PS3 Media Server / Universal Media Server Guide

[rajputwarrior]

just got a ps3 and im going through the guide. Thanks audio!

[+Audioboxer Subscriber²]

New update - http://ps3mediaserver.org/files/pms-setup-...ws-1.11.363.exe

changelog between r363 and r356:

- Ability to choose the subtitles color

- Audio transcoding to 48kHz by default on PS3 (new renderer parameter 'TranscodeAudioTo441kHz', feel free to tweak it)

- Support of HTTP chunk encoding (from the client side)

- Regional profiles support for Bravia TVs

- New renderer parameter (see 'TranscodedVideoFileSize', for Samsung/Philips TVs maybe)

- iTunes library support on Windows

[rajputwarrior]

thanks for the update audio

[TDQuiksilver]

Thanks for the heads up AB! (Y)

[Lezard]

Quick question, how come my movies show up as a smaller res when I download them, but when I stream them, they come up higher resolution and better?

[+Elі Subscriber²]

New update - http://ps3mediaserver.org/files/pms-setup-...ws-1.11.363.exe

Thanks, I missed that update, this is most definitely the best Media Streaming software for the PS3, being using it for the last year or so.

[Guest]

I wish there was a built-in updater for this. Every time I install the new version it resets all my settings :(

[+Audioboxer Subscriber²]

I wish there was a built-in updater for this. Every time I install the new version it resets all my settings :(

Are you on a mac?

The PC version retains settings.

[Guest]

Are you on a mac?

The PC version retains settings.

Yeah, OS X.

[dothesmash]

Hey Boz... or anyone out there

I was reading Boz's post about using eac3to and mkvmerge to make some nice blu ray rips.. After hours of trying to figure it out, although seems simple enough, can't seem to get it right..

What I'm trying to do is rip all my blu-rays to these drives I bought for ease of access to stream to my PS3 via PS3 media server. I want to do all the transcoding beforehand so PMS doesn't have to transcode anything. AND I'd like it to be the best quality it can. Hope it's possible.

Here's what I did..

1. I rip my BD to the drive. First one i try is a VC1 m2ts

2. i use eac3to to make the mkv and flac. (mkv still shows as VC1 codec when played) perhaps this is my problem, but can't seem to find where to change it.

3. Use MKVMerge to mux the 2 files. Plays on the PC, doesn't stream.

I appreciate your responses in advance.

[Boz]

The VC1 might be the culprit. If you are not using PS3MS you will have problems playing VC1 on your PS3.

That's your problem. Now, keep in mind that even if your MKV is in fact VC1 codec, PS3MS will not necessarily transcode, it will just rewrite headers so PS3 can stream it.

The only solution for VC1 MKVs, if you want to play them without passing through PS3MS is to re-encode them to h.264

The positive thing though is that majority of Blu-ray movies are in fact h.264 so there might be a handful of VC1 ones.

I would definitely suggest to you to re-encode. You should use MeGUI app. RipBot is a good program and produces fantastic results but is VERY slow.

with meGUI you can fine tune the encoding settings so you can get your VC1 movie encoded into h.264 within maybe 2 or 2 and half hours for a 90 min movie. You just have to play around with some settings.

My suggestion is you do this:

1. When you install meGUI run it.

2. In the menu, go under Tools (I think) and you should see an option called AviSynth Script Maker. Run that.

3. AviSynth Script maker will have a box where you will pick your MKV movie. Keep in mind that i don't re-encode audio with meGUI, just video. So when you extract video stream with eac3to you should just re-encode that not audio, cause meGUI will go AC3 640 as the highest.

4. Once you point to MKV source you will see a quick preview of your mkv file. You can close that and close AviSynth Script Creator.

5. Now in meGUI you should see that some info is populated in the video section of the screen. That's all great and you should now look under Templates list box. When you installed meGUI you will see that it will ask you to install various templates (like for iphone, blu-ray, xbox etc etc). Check all of those when you install and they will show up in meGUI.

6. Just pick BLU-RAY FAST and go to CONFIG so you can fine tune settings.

7. When you click CONFIG you will get another window where you can fine tune meGUI options for that profile "Blu-ray Fast".

8. You can play around and test which encoding setting will give you the best results. I use Constant Quantitizer or Constant Quality depending on the footage but those 2 settings should be good for you to play around with. Remember with these settings the lower the number in parameters the better encode. So play and encode same footage a couple of times to get the best quality you want. It's well worth losing few hours (4-6 hours) for encoding or you can just play around with smaller video files. Once you nail down these settings and get perfect quality that gets encoded faster you won't even think twice. You'll just pump them out when you stumble upon VC1 file.

Hell I even re-encode my existing h.264 rips from Blu-ray so I can save a few gigabytes here and there without really losing quality.

Again, you can avoid re-encoding if you use PS3MS for those mkvs. They won't play as VC1 directly on PS3 unfortunately.

[Boz]

Hey Boz... or anyone out there

I was reading Boz's post about using eac3to and mkvmerge to make some nice blu ray rips.. After hours of trying to figure it out, although seems simple enough, can't seem to get it right..

What I'm trying to do is rip all my blu-rays to these drives I bought for ease of access to stream to my PS3 via PS3 media server. I want to do all the transcoding beforehand so PMS doesn't have to transcode anything. AND I'd like it to be the best quality it can. Hope it's possible.

Here's what I did..

1. I rip my BD to the drive. First one i try is a VC1 m2ts

2. i use eac3to to make the mkv and flac. (mkv still shows as VC1 codec when played) perhaps this is my problem, but can't seem to find where to change it.

3. Use MKVMerge to mux the 2 files. Plays on the PC, doesn't stream.

I appreciate your responses in advance.

Also.. FLAC will not work for you if you don't transcode through PS3MS. So you need to use PS3MS to passthrough the files anyways. You check DTS/FLAC->LPCM in your PS3MS settings and you should be set.

This way, you will not need to re-encode VC1 movies. You will still pass them through PS3MS and PS3MS will fix the VC1 header so PS3 can play it.

[dothesmash]

I appreciate the info.

The only solution for VC1 MKVs, if you want to play them without passing through PS3MS is to re-encode them to h.264

I am using PS3MS. But i would like to use it JUST to passthrough the files. Keeps giving me a data corrupted message. You said PS3MS will rewrite the headers so a VC1 will play? Maybe I'm missing something else?

Let me know. If you care to PM me, that's cool too. Thanks in advance.

[Boz]

I appreciate the info.

I am using PS3MS. But i would like to use it JUST to passthrough the files.

You can't really.. VC1 files are not support on PS3.. so if you bypass transcoding through PS3MS you will keep getting that wrong format message. You should tell PS3MS to transcode your MKVs.. don't worry though, PS3MS can recognize streams so it will only transcode if there's a problem with the file.

You can set in global decoding options for PS3MS to always to handle MKV files.

I had no problems playing VC1 files that way. There was an earlier build (prior to 356) that had problems with VC1 and it was a bug, but since i installed 356 build it worked out great. There's an even new build now.. so don't forget to use the latest one (even if its' BETA). Usually shagrath fixes things that are spotted like that NTSC problem with VC1 titles.

As I mentioned if you don't want them transcoded/fixed by PS3MS you should re-encode the movie into h.264. That's the only way to get it compatible with PS3 unfortunately.

[dothesmash]

and megui is the best bet it seems..

OK, well I just got reamed out by the wife b/c I've been working on figuring this out for a good 12 hours now. That being said, I'll try that tomorrow, and shoot on back here with the results. I guess just to watch movies, the h.264 has some nice quality as i've seen. Thanks for the help. Hopefully I'll chat with you tomoorrow.

[+Audioboxer Subscriber²]

changelog between r366 and r363:

- Some changes on Sony, Philips renderer support

- Fix bug with subtitles search on large dir browsing

http://ps3mediaserver.org/files/pms-setup-...ws-1.11.366.exe

Fixes an annoying bug that caused playback to stop 10 seconds early for me with all files in r363.

[dothesmash]

OK.. I'm back.

Boz, the encode took a good 16 hours, but that's ok. It's now an mkv with avc video and flac audio. I made another with the ac3 audio as well. PS3MS still will not stream it without decoding. I've checked the DTS/FLAC -> PCM option.

Now a note.. If I convert it to mpg with mkv2vob, it streams fine.. FF and RW work nice. Seems like mkv2vob isn't transcoding anything, just rewriting headers. Am I correct? If so, should this be my option, or is there a better way to do this? Thanks!!

[dothesmash]

been a couple weeks. Built a new HTPC just for this in the meantime. Plays everything fine now. Tried a reencode of an avc1 at insane quality, and the file size dropped from 37GB to less than 11. Still looks great though! Is this normal?

[+Audioboxer Subscriber²]

Updated build here that uses the PS3 Slim Icon for anyone who cares - http://otmanix.de/download/pms-setup-windows-1.20.rev368.exe

[jelli]

Could anyone enlighten me as to a small problem I am having, for some reason when I am watching a 720p, AVC1 encoded file stored in an MKV container (download from the internet) the last ~20 seconds are unviewable and the PS3 reports that it is corrupted data. Any solution or guidance available for solving this? It's rather annoying.

[+Audioboxer Subscriber²]

Could anyone enlighten me as to a small problem I am having, for some reason when I am watching a 720p, AVC1 encoded file stored in an MKV container (download from the internet) the last ~20 seconds are unviewable and the PS3 reports that it is corrupted data. Any solution or guidance available for solving this? It's rather annoying.

Build I posted above fixes that.

Or you could just place this file in the same directory as PMS.exe, if you're running build 366 and would rather stay with it (if you prefer seeing a fat PS3 icon?).

[Brad.]

With a few files that I copy to my ps3 from PS3 media server, they transcode from .mkv and then are sent to my PS3, so with the larger movies I do it over night, but sometimes they dont stop. Like for instance with a movie (7gb in size) I left it over night and it had ''copied'' 20gb to my PS3 but it wasnt complete. This has happened a few times with other files too. Any ideas?

[jelli]

Build I posted above fixes that.

Or you could just place this file in the same directory as PMS.exe, if you're running build 366 and would rather stay with it (if you prefer seeing a fat PS3 icon?).

ahhh thanks AB, presumed that the build just added a new icon. Should of guessed by the change in build number there was more to it than just that.

[[DGS]]

is there a "final" release coming soon ?

[lyunya]

does streaming hd files to the ps3 rely mostly on the cpu or gpu? I need to know what to upgrade to prevent the jerkiness.