AAC 5.1 to AC3 5.1 Conversion

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VSG12777

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Hi guys

I have a problem with AAC 5.1 to AC3 5.1 conversion, mainly cos my WDTV HD Media Player (Gen 1) can't play MKV with 5.1 AAC audio.

I have the XVID4PSP program (recommended by a friend) and I successfully converted some AAC to AC3 5.1 640 Kbps sound using this. But, I had to 1st split the audio track from the MKV (as an AAC file) using TSMUXER, then use the AAC file in XVID4PSP and convert it to AC3 5.1 (640 Kbps), then use MKVMERGEGUI to merge the AC3 file with the main MKV and delete the default AAC track. This would produce a new MKV with the AC3 audio and this plays perfectly on the WD media player.

I have 2 excellent blu ray rips of The Kingdom and Commando, which are MKV, 720p but which have Italian DTS and English AAC 5.1 audio. Picture quality is excellent. Audio is the issue. When I try to convert the AAC to AC3 640 Kbps, XVID4PSP is giving me an error saying "ERROR: Can't create resampling context. Resampler can`t work with multichannel audio."

The AAC track in the MKV according to VLC player (Codec information), is 6 channels 48 KHz sample rate. But when I extract the audio as an AAC file, XVID4PSP shows the same file as 24 KHz sample rate and 6 channels. So when I try to upsample this file to AC3 640 Kbps 48 KHz, it gives me this error.

Does any of you have any idea on how to get around this problem? I would really love to convert the audio to ACe 5.1 640 Kbps and merge it with the main MKV so that I can enjoy the files on my WDTV media player.

Look forward to hearing from you soon. Thanks!

Warm regards,
Venkat:)
 
Even I have WD TV 1st gen which I bought from US almost two years ago.....I still have it though I use POHD now......Anyway when I was using it even I faced the exact same problem with AAC MKV files. I did an extensive research of a programm that can convert the Audio from the MKV to AC3, keeping the video untouched. After quite a few trials and errors I finally found this excellent application called PopCorn MKV AudioConverter. In one word its fantastic, though a bit complicated to use or shall I say...to configure but provided excellient result and that too within 15 minutes (HD rip MKV) on my avg Dual Core notebook.........and the best part is its free :)
The only thing negetive is that the application needs to be configured manually before we can start using it.

When you unzip the application you would get a zip file named "Audio converter Tools.zip" along with the other application files and the application exe. This zip file has all the tools this application needs to run. Make sure you unzip this files in the same directory you have the popcorn application exe. Once that is done you will have folders like "Aften", Besweet", "Delaycut" etc........run the Audioconverter.exe fiile and you would be presented the following screen.....

2944ajc.jpg


The only catch is you have to manually set the locations for all the files in first tab "MKV Tools" which would be where you unzipped Audio converter Tools......Like for example MKV info dll file is in the MKV info folder. MKV extract is in the MKVtoolnix folder......and so forth......you need to do the same for one file in Audio tools 2 tab as well. Once all this is done, choose the source file and select "Single file". Also make sure to choose the bitrate in the AAC tab on the right. When all is ready click on RUN.
You should get a new MKV file with AC3 audio without absolutely no loss in video quality. The process should not take more than 15-20 minutes.......

You can download the application from the following Link.....:)

MKV_AC3_convertor.rar - download now for free. File sharing. Software file sharing. Free file hosting. File upload. FileFactory.com
 
Last edited:
Hey thanks for that info Sam. I actually have MKVToolNix - the package. It contains MKV Merge and MKV Merge GUI (which I normally use for deleting non-English audio tracks in some downloaded blu ray rips). I also have TS Muxer, which has the ability to split the audio and video tracks from any file as separate files.

This PopCorn MKV Audio Converter seems to be a new one to me. I shall certainly try it out.

The error that XVID4PSP throws up is due to a difference in the sample rate of the AAC 5.1 track (24 KHz) and the AC3 5.1 track (48 KHz) that I want to convert it to. VLC Media Player however shows the AAC 5.1 track as 48 KHz when I click on Tools - Codec Information. Confused!

Hope your software works! Shall go home and try it out as I am posting this message from office. The image in your message is also not visible.

Warm regards,
Venkat
 
VSG12777 said:
Hey thanks for that info Sam. I actually have MKVToolNix - the package. It contains MKV Merge and MKV Merge GUI (which I normally use for deleting non-English audio tracks in some downloaded blu ray rips). I also have TS Muxer, which has the ability to split the audio and video tracks from any file as separate files.

This PopCorn MKV Audio Converter seems to be a new one to me. I shall certainly try it out.

The error that XVID4PSP throws up is due to a difference in the sample rate of the AAC 5.1 track (24 KHz) and the AC3 5.1 track (48 KHz) that I want to convert it to. VLC Media Player however shows the AAC 5.1 track as 48 KHz when I click on Tools - Codec Information. Confused!

Hope your software works! Shall go home and try it out as I am posting this message from office. The image in your message is also not visible.

Warm regards,
Venkat
Click to expand...

I have xvid4psp as well, its an excellent programm, but I havent used it for this particular problem.......I usually use it for converting videos to use it on my PSP/iPod touch, or compress it for youtube uploades............
Popcorn converter works like a charm , as I said I have used it personally and was very satisfied with the result. I couldnt get it to work in the first go, but with few trials I was all set..........try it and let me know if you need any assistance ........:)
 
sam9s said:
The only thing negetive is that the application needs to be configured manually before we can start using it.
Click to expand...

That's only if you download it from unofficial sources, like the one you linked to.

If you download it from here (Compressed. EXE - may trigger false-positive virus alerts) or here (Compressed .ZIP - does not support auto-update), then when you run the program for the very first time, it'll ask your permission to download (and install) the author-approved utility package, and once that is done, you are ready to go.

If you have already run the program but still want to auto-download and install the utility package, you can find the option in one of the menus to do so.
 
HeartWare said:
That's only if you download it from unofficial sources, like the one you linked to.

If you download it from here (Compressed. EXE - may trigger false-positive virus alerts) or here (Compressed .ZIP - does not support auto-update), then when you run the program for the very first time, it'll ask your permission to download (and install) the author-approved utility package, and once that is done, you are ready to go.

If you have already run the program but still want to auto-download and install the utility package, you can find the option in one of the menus to do so.
Click to expand...

The application asked the permission to download the utility package for me as well (AFA I remember). By manually configuring what I meant was, the application does not take the path to the tools automatically, you have to manually select the path for the desired tool.

BTW....Thanks for this excellent tool. :)
 
Last edited:
sam9s said:
By manually configuring what I meant was, the application does not take the path to the tools automatically, you have to manually select the path for the desired tool.
Click to expand...

Nope - at least not on most setups. It'll download the utility package, unpack it, and configure AudioConverter to use the utilities just downloaded.

At least it does for most users :o
 
i recommend iDealshare VideoGo which can work as either a AC3 encoder or AC3 decoder.

Acting as an AC3 Decoder, it easily helps:


Convert AC3 audio to other audio formats like convert AC3 to WAV, convert AC3 to AAC, convert AC3 to AIFF, convert AC3 to FLAC, convert AC3 to M4A, MP3, WMA, OGG, AU, RA, MP2, DTS and etc.
Convert video with AC3 audio codec to video with other audio codec like AAC, MP3, MP2, DCA, PCM, WMA etc. You may choose to keep or change the output video format like convert MKV with AC3 to MP4 with AAC.
Convert video with AC3 audio to audio format like convert MKV with AC3 to MP3 audio.


Acting as an AC3 encoder, it easily helps:


Convert almost all popular audio formats to AC3 like convert DTS to AC3, convert FLAC to AC3, convert APE to AC3, convert to AC3 from Apple Lossless ALAC, AMR, QCP, CAF, VOC, VQF and etc.
Convert video with various audio codec to video with AC3 codec as well as keep or change the video format like convert MKV with FLAC codec to MKV with AC3 codec.
Change AC3 audio channel like from AC3 stereo to AC3 5.1/6 channel, from Dolby Digital 5.1 AC3 to Mono or Stereo AC3
 
Use "Handbrake" video converter application. Its free and has a very user friendly GUI and works seamlessly with all video formats. i use it a lot of times to change the audio formats in the various brrips which don't work on my htib
http://handbrake.fr/
 
Last edited:
lol..... I wonder everybody is just registering to post on this very thread ... :D :D
 
If your source files are video files with AAC audio codec and you want to convert them to other video formats with other audio codec, you may prefer to this powerful AAC to AC3 Converter.

Just click the "Setting..." button -> "Advanced" window -> "Advanced" tab, then go to "Audio" column, click "Audio Codec" drop-down list to select desired one like "ac3".

It's quite easy, and hope it will help you more or less.
 
I use iDealshare VideoGo to convert MKV DTS or AAC to MKV AC3

To set the 5.1 channel, you may follow the setting below:
Click "Setting..." button, the "Advanced Settings" Window will pop up right beside the main window; ..In the 'Advanced Settings' Window,

Switch to 'Advanced' tab and then go to the 'Audio Codec' section;

Click Stereo on the right side of Channels to select 5.1 from the drop-down list.
 
You can use MPC-HC or any other player like VLC or PotPlayer which when configured will automatically play a AAC 5.1 as AC3 5.1 and the AVR will play it as DD 5.1. I do this in my HTPC and works perfectly but if you are going to use a media player then I am not sure this kind of conversion can be done within the settings.
 
I have a (now obsolete) WD TV live box, and tho it does process AAC my amp doesnt. And now X265 is the norm, which WD doesnt support. Double whammy.

And worse, most converters dont run on Windows XP anymore :(.

After some googling, I found FFmpeg, and amazing utility. Most utilities available actually use ffmeg and just provide a user friendly graphic interface. Version 2015-06-12 git-4af9eb4 is the last one supported by XP. You run it in a cmd prompt window.

First run:
ffmpeg -i yourfile.mkv -c copy -c:v libx264 yourfile_out.mkv

where yourfile is the name of your x265 file. Then run:

ffmpeg -i yourfile_out.mkv -c copy -c:a ac3 yourfile_ac3_out.mkv

yourfile_ac3_out is now in x264, ac3 format. I found no deterioration in quality. The major problem is that it takes a LONG time for the x264 conversion, almost as long as the length of the video. ac3 conversion is relatively fast. That is why I do it in two steps. You can actually combine both steps and run it in one shot.

The copy flag ensures that all other data (like subs) are intact.

vkj
 
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