Monday 2 May 2016

Fix Handbrake crash on OSX(10.11) El Capitan

I just tried to use Handbrake (version 0.99) to rip a DVD on OS X 10.11.4 and it crashed halfways through so I ran Handbrake's update (0.10.5) but it still crashed ;( It turns out that OSX El Capitan has removed a software library that is used to decrypt DVDs (libdvdcss) from the system - so if you've got an older dodgier version (of libdvdcss) lying around it works but crashes. Either that or Handbrake fails to find anything on the DVD you're trying to rip, as mentioned on Reddit.

To fix the problem you need to install an up to date version of libdvdcss - either by downloading a slightly old version and copying it into the /usr/loca/lib e.g. if the downloaded library file is in Downloads:
sudo cp ~/Downloads/libdvdcss.2.dylib /usr/local/lib
Or you can build/install the latest version using Macports, homebrew, or from source. If you use Macports then you may need to link the macports installed version to /usr/local/lib (so that Handbrake can find it):
sudo ln -s /opt/local/lib/libdvdcss.2.dylib /usr/local/lib
Now start Handbrake and you should be good to go...