VLC 2.0 AND Blu Ray. What Do I need?

[bmurphy]

Sorry, I did not realize that the forum was MAC OS only.

[inkobl]

Thanks for advising me if someone find an issue it doesn't seems to work for me either... on my macbook pro.
I can read bluray but it's very slow, lot's of cut maybe my graphic card is guilty ?

I've got another problem for my own movies made at home with finalcut pro 7 there is some little cut beetwen each parts that make impossible to read with the new VLC 2, any issues again for this problems ?

[bellboy]

Paul,

Thanks for the detailed post...but my brain has melted under the load of deciphering it.

Is there a step-by-step guide that could be posted here? I've done what I could to the files that I downloaded from the posts here, but I'm still getting the error that the AACS library doesn't exist.

I do have a piece of software to play BR discs (from MacGo), but it's pretty lame and doesn't have menu support yet.

I don't want to get booted from the forum if my question is a violation of forum rules, but if I could be pointed in the right direction I sure would like to be able to watch my own BR discs at my desk instead of firing up the PS3.

Thanks, BB

[PaulMC]

Very sorry about this long-delayed reply, sometimes our lives do get rather hectic...

1. Jean-Baptiste, if still needed, I'll look into how to update the Wiki with a brief summary of AACS processing. There's so much great info already available over on Doom9's Forum that I guess providing links to those external threads (if okay to do so) would be useful too.
2. inkobl, if you've haven't already done so, perhaps you could try viewing the relevant title's raw '.m2ts' file(s) (assuming there's no DRM or it can safely be stripped) in other OS X video players to compare. (The AVS Forum website has a lot of user-collected disc info with title playlist/m2ts details, in the 'NEW Unofficial Blu-ray Audio and Video Specifications Thread'.) I myself often use MPlayer OSX Extended and MPlayerX. [Although note that, in some OS X versions, MPlayer OSX Extended Rev 14 may crash when launched for the first time (building a font cache), complaining about a missing 'libz.1.dylib' library; if so then make a symbolic-link, within the '/path/to/MPlayer OSX Extended.app>/Contents/MacOS/lib/' subdirectory, pointing to '../../Resources/Binaries/mpextended.mpBinaries/Contents/mpextended.mpBinaries/Contents/MacOS/lib/libz.1.dylib'.]
   
   For instance, I've been finding that the main title from my backup BD folder of 'The Tree Of Life (2011)' yields no picture (e.g., "grey screen") nor sound in VLC 2.x, but the associated raw file plays fine in both of the above players; and ditto for the various raw files associated with the main title from my backup BD folder of 'X-Men: First Class' (no doubt future VLC updates will address such glitches). OTOH, if you find that all players are struggling with a given BD title then, as you mentioned, it's probably an issue with the graphics hardware/drivers.
3. bellboy, as VLC's Blu-ray disc (BD) playback functionality is still very much in development (esp. on the Mac OS X side), it's difficult to come up with a definitive guide for commercial AACS-protected BDs. Not to mention that there can also be other DRM layers on top of "pure" AACS (e.g.: BD+, Bus Encryption, etc.). It really is a big protection mess out there, & unfortunately the legality of circumventing DRM may be "iffy" depending on where you reside and so on...
   
   For VLC Mac & commercial playback, the best solution could be to just pre-strip the DRM from your discs altogether (bearing in mind the above caveat), by using MakeMKV either to make a decrypted backup BD folder or in streaming mode for on-the-fly decryption; or, in a Windows Virtual Machine or Boot Camp partition, by using AnyDVD HD or DVDFab PassKey for on-the-fly decryption. BTW, I should note that MacGo's Mac Blu-ray Player software is itself based on VLC; so, as you've already tried that and found it somewhat incomplete, VLC might not be the best choice for you in any case. ;-) Alternative OS X BD player software would include Fengtao/DVDFab's Media Player for Mac (although this too is partly based on the open-source XBMC media player, plus improvements in playlist/title selection & probably substituting DVDFab's own decryption); they do offer a free trial. In terms of officially licensed, fully featured software BD players (CyberLink's PowerDVD and the like), it seems that they're currently available for MS Windows only, which of course can also be run on your Mac via a VM or Boot Camp.
   
   If you do still want to plunge into the brave new world of AACS in VLC (& your discs don't also have extra DRM such as BD+, etc.), then I guess a relatively brief guide for the current VLC 2.0.1 Mac release might look like this, assuming that you intend to use the pre-built libaacs library-file from Dec 2011 & the latest 'KEYDB.cfg' database-file:-
   1. Use the Intel 64-bit edition of VLC 2 (since that libaacs file is Intel 64-bit only).
   2. Verify that the libaacs file is in a suitable location, and do the same for the supporting libgcrypt file. (See the earlier posts on where to obtain the latter, and also about renaming/sym-linking the libaacs file if necessary. Note also that the OS X edition's external dependency on libgcrypt will very likely be eliminated soon, & the latter's code rolled into libaacs.) Now, exactly what constitutes a "suitable location" is tricky... The standard instructions say to place the libaacs file into '/path/to/VLC.app/Contents/MacOS/lib/'. However, due to the internals of how the two libraries are being loaded, this will likely work only when launching VLC from the command line (Terminal utility), and you'd also need to first do two other things: (i) place the supporting libgcrypt file into a second new subfolder also named 'lib' within that first 'lib' subfolder; and (ii) in Terminal, explicitly 'cd' to the first 'lib' subfolder, so as to make it the current directory before invoking the VLC executable. OTOH, if you'd prefer to launch VLC in the GUI way, then detailed instructions can be found in the 'OSX Blu-ray playback and libaacs working?' thread, where SquishedSquirrel describes one way to set up a special GUI-layer environment-variable that points to the library files in a custom location (I too have been doing something similar to this).
   3. Verify that the 'KEYDB.cfg' file is located in the correct (hidden) subfolder under your user account. If necessary, open the Terminal utility and, at the command prompt, enter: 'mkdir -p ~/.config/aacs' (without the quotes). Then, in Finder, bring up the 'Go | Go to Folder...' dialog/sheet, and enter: '~/.config/aacs'. That should reveal the hidden 'aacs' subfolder, and you could then copy a 'KEYDB.cfg' file into there, & open it in a text editor to see its contents, etc.
   4. Manually add Volume Unique Key (VUK) entries for your discs into the 'KEYDB.cfg' file. As confirmed by developer Jean-Baptiste, the current OS X edition of libaacs still lacks full support for the MultiMedia Commands (MMC) needed to query a disc for data such as its Volume ID, etc. [Recall that libaacs uses the Key DB's processing-key & host-certificate entries to communicate with a disc for its Media Key & Volume ID, from which libaacs can then auto-compute its VUK key & hence all its Title keys for playback.] So, even the latest default 'KEYDB.cfg' file is rather useless on the Mac. At the moment, you'll need to manually add those VUK entries. This is where things get "iffy" again in terms of legal issues... I'll just say that there do exist cross-platform utilities that can obtain a disc's VUK, and there are even public user-submitted VUK entries for many discs; see the relevant threads in Doom9's Forum (General > Decrypting). Remember though, most available VUK entries are in "classic" DumpHD format, whereas libaacs uses an extended syntax. (See earlier posts for a link to the official 'KEYDB.cfg' template for libaacs; it has extensive comments on, & examples of, the expected formats of various entries -- e.g., all hexstrings must begin with '0x'.) Once you get the hang of all this, it's actually not too bad, and I myself have had success adding VUKs for a few of my backup BD folders that I'd ripped "as-is" (with AACS intact) for various reasons. For additional help with Key DB entries, you could also try posting over at Doom9.

Anyway, let's continue to keep an eye out for future improvements in VLC for BD playback, esp. in OS X.

Kind regards,
--Paul

[blucy]

> In terms of officially licensed, fully featured software BD players (CyberLink's PowerDVD and the like), it seems that they're currently available for MS Windows only, which of course can also be run on your Mac via a VM

Hmmm... I asked them and they answered it wouldn't work via VM (Parallels etc.). Always restarting for using Boot Camp for watching a BD (or a part of it) is too cumbersome.

[laferrierejc]

http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name

I've followed these instructions about 3 times now. They seem pretty clear to me. Put the key file in the %appdata% folder (which defaults to Roaming subfolder), but just for good measure, I put the key file at the parent of Roaming (i.e. appdata) and in the vlc program files dir (which is a subfolder of videolan).

then I dl'd the 64 bit file for my 64 bit windows and placed the file inside "c:\program files (x86)\videolan\vlc\" folder (btw has to be done through saving to the desktop first, then from within explorer, copy the file over. That's okay, minor sacrifice made to ensure a proper working UAC).

the error I get when I try to open a blu ray inside vlc is:
This Blu-Ray Disc needs a library for AACS decoding, and your system does not have it.

when I try the 32 bit dll (windows is 64, but vlc is 32) I get a different message
Missing AACS configuration file!

So... I'm not sure what's going on. I do have uac enabled... I tried running the program in administrator mode which had no affect... I've tried regsvr32' the dll, (which doesn't do anything, nor is the right thing to do with this type of dll, since it's the app's (vlc) decoding dll.)

I also tried this on ubuntu... I was running v12 Ubuntu x64... finally got vlc installed after doing the package list updates, but only from bash...

I believe I pulled the key file, and the 64 bit file... but... after doing all that, I didn't have a blu-ray option inside my vlc... I was wondering if the x64 build was an older version (not 2.0 vlc)... I didn't check that yet...

but yeah, lots of crazy variables... and I still can't get it to play a range of blu ray discs I have...

[blucy]

Hi, did you notice this thread is in the Mac OS X section?

[laferrierejc]

I just read that a few posts up... now I see it...

yeah, when I do a google search for vlc blu ray, this forum thread is the second entry...

jumping into the thread, I read VLC 2.0 AND Blu Ray, check the website url, see it's videolan.org...

people giving advise on vlc 2.0 and that website (http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name/) was the second post mentioned in this thread...

So I thought I was in the right place. I haven't read anywhere else (forum threads mainly) on the interwebs that gives much detail on this website
http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name/

I guess I'll open a new thread.

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=103101#p348439

[eno12]

Not sure if this is the best place to post this. I added support for OSX MultiMedia Commands (MMC) to libaacs. An alpha version for Mountain Lion is posted at http://www.cs.unm.edu/~hjelmn/libaacs_mac_10.8.tar.gz.

To install this version of libaacs (this is not for beginners) in VLC 2.0.3 (do not use the provided VLC binary with any other version of the app):

1) decompress the above tarball (.tar.gz) by double-clicking it. this will give you a directory containing two files: VLC (modified binary from VLC.app/Contents/MacOS), and lib/libaacs.dylib
2) right-click on VLC and choose Show Package Contents
3) navigate to Contents/MacOS
4) drag and drop VLC into this folder and replace the existing VLC binary
5) drag and drop lib/libaacs.dylib into the library directory
6) run VLC normally. You will need a KEYCFG.conf in ~/.config/aacs for this to work

Note: the VLC provided in this tarball is only modified in one way: an rpath to @executable_path/lib has been added using install_name_tool (part of Xcode). If you want to fix the VLC binary yourself run: install_name_tool -add_rpath @executable_path/lib VLC from the Contents/MacOS directory of VLC.app.

I will be submitting a patch to libaacs (and hopefully helping fix the loading issue) once I am satisfied with quality of my code.

[blucy]

eno12 wrote:
> To install this version of libaacs (this is not for beginners)...

Since I would call myself a beginner (but I'm very interested in blu ray on Mac)
I guess I will have to wait for a more "idiot-proof" solution...

But thanks for your efforts!

[atonaldenim]

I just wanted to update this thread to say that I've just tried for the first time to use VLC 2.0.3 in Mountain Lion 10.8.2 to watch a Blu-ray movie on my Mac, and it worked very well. I just got a 2x BD-ROM USB drive, and have a 2012 MacBook Air. I followed the instructions from http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name which gave me a version of libaacs dated August 20, 2012, started watching "The Hurt Locker", and found that the video would pause every 10-30 seconds while the drive spun up for a few seconds to buffer more video. Out of the box, it was unwatchable. But I did some searching and found the tip to go to Preferences > Show All > Input / Codecs > Demuxers > FFmpeg, scroll about 25% down and set Threads from 0 to 4. After that, playback was smooth with no pausing to buffer.

So as of October 2012 it looks like a lot of these issues have been fixed. Mac users can definitely use VLC to watch Blu-ray movies for free without having to pay for additional software. Hope that's helpful for anyone who comes across this thread later.

[andrman]

I just followed the directions on http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name today and am still getting the 'Missing keys?" error.

Can you describe the exact procedures you used, where you put each of the files?

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

You should really look at the next release (2.0.4) because it will be way better for that.

[blucy]

You should really look at the next release (2.0.4) because it will be way better for that.

When will it be available?

[fkuehne]

Shortly

[gg74]

Not sure if this is the best place to post this. I added support for OSX MultiMedia Commands (MMC) to libaacs. An alpha version for Mountain Lion is posted at http://www.cs.unm.edu/~hjelmn/libaacs_mac_10.8.tar.gz.

I will be submitting a patch to libaacs (and hopefully helping fix the loading issue) once I am satisfied with quality of my code.

I've tried your libaacs but it seems to depend from gcrypt11, I followed the suggestion of previous posts about getting it from an old VLC dmg, but once I placed it in VLC.app/Contents/MacOS/lib (the same dir of libaacs) it seems libaacs fails anyway to open the gcrypt library since the one distributed with old vlcs are API version 17, while you linked libaacs against gcrypt11 API version 19.

I can see this in the shell output launching VLC from terminal (with -vvv to see more details).

I'm using your patched VLC executable to solve the rpath library problem, and "otool -L" on libaacs says all dependencies are there

Can you update your archive to include also the libgcrypt11.dylib you linked libaacs against?

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

Did you check on the other website?

[gg74]

Did you check on the other website?

Do you mean http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name/?

The libaacs in that site is updated? I had the impression that the page was "static" from at least a few months, anyway just got the libaacs from there and I'll try it as soon as I'm at home

A rapid check with otool on my mac at work seems to confirm it does not depend from gcrypt:

Code: Select all

libaacs.dylib: libaacs.0.dylib (compatibility version 3.0.0, current version 3.1.0) /usr/lib/libobjc.A.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 228.0.0) /usr/lib/libSystem.B.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 169.3.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/IOKit.framework/Versions/A/IOKit (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 275.0.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/Cocoa.framework/Versions/A/Cocoa (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 19.0.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/DiskArbitration.framework/Versions/A/DiskArbitration (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 1.0.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreFoundation.framework/Versions/A/CoreFoundation (compatibility version 150.0.0, current version 744.0.0)

EDIT: Just tried with the libaacs.dylib mentioned in this last post and "Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind" blu-ray on my external blu-ray burner attached to my 2008 24" imac with 10.8.2 and it works perfectly

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

EDIT: Just tried with the libaacs.dylib mentioned in this last post and "Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind" blu-ray on my external blu-ray burner attached to my 2008 24" imac with 10.8.2 and it works perfectly

[eno12]

Did you check on the other website?

Do you mean http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name/?

The libaacs in that site is updated? I had the impression that the page was "static" from at least a few months, anyway just got the libaacs from there and I'll try it as soon as I'm at home

A rapid check with otool on my mac at work seems to confirm it does not depend from gcrypt:

Code: Select all

libaacs.dylib: libaacs.0.dylib (compatibility version 3.0.0, current version 3.1.0) /usr/lib/libobjc.A.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 228.0.0) /usr/lib/libSystem.B.dylib (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 169.3.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/IOKit.framework/Versions/A/IOKit (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 275.0.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/Cocoa.framework/Versions/A/Cocoa (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 19.0.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/DiskArbitration.framework/Versions/A/DiskArbitration (compatibility version 1.0.0, current version 1.0.0) /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreFoundation.framework/Versions/A/CoreFoundation (compatibility version 150.0.0, current version 744.0.0)

EDIT: Just tried with the libaacs.dylib mentioned in this last post and "Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind" blu-ray on my external blu-ray burner attached to my 2008 24" imac with 10.8.2 and it works perfectly

Yup. I pushed the changes upstream. All future builds on that site will support OSX!

[ppcguy]

VLC 2.0.4 can indeed play blu-ray discs! i bought a samsung usb blu-ray drive and it came today and i also bought the avengers on blu-ray/dvd. and i did as the previous posters did and downloaded the files from
http://vlc-bluray.whoknowsmy.name/ and followed their instructions and blu-ray works on my intel mac! I don't even have to buy the shady macgo blu-ray player for a ripoff of $39.99.

Thank you to the Mac developers of the VLC project.

I am now watching The Avengers on Blu-Ray on my intel Mac.

thank you, thank you

here's how you play blu-ray discs on vlc:
1. launch VLC
2. Click File on Menu and select open Disc
3. click open BDMV folder and select the directory in the blu-ray with the BDMV file
4. click open
5. blu-ray movie should be playing at this point.
6. press cmd f for full screen
7. enjoy!

[ppcguy]

apparently, "the avengers" blu-ray work and "pride and prejudice" blu-ray work but "army of darkness" doesn't and "alien" doesn't, something to do with BD+ encryption, so i bought macgo bluray player and now all my blu-rays work.

I am a little disapointed in VLC

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

I am a little disapointed in VLC

Seriously? You understand the impact of the work involved by reverse engineering blurays?

[blucy]

>> You should really look at the next release (2.0.4) because it will be way better for that.

> When will it be available?

Shortly

Is this version (which version?) available in the meantime?

[Jean-Baptiste Kempf]

Yes. 2.0.4 is out.