Monthly Archives: August 2015

Editing MKV flags to stop subtitles

When viewing some mkv files you end to find in some cases that the soft subtitles are enabled by default. To disable, follow this

Check the current file info:

mkvinfo <filename>.mkv
+ EBML head
|+ EBML version: 1
|+ EBML read version: 1
|+ EBML maximum ID length: 4
|+ EBML maximum size length: 8
|+ Doc type: matroska
|+ Doc type version: 2
|+ Doc type read version: 2
+ Segment, size 4687414538
|+ Seek head (subentries will be skipped)
|+ Segment tracks
| + A track
|  + Track number: 1 (track ID for mkvmerge & mkvextract: 0)
|  + Track UID: 1280263319
|  + Track type: video
|  + Forced flag: 1
|  + Lacing flag: 0
|  + MinCache: 1
|  + Codec ID: V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
|  + CodecPrivate, length 40 (h.264 profile: High @L4.1)
|  + Default duration: 41.708ms (23.976 frames/fields per second for a video track)
|  + Video track
|   + Pixel width: 1280
|   + Pixel height: 688
|   + Display width: 1280
|   + Display height: 688
|   + Interlaced: 0
|  + Enabled: 1
|  + Default flag: 1
|  + Timecode scale: 1
|  + Max BlockAddition ID: 0
|  + Codec decode all: 1
| + A track
|  + Track number: 2 (track ID for mkvmerge & mkvextract: 1)
|  + Track UID: 1577341855
|  + Track type: audio
|  + Forced flag: 1
|  + Codec ID: A_DTS
|  + Audio track
|   + Sampling frequency: 48000
|   + Channels: 2
|  + Content encodings
|   + Content encoding
|    + Content compression
|     + Algorithm: 3 (header removal)
|     + Settings: length 4, data: 0x7f 0xfe 0x80 0x01
|    + Order: 0
|    + Scope: 1 (1: all frames)
|    + Type: 0 (compression)
|  + Enabled: 1
|  + Default flag: 1
|  + Lacing flag: 1
|  + MinCache: 0
|  + Timecode scale: 1
|  + Max BlockAddition ID: 0
|  + Codec decode all: 1
| + A track
|  + Track number: 3 (track ID for mkvmerge & mkvextract: 2)
|  + Track UID: 957802682
|  + Track type: subtitles
|  + Forced flag: 1
|  + Lacing flag: 0
|  + Codec ID: S_TEXT/UTF8
|  + Language: rum
|  + Enabled: 1
|  + Default flag: 1
|  + MinCache: 0
|  + Timecode scale: 1
|  + Max BlockAddition ID: 0
|  + Codec decode all: 1
|+ EbmlVoid (size: 3734)
|+ Segment information
| + Timecode scale: 1000000
| + Muxing application: libebml v1.0.0 + libmatroska v1.0.0
| + Writing application: mkvmerge v4.1.1 ('Bouncin' Back') built on Jul  3 2010 22:54:08
| + Duration: 5985.440s (01:39:45.440)
| + Date: Tue Feb  8 11:55:23 2011 UTC
| + Segment UID: 0xb4 0xc9 0x7c 0x1f 0x34 0xa2 0x1a 0x42 0xae 0x1c 0x29 0x97 0xe3 0x7d 0xc3 0xb3
|+ EbmlVoid (size: 1351)
|+ Cluster

So we want to disable, and remove the default flag, as well as the forced one

mkvpropedit <filename>.mkv --edit track:3 --set flag-default=0
mkvpropedit <filename>.mkv --edit track:3 --set flag-forced=0
mkvpropedit <filename>.mkv --edit track:3 --set flag-enabled=0

mkvinfo <filename>.mkv
+ EBML head
|+ EBML version: 1
...
| + A track
|  + Track number: 3 (track ID for mkvmerge & mkvextract: 2)
|  + Track UID: 957802682
|  + Track type: subtitles
|  + Forced flag: 0
|  + Lacing flag: 0
|  + Codec ID: S_TEXT/UTF8
|  + Language: rum
|  + Enabled: 0
|  + Default flag: 0

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Jumping from Windows 7 to Windows 10

In summary – surprisingly painless

I’ve been running Windows 7 since it went RTM and was very happy with it. It was reliable, everything just worked, and it wasn’t too much of a resource hog. I completely bypassed Windows 8/8.1 as this is a desktop/gaming PC so a touch interface is of 0 interest to me.

The Upgrade

I prefer to do a clean install of a new OS, and that was my plan in this case. Unfortunately, Microsoft in their infinite wisdom decided that there would be no way to convert your Win7 key to a Windows 10 one directly even though I’m entitled to the “free” upgrade. Given that I’d bought a shiny new SSD to install everything on, this was a little inconvenient.

To be fair to Microsoft, the upgrade was a little slow but no issues encountered. Everything just worked post upgrade. Though since this system had been running for a few years there was a bit of cruft to deal with. At this point I extracted the windows 10 product key, and rolled the change back to Windows 7.

Upgrade customers are entitled to rollback to Windows 7 for a month, so use it if you need it 🙂

The Clean Install

In possession of a valid product key, I then installed the new SSD and installed Windows 10 (64-bit International). Again, very smooth process – definitely the easiest Windows install I’ve ever had to do. No device drivers of any kind required, everything was just automagically identified, and drivers installed while I was still in the process of turning off all the creepy bits.

Minor Issues (and they are very minor)

Cortana requires that you be in the UK. Region set to Ireland (the accents aren’t that different guys!) disables here
Libraries are disabled by default – easy to turn back on, but why disable a great feature
Settings are now spread between two panels – a settings one, and the proper control panel. One management space please.
Start Menu – haven’t used the Start Menu/Programs list since Vista went live. Don’t use it in Windows 10 so no change. Windows key + name of file or program… job done

Conclusion

Easy upgrade, very slick clean install. As long as you turn off all the creepy phone-home telemetry, it’s a worthwhile upgrade.