Especially in terms of video quality.   The latest video cards can only do 10-bit.  "Sony has a totally legit performance-enhancer - a feature called Super Bit Mapping (SBM). This feature processes a 14-bit video signal from the original 8-bit on discs. SBM eliminated banding effects as colors shifted from light to dark. I really noticed the improvement any time the moon or sun appeared onscreen: In such scenes, rough gradations are normally visible radiating away from the brightest part of the image. But with SBM engaged, the same transitions looked smoother and more natural - something that helps to separate this as a flagship player."     

J river just needs to make it like MyMovies, so we can use this changer with RS-232.  I have requested that feature, but not seen it yet.    Finding this changer is not an easy task, since Sony discontinued them last year. 
Anyway, your menus would be available with a changer.  I own 3 of these changers, and it was much cheaper than putting Bluray movies on the hard disk.