[David Andrews]

Hi Stuart

It feels like a long time ago when I posted the messages above!

I was using Vista at the time but the command is a DOS command, so basically you go into XP, Vista or Winodws 7 as normal, then open a command prompt, move to the directory you have your AC3 files stored in and type the command.

For example (from my post on Apr 24, 2009 at 10:21:57):

copy /b part1.ac3+part2.ac3+part3.ac3 completefile.ac3

See my post above for a full description of the command and filenames etc.

There isn’t any transcoding or anything much going on. the /b parameter on the copy command is for binary copy. This means it isn’t doing anything with the content of the files, just simply appending one to another.

The operation is almost instant.

Regards,
David

[David Andrews]

Hi Joe

Yeah, sorry, I should have included some detail in my last post.

In the end I didn’t use a tool, I found a number of pages detailing how to use the basic DOS copy command with the /b switch so I tried that and it worked!

Basically, if you have, for example, three .ac3 files called part1.ac3, part2.ac3 and part3.ac3.

Open a command prompt, change to the directory where the ac3 files are located and type:

copy /b part1.ac3+part2.ac3+part3.ace completefile.ac3

This will create a new file called completefile.ac3 which is the other three joined together.

I believe this also works with the .m2v video files as well but I haven’t needed to join those.

Regards
David

[David Andrews]

Hi Jon / Joe

Thank you both so much for your help.

I have joined the 5 AC3 files into a single file, re-imported it into Encore and now have a 5.1ch Dolby Digital track for my blu-ray, which is fantastic.

Regards.
David

[David Andrews]

Thanks Joe.

I’ve done some searching for AC3 joiners so I have a few things to try. Hopefully I won’t encounter video/audio sync issues afterwards. Its not perfect at the moment (original wasn’t perfect to begin with) but its acceptable considering the source material.

As long as there isn’t a delay in moving from one timeline to another, that may also work so I’ll also give that a try.

Regards.
David

[David Andrews]

Hi Jon

Thanks for you reply.

My original transport stream was split into 5 parts due to its size so after the demux I actually have 5 .m2v video files and 5 .ac3 audio files which I have placed one after another on the main timeline.

Could this be the problem? If it is, is there a recommended tool for combining the files into a single video file and a single ac3 audio file?

I don’t think there is a 2ch stream in the file, I believe it only had a surround audio stream. It was originally an HD stream sent to cinemas from a live concert.

It sounds like Encore is re-encoding the audio for some reason but I am not sure how to stop this.

David