Jam Mad Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 you may not know this, but when you buy a dvd laptop, after the third or fifth time you use it the system 'region locks' the dvd drive. so if you take it abroad, it's useless unless you're using your old dvd's. OUTRAGEOUS ! mad.gif i'm really livid at yet another example of some obstructive limitations thought up by some sick computer geek to make get one over on people. i cannot think of a single reason why this makes sense ! furthermore, it is ludicrous in this day and age of international travel. i know that some software is available for the pc to hack this, but anyone know if it's also available for the apple os ? i plan to buy an ibook tomorrow.. j Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan mackman Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 try going to www.winfiles.com where you can download all sorts of official windows software. there is a search ficility that you can try and it should bring you some sort of solution as it has solved almost every software type fix i have ever needed. hope that helps Honda Imola Gold with cycle wings id=orange> 1600 Vauxhall currently for sale! id=blue> 07899 668828 id=green> see my seven here: my seven Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dirty Den Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Are you using something like WinDVD to play your films? If so, the region data might simply be in the registry. Or maybe it's stored in a ROM on the drive itself sad.gif It makes sense because the film studios say so.... wink.gif Den teeth.gif - Self portrait - still unable to remove the smile! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greg Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Jam, As a self confessed geek consultant I do not think its the geeks fault - it the business people who accept / want things like this. There are a few other issues on the horizon, like the UK government supporting US style patent laws for Europe. Most of europe is against this, as is the patent office (or was) - Why because, big business (M$) wants it as it allows them to patent a whole shed load of rubbish - Like BT patent in the "Hyper link". People might make / design things - but it takes a business person / manager to sell it. Rant over. Greg, Q 880 RAE (Green/Ali XF) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Brother Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Try searching Google for "DVD GENIE" It is free, will unlock your current software and automaticaly change it to play any region dvd smile.gif Steve "The original X-Power" www.Se7en-Up.co.uk id=green> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rgrigsby Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Remote Selector does the same thing. Not for the the Mac though I'm afraid, guess there must be something out there for the Mac although a quick search didn't show anything up. There's some more links/software here Rob G www.SpeedySeven.com Edited by - rgrigsby on 2 Jul 2002 12:33:18 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simos Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 If you cannot get such a prog for Apple then you can probably get the friendly PC head in your office to install the drive in a PC temporarily and clean it, the interface either EIDE or SCSI or whatever and the drive should be compatible with both. This isn't a long term workable strategy but might get you out of a hole in the short term. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jam Mad Posted July 2, 2002 Author Share Posted July 2, 2002 well after a furious half an hour of checking i have found two interesting things.. 1 - it is hollywood's fault.. the region locking is due to a law that only affects laptop dvd drivers. 2 - there are patches available for macs... oh, and the last thing i found out was that if you buy four dvd's from your local shop, you may well find that they come from four different regions. home dvd players flout the law slightly and do discriminate between regions. still annoys me though... j Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greg Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Jam, What about complaining to the vendor - fit for purpose and all that! Greg, Q 880 RAE (Green/Ali XF) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
F355GTS Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Jam If you're going to buy an iBook e-mail me, there's a deal to be done! Mark Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dirty Den Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Jam - Not completely sure that's true (that it only affects laptops). Most PC DVD playback software will threaten to region lock the player after a number of region changes. WinDVD certainly does. Blame the film studios, they introduced region encoding. Den teeth.gif - Self portrait - still unable to remove the smile! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rgrigsby Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Yup as of Jan 2000 it's in theory meant to effect all DVD-ROM drives regardless of what they are fitted in. Also in theory consumer DVD players are meant to be region locked from the start, but there's always ways around that!! Cheers Rob G www.SpeedySeven.com PS Uh-oh another Mac convert eek.gif Edited by - rgrigsby on 2 Jul 2002 13:40:32 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miraz Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 The NZ government has made it illegal to sell region locked hardware or software DVD players in NZ. It's worth checking to see if you can find a NZ-specific driver file available for download anywhere. Otherwise just use DVD-Genie, as it not only gets rid of the region locks but also tends to optimise the performance of the player too. Miraz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattdixon Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 try this: http://www.google.fr/search?q=cache:P6Jkdmj4nY4C:perso.club-internet.fr/farzeno/firmware/dvd/dvdfi.htm+mac+dvd+hack+firmware&hl=fr&ie=UTF-8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mattdixon Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 try this: http://www.google.fr/search?q=cache:P6Jkdmj4nY4C:perso.club-internet.fr/farzeno/firmware/dvd/dvdfi.htm+mac+dvd+hack+firmware&hl=fr&ie=UTF-8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Red SLR Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 I think we are R2.. or is that the USA? I think the USA is R1? Anyway you can get DVD player software that will play any region. Also I think some DVDs have their region set to 0 when they are made thus will work on any DVD player. I know the DVD player I have at home will play any region - but you have to select it manually before you put the DVD in... if you dont know what region it is it takes a while! Simon. X777CAT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dirty Den Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 R2 is UK and parts of Europe, R1 is the US and Canada. R0 is something completely different - in affect, a region free DVD from what I understand. I think this is mainly used by documentaries etc. If anyone wants a home DVD player chipped, I've used these chaps and they were great: here Den teeth.gif - Self portrait - still unable to remove the smile! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JP Posted July 3, 2002 Share Posted July 3, 2002 there's loads of software out there to sort this problem out. Try simple searches on the net. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jonathan Ratty Posted July 3, 2002 Share Posted July 3, 2002 For the Mac solution, have you tried tossing out the Preferences file for the DVD software (System folder::Preferences)? My Mac Cube had a problem with the DVD player, so I re-installed the software. This started the '5 attempts' process again, suggesting that you can replace the software to re-set your region coding if necessary. Jonathan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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