MKV Quicktime/Perian Green Screen & Unable to convert. ARGH!

[nightmaresonwax]

Hello there. I've done lots of research trying to find a solution to this issue I'm having, but to no avail. Any help greatly appreciated!
I have mkvs of a couple of tv shows I like to catch up on, and some of them play fine, while others do not.
I have the latest software installed (Perian/Quicktime Pro), and I basically get a green screen with no audio. The loading bar runs so it can obviously read the file, but I can't see or hear anything. VLC, of course, plays the file fine, so it wouldn't really be an issue for me except they won't play on my WD TV Live HD Player either... So it is clearly a codec issue.
Despite the green screen, I attempted to export the file to Mpeg-4 (mp4), with h.264 video (matching the original file's settings) and AAC audio. The conversion stops not long after with an error message -
"Failed: Export process terminated unexpectedly (10)"
It lets me export to mp4 with video pass-through, but then the resulting file also suffers the same green screen.

Media Inspector gave me the following report on a file that doesn't work:

* * * Media Inspector 0.7.430 file analysis report.
* * * Media Inspector is ©2011 by Diego Massanti - http://mediainfo.massanti.com
* * * MediaInfoLib by Jerome Martinez - http://mediainfo.sourceforge.net
Created on: 11 Apr 2011 11:15:28 GMT+01:00
Report for file: 1.mkv

General / Container Stream #1
Total Video Streams for this File.................1
Total Audio Streams for this File.................1
Video Codecs Used.................................AVC
Audio Codecs Used.................................AC3
File Format.......................................Matroska
Play Time.........................................45mn 37s
Total File Size...................................3.27 GiB
Total Stream BitRate..............................10.3 Mbps
Encoded with......................................mkvmerge v4.6.0 ('Still Crazy After All These Years') built on Mar 10 2011 02:50:32
Encoding Library..................................libebml v1.2.0 + libmatroska v1.1.0
Video Stream #1
Codec (Human Name)................................AVC
Codec (FourCC)....................................V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Codec Profile.....................................High@L4.1
Frame Width.......................................1 920 pixels
Frame Height......................................1 080 pixels
Frame Rate........................................25.000 fps
Total Frames......................................68426
Display Aspect Ratio..............................16:9
Scan Type.........................................Progressive
Color Space.......................................YUV
Codec Settings (Summary)..........................CABAC / 4 Ref Frames
QF (like Gordian Knot)............................0.195
Codec Settings (CABAC)............................Yes
Codec Settings (Reference Frames).................4
Video Stream Length...............................45mn 37s 40ms
Video Stream BitRate..............................10.1 Mbps
Bit Depth.........................................8 bits
Video Stream Size.................................3.15 GiB (96%)
Video Encoder.....................................x264 - core 114 r1913 5fd3dce
Video Encoder (Settings)..........................cabac=1 / ref=4 / deblock=1:0:0 / analyse=0x3:0x133 / me=umh / subme=8 / psy=1 / psy_rd=1.00:0.00 / mixed_ref=1 / me_range=16 / chroma_me=1 / trellis=1 / 8x8dct=1 / cqm=0 / deadzone=21,11 / fast_pskip=0 / chroma_qp_offset=-2 / threads=18 / sliced_threads=0 / nr=0 / decimate=1 / interlaced=0 / constrained_intra=0 / bframes=3 / b_pyramid=2 / b_adapt=1 / b_bias=0 / direct=1 / weightb=1 / open_gop=0 / weightp=2 / keyint=250 / keyint_min=25 / scenecut=40 / intra_refresh=0 / rc_lookahead=40 / rc=2pass / mbtree=1 / bitrate=10090 / ratetol=1.0 / qcomp=0.60 / qpmin=0 / qpmax=69 / qpstep=4 / cplxblur=20.0 / qblur=0.5 / ip_ratio=1.40 / aq=1:1.00
Video Stream Language.............................English
Audio Stream #1
Codec.............................................AC-3
Codec (FourCC)....................................A_AC3
Audio Stream Length...............................45mn 37s 24ms
Audio Stream BitRate..............................192 Kbps
Audio Stream BitRate Mode.........................CBR
Number of Audio Channels..........................2
Audio Channel's Positions.........................Front: L R
Sampling Rate.....................................48.0 KHz
Bit Depth.........................................16 bits
Audio Stream Size.................................62.6 MiB (2%)

Any help greatly appreciated as I'm now at a loss...

 

[nightmaresonwax]

I think Aukun Video Converter for Mac Can help you.

I applaud your shameless self promotion, sir.

 

[Jolly Giant]

i'm seeing the same for some of the mkv's i try to convert. for now, i have no choice but to use a video converter on my winsloth machine to convert such files.

i prefer using QT7 pro because the size of the converted movies is much smaller when compared to what the PC software spits out. the quality is acceptable, though.

i'm fairly certain that QT/Perian is missing some codec.

anyhoo, will keep checking in on this thread to see what transpires.

 

[nightmaresonwax]

i'm seeing the same for some of the mkv's i try to convert. for now, i have no choice but to use a video converter on my winsloth machine to convert such files.

i prefer using QT7 pro because the size of the converted movies is much smaller when compared to what the PC software spits out. the quality is acceptable, though.

i'm fairly certain that QT/Perian is missing some codec.

anyhoo, will keep checking in on this thread to see what transpires.

Hey Jolly. Well, I just checked out Handbrake, and it is managing to re-encode the mkv as m4v using h.264, with audio pass-through - the resulting file is working absolutely fine with no green screen.
Obviously this isn't ideal as it takes so bloody long! I think it must just be the way some mkv's are encoded, so it occurred to me that using Quicktime Pro to export with video pass-through would be pointlesss, because nothing is changing apart from the container... So re-encoding seems to be the only option...

Hope this helps, and I too will keep an eye on this thread for anyone else's input, because re-encoding with h.264 is so time consuming, and my macbook pro currently sounds like a vacuum cleaner... NOT IDEAL!

 

[nightmaresonwax]

Just to give an update, I've had a breakthrough!!! I downloaded MKVTools (http://www.emmgunn.com/mokgvm2dvd/mokgvmdownload.html) to see if it would do the trick. When I loaded up one of the mkv's giving me the green screen/convert problems, I was immediately faced with a popup message telling me the MKV had "Header Removal Compression", which could cause problems, but it could be turned off in the Edit section. BOOM! Job done. The MKV is now fully working with Quicktime, no green screen, able to convert.
On another note, MKVTools is able to convert from MKV to M4V with complete pass-through (video&audio), whereas with Quicktime I had to re-encode the audio. So another bonus!

AAH! Relief.

Let me know if this works for you Jolly...