Is it possible to connect a BluRay-player to the MacBook, and play movies?

The Mac OS does not currently support Blu-Ray movie playback. The only option would be to load Windows through Boot Camp, find a compatible external BD player and appropriate Windows software.

Matt

No Mac OS X will not play Blu-ray at this time....I found this explanation of why not...I realize the article is a year old, but I have not seen anything new yet...

So the basic answer is No (as of 9/17/09).

You can't play Commercial Blu-ray movies on your Mac natively. It can be done on a Mac via Boot Camp, and adding in your own hardware, but there isn't a native route today.

Here's why:

First you would need to put a Blu-ray drive in your Mac. Not that hard to do. There are several out there including the Pioneer and the MCE Technologies drive.

Next you would need software to play back the Blu-ray movie. This is where you hit the first problem. There isn't any native software on the Mac currently (as of 9/17/09) that plays Commercial Blu-ray disks. The problem is that Blu-ray disks incorporate DRM encryption technology that isn't supported under the Mac OS. No software vendors have stepped up with player software.

But it goes deeper than that. Blu-ray also employs a technology called HDCP (High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection) created by Intel. HDCP playback requires that all of your hardware (not just playback software) be HDCP compliant. This means your Blu-ray drive, computer, graphics card, monitor and even video cable (DVI or HDMI) have to be HDCP certified. This was mandated by the movie studios to plug the "analog hole", or the ability to rip video by just running a video cable out from a device that decrypts the video signal to a device that doesn't care where the video came from.

All of this adds up to mean that you can't playback commercial Blu-ray disk on your Mac.

To make this happen natively on a Mac. Apple would need to add HDCP support to the Mac OS, have a HDCP certified Blu-ray drive (the Pioneer and MCE ones are), HDCP certified graphics card (many new Nvidia and ATI ones are), HDCP certified display (none of Apple's are, but many 3rd party ones with HDMI are) and software to decrypt the disk (rumors of iTunes adding this have been around for years now, but have never emerged).

I wouldn't hold my breath on this one sorry to say.

Actually... it is possible. Sort of. 😉

This is what I discovered in my quest for playing Blu-Ray on a Mac:

1. Download and install 'MakeMKV' from here: http://www.makemkv.com/download/ (this is currently a 60-day free beta demo)

2. Pop your Blu-ray DVD into your external Blu-ray drive (I use the LGBE06).

3. Open 'MakeMKV' and click on the button that opens the Blu-ray disc.

4. Once your Blu-ray disc is read, select the file(s) you want - the actual movie will most likely be the largest file - set an output location, then click 'Make MKV'.

5. Download and install the latest free version of 'Plex' from here (I love 'Plex'!): http://www.plexapp.com/plexstable.shtml

6. Right-click the .mkv file and select 'Open With - Plex'.

So far, that works really good for me. I hope it does the job for you too (for now, at least). All the best! 🙂

You can add an external Blu Ray drive through USB, install Windows 7 through Boot Camp, install Blu Ray playing software like PowerDVD or the like (if it wasn't included with the Blu Ray drive)

The only thing I'm not sure about is whether modern Macbooks will support the needed HDCP to play Blu Rays in Windows. I know they didn't a few years back, but I sort of think they do now...not sure.

But it has to be done in Windows-OS X can't play Blu Rays.