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Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

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bradsm87

Serviio newbie

Posts: 5

Joined: Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:02 am

Post Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:16 am

Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

My pre-2020 LG TV that supported DTS audio was great and I've never had transcoding enabled in the past.

The new LG TV that no longer supports DTS audio has been a nightmare!

The TV displays the video fine without audio on videos containing DTS when transcoding is not enabled (eg. mkv or mp4 files). First I tried transcoding to LPCM but the TV doesn't support that either. AC3 works but there is no video (black screen) when transcoding is enabled but I can hear the audio playing. Here is the profile that has working audio but no video:

<Profile id="2" name="DTS to AC3" extendsProfileId="1">
<Transcoding>
<Video targetContainer="mpegts" targetACodec="ac3" aBitrate="640">
<Matches container="*" aCodec="dca"/>
<Matches container="*" aCodec="dts-hd"/>
</Video>
</Transcoding>
</Profile>

I then tried "mpeg" (MPEG2 PS) container and the TV says the file is not playable.

With "applehttp" (HLS), the video is missing from the list completely.

If I add this line, the TV reports the file as unplayable:

<ResourceTransportProtocolHandler>org.serviio.upnp.protocol.http.transport.LGProtocolHandler</ResourceTransportProtocolHandler>

Here is the WebOS 6 compatibility list. WebOS 5 is the same.

https://webostv.developer.lge.com/disco ... /webos-60/

LG claims that MPEG2 TS containers should work with AVC or HEVC with Dolby Digital audio but it does not with Serviio.

There must be a way to make this work! I'm so disappointed that a TV would not even support passing through DTS to an AVR or sound bar.

Here are some old links that look relevant. Now that LG dropped DTS, transcoding is more important than ever to get working with LG TVs.

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=6386

http://www.homemediaserver.ru/forum/vie ... 073#p10100

https://bitbucket.org/xnejp03/serviio/i ... ing-for-lg
Last edited by bradsm87 on Tue Oct 19, 2021 4:36 am, edited 1 time in total.
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bradsm87

Serviio newbie

Posts: 5

Joined: Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:02 am

Post Tue Oct 19, 2021 4:16 am

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

Serviio puts .mpeg file extension on TS virtual files.

On LG's compatibility list, it lists these file extensions only for transport streams:

.ts
.trp
.tp
.mts

It also lists MPEG files (like the very old MPEGs) with .mpeg extension, but they do not support any newer video or audio codecs.

Could the solution be as simple as presenting the stream to clients with a .ts extension rather than .mpeg?

If I use the UPnP Technologies Developer tools to get the HTTP path to an MPEG2 TS transcoded item, it has an "mpeg" file extension when downloading it using a web browser. Can I change this to use a "ts" file extensions in a config file somewhere?

Edit: Maybe the .mpeg extension was just the browser's handling of the mime type. I'm not sure.

I've now tried the following mime types without success:
video/mpeg (default profile)
video/mp2t (RFC 3551)
video/vnd.dlna.mpeg-tts
video/x-mpegts
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atc98092

User avatar

DLNA master

Posts: 5205

Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:22 pm

Location: Washington (the state)

Post Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:49 pm

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

What model LG do you have? I never use the TV's player, so I haven't really tested its capabilities. I much prefer the user interface of either a Roku or Kodi on my Shield, not to mention the Shield plays everything without transcoding.

Serviio isn't actually changing the file extension. It might list it that way when you view the metadata, but if you look at the folder view you still see the actual file extension.

I'll do some experimenting this afternoon when the TV's player and see what I get with some DTS tracks. My TV feeds the audio back to an AVR via ARC, so it might differ from what a TV is capable of playing over the internal speakers. While my TV has eARC, my AVR is just the older ARC, so it won't send any of the lossless tracks directly.
Dan

LG NANO85 4K TV, Samsung JU7100 4K TV, Sony BDP-S3500, Sharp 4K Roku TV, Insignia Roku TV, Roku Ultra, Premiere and Stick, Nvidia Shield, Yamaha RX-V583 AVR.
Primary server: Intel i5-6400, 16 gig ram, Windows 10 Pro, 22 TB hard drive space | Test server Windows 10 Pro, AMD Phenom II X4 965, 8 gig ram

HOWTO: Enable debug logging HOWTO: Identify media file contents
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atc98092

User avatar

DLNA master

Posts: 5205

Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:22 pm

Location: Washington (the state)

Post Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:46 am

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

OK, testing with my Nano85, using the default LG profile in Serviio. I'm playing a TS file (OTA recorded movie) without issue. Naturally, the video is MPEG-2 and the audio is AC-3. I then tried a Blu Ray which I know has DTS audio. As expected, it played but no sound.

So, I tried my own version of a test profile, and now the DTS media isn't showing at all. Very puzzling. I'll continue to play around with this and see if I can stumble across the reason. I have other media that contains DTS Master Audio, and some are visible while others are not. The one I could see plays fine, and that's a 4K title.

Everything I tried was unsuccessful. For whatever reason, when LG sees a transcoded file, it won't show it. The one target container that appeared to work was ASF, but while the titles appeared, none of them would play. If I switch back to the "regular" LG profile, all the titles appear, but anything with DTS or any of the lossless codecs will not play audio. I even tried using LPCM as the audio, but they still don't even appear in the selections.

This is why I don't bother with the built-in TV players. External players like the Roku or the Shield work far better.
Dan

LG NANO85 4K TV, Samsung JU7100 4K TV, Sony BDP-S3500, Sharp 4K Roku TV, Insignia Roku TV, Roku Ultra, Premiere and Stick, Nvidia Shield, Yamaha RX-V583 AVR.
Primary server: Intel i5-6400, 16 gig ram, Windows 10 Pro, 22 TB hard drive space | Test server Windows 10 Pro, AMD Phenom II X4 965, 8 gig ram

HOWTO: Enable debug logging HOWTO: Identify media file contents
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bradsm87

Serviio newbie

Posts: 5

Joined: Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:02 am

Post Wed Oct 20, 2021 1:09 am

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

atc98092 wrote:For whatever reason, when LG sees a transcoded file, it won't show it. The one target container that appeared to work was ASF, but while the titles appeared, none of them would play. If I switch back to the "regular" LG profile, all the titles appear, but anything with DTS or any of the lossless codecs will not play audio. I even tried using LPCM as the audio, but they still don't even appear in the selections.


I grabbed a transcoded file with H.264 video and AC3 audio (downloaded from Serviio via web browser) and put it on a USB stick and into the TV and even that has very strange playback. It constantly speeds up and slows down and the elapsed time even jumps backwards by a second or two sometimes. The same file plays fine on a PC.

LG's media compatibility says that both AVC and HEVC should play fine in a TS container. I logged a support ticket with them.

I absolutely do not want to transcode the video. I must pass through video and transcode audio only. I can't use the ASF container for this according to LG's compatibility list for codecs and containers.

It's a C1 OLED but my understanding is that almost all LG TVs don't play transcoded TS streams from Serviio correctly.
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atc98092

User avatar

DLNA master

Posts: 5205

Joined: Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:22 pm

Location: Washington (the state)

Post Wed Oct 20, 2021 2:16 pm

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

bradsm87 wrote:
atc98092 wrote:It's a C1 OLED but my understanding is that almost all LG TVs don't play transcoded TS streams from Serviio correctly.


That certainly seems to fit what I see with mine. Why that one single transcoded file was available and played, I have no idea. I don't know the knowledge required to investigate why the TV and Serviio don't agree on playback. I did notice that when using the regular LG profile, a couple of movies would play an alternate audio track (usually the commentary) that happened to be AC3, not DTS. But I couldn't find any way of selecting a different audio track (almost all of my movies are ripped with every English audio track available, and they almost all use AC-3 on the non-primary track) from the LG interface. No button on the remote offered any ability to select the audio or caption tracks that might be available on the media. Overall just another poor player implementation by a TV manufacturer. Samsung is just as bad.
Dan

LG NANO85 4K TV, Samsung JU7100 4K TV, Sony BDP-S3500, Sharp 4K Roku TV, Insignia Roku TV, Roku Ultra, Premiere and Stick, Nvidia Shield, Yamaha RX-V583 AVR.
Primary server: Intel i5-6400, 16 gig ram, Windows 10 Pro, 22 TB hard drive space | Test server Windows 10 Pro, AMD Phenom II X4 965, 8 gig ram

HOWTO: Enable debug logging HOWTO: Identify media file contents
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bradsm87

Serviio newbie

Posts: 5

Joined: Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:02 am

Post Sun Oct 24, 2021 11:09 pm

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

I'll do some research on ffmpeg's mpegts options then do some encodes and see if I can find some options that play well without live transcoding.

https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-formats.html#mpegts-1

If I find options that appear to work well, I'll contact @zip and see if the custom options can be implemented in some way in the transcoding.
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bradsm87

Serviio newbie

Posts: 5

Joined: Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:02 am

Post Mon Oct 25, 2021 12:57 am

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

I tried all of this one at a time without success:

-mpegts_service_type advanced_codec_digital_hdtv
-mpegts_m2ts_mode 1
-mpegts_flags system_b
-omit_video_pes_length 0
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nuttyquarter

Serviio newbie

Posts: 4

Joined: Tue Jan 31, 2023 7:54 am

Post Tue Jan 31, 2023 8:14 am

Re: Let's solve mpegts streams on LG TVs

bradsm87 wrote:I tried all of this one at a time without success:

-mpegts_service_type advanced_codec_digital_hdtv
-mpegts_m2ts_mode 1
-mpegts_flags system_b
-omit_video_pes_length 0

Same here.
redactle

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