Linux Some MKVs won't play, HDD issue?
#1
Hi all,

New user here (stop groaning) and having a weird 'ol issue you maybe able to help me with. I'm not convinced it's a Crystalbuntu issue, thought is was an XBMC issue but then just discovered that it might not be that either!?!

So to the issue, I have a 3Tb Seagate drive (HFS+) plugged into my hacked ATV1, it's mostly got my ripped DVD collection on it (MP4 all play perfectly) but have started to fill it out now with some MKV's. From the off some of these MKV's didn't play, I'd get an error message 'One or items failed to play. Check the log file for details' - http://pastebin.com/ngRM7Ruk - having looked through that (the interesting bit is at 13.19.43) I figured it was a problem with a codec or perhaps the inbuilt XBMC player not liking the files contained in the MKV. Out of curiosity I moved the files to a 128Gb hard dive (HFS+) and plugged that into the ATV to see what would happen, clearly I expected the same results but shockingly the files played!

So now I'm thinking perhaps its the Seagate? I'm wondering if 3TB is too big a drive and that I should perhaps partition it? I've searched here and at XBMC, Google too but can't find a definitive answer, thought I'd throw it out there and see what you guys think.

I've got a Tb of files on there already so at some point I'll copy them off and partition but would be happier knowing that that is the answer rather than spend a day dealing with a huge file copy.

Thanks for your help/advice in advance I very much appreciate it
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#2
Things I'd check in my random-thought-process kind of way...

Filesystems - are they the same, as opposed to the same type? Are there limitations, or something that perhaps varies when you format a drive that big?

File access - can you read the file from the command line? To copy it, to play it in some other player?

Container - can you use ffmpeg to re-wrap one of the offending files into MP4 (assuming the tracks are allowed)? Does that play?

Drive - have you scanned it for errors, could it have problems (I don't know HFS+, so can't say that it could get fragmented, run out of inodes, dislike rainy bank holidays or anything else).

System - can anything else mount the drive? If so, can that other system read the file(s)?

Permissions - you're not changing permissions when you copied them to the other drive, are you?

You have a lot of errors in that logfile, so something is really objecting to your media, isn't it...
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#3
(2012-06-03, 19:49)Prof Yaffle Wrote: Hi, thanks for your thoughts, some things there I'd not considered.

Filesystems - are they the same, as opposed to the same type? Are there limitations, or something that perhaps varies when you format a drive that big?

Yes they're the same, the question I can't seem to find an answer for is does an HFS+ 3Tb drive have some limitations with Crystalbuntu, I know Crystalbuntu uses an older version of Ubuntu. I've posted this same issue on the Crystalbuntu forums. Here's the latest log file trying to play one of the files from the Seagate - http://pastebin.com/FENWPfSu

File access - can you read the file from the command line? To copy it, to play it in some other player?

Yes I can, I ran the following command - cat /media/drive/path/to/my/bad/file.mkv > /dev/null to verify that the entire file can be read off the disk, it can.

Container - can you use ffmpeg to re-wrap one of the offending files into MP4 (assuming the tracks are allowed)? Does that play?

I've converted a couple of the files using Handbrake to MP4 - weirdly some worked, others didn't, I havn't troubleshot that just yet.

Drive - have you scanned it for errors, could it have problems (I don't know HFS+, so can't say that it could get fragmented, run out of inodes, dislike rainy bank holidays or anything else).

Yep, no probs at all.

System - can anything else mount the drive? If so, can that other system read the file(s)?

Yep, my Macbook Pro see's it and plays the MKV files from it.

Permissions - you're not changing permissions when you copied them to the other drive, are you?

No, I don't touch the permissions.

You have a lot of errors in that logfile, so something is really objecting to your media, isn't it...

Tell me about it Smile

Thanks agin for your thoughts, I'll keep the post updated as I troubleshoot the issue.
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