DVD Region Free

Question

Level 1

85 points

DVD Region Free

Assuming that Boot Camp is not an April Fool's joke I wonder if this means that we will be able to use some of the Windows applications, such as DVD Region Free, to play legally bought Region 1 DVD's on the MacBook Pro!

Has anybody downloaded the Beta and tried this yet?

I for one wil definitely be upgrading to a MacBook Pro if it is possible!

iMac G4 1.25 GHz and PB G4 15 1.5GHz, Mac OS X (10.4.5)

Posted on Apr 5, 2006 6:35 AM

Reply

Answer 1

The Cardinal Author

Level 1

85 points

Apr 6, 2006 1:40 AM in response to The Cardinal

Nobody tried this yet?

Reply

Answer 2

Ren

Level 2

175 points

Apr 6, 2006 1:47 AM in response to The Cardinal

Hi, you can use VLC player for Mac OS X to play dvds from any region as it is region free (doesn't check what dvd region your using, just plays)

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

And it is not an april fools joke, quite worryingly, it's dead serious!

Hope that helps.

Ren

Reply

Answer 3

The Cardinal Author

Level 1

85 points

Apr 6, 2006 4:13 AM in response to Ren

VLC doesn't work with the UJ-825 so I assume that it won't work with the drive in the MacBook Pro, which I think is an 857.

Reply

Answer 4

Ian Gibb

Level 1

23 points

Apr 9, 2006 6:25 PM in response to The Cardinal

no, VLC doesn't work to play out of region dvd's 😟 I tried it the other day on one of my region 2 dvd's and it kept giving me an error, I even tried ripping the files to my HD using MTR and it still didn't work, I think we might have to wait a bit before the next upgrade of VLC. It seems to play my Region 1 DVD's fine so far though

Reply

Answer 5

The Cardinal Author

Level 1

85 points

Apr 10, 2006 2:28 AM in response to Ian Gibb

That's why it will be so interesting to see if anybody can boot up in XP and see if software like DVD Region-Free will work. The UJ-825, for example, is available in PCs and can be overridden by software, but it can't be in the Powerbook.

If DVD Region Free works then that will allow us to play our legally purchased region 1 DVDs on the MacBook Pro.

Reply

Answer 6

enamic5

Level 4

998 points

Apr 10, 2006 4:08 AM in response to The Cardinal

The problem is that since the 825 there is now region free firmware hack for the Mac. all region settings are now also set in the drive, not just in the DVD software, which means that VLC won't work on them.

Using a Firmware upgrade (if one is eventually available) on the Windows Partition might work on the windows side of things. But I wouldn't wanna know what happens to the Mac side of things.
Since there is not even a firmware update for drives from 2 years ago (825), I doubt there is gonna be one for the newer ones that quickly. I personally would love my Mac to read all regions as well. But hacking it from the Windows partition, that's something I would never do.

Reply

Answer 7

The Cardinal Author

Level 1

85 points

Apr 10, 2006 8:48 AM in response to enamic5

I wasn't really thinking about hacking the drive on the Mac side. I have been looking for a firmware hack for ages but one isn't available.

I was thinking you could just use the DVD region free software on the XP side to watch region free movies in Windows. I'm not going to fork out £2,500 just to try it out though.

I was hoping that a nice person who has already bought a MacBook Pro and has loaded BootCamp might try it out before I buy a Sony Vaio (which I know will work with DVD Region Free), as I would rather go fo the MacBook.

Reply

Answer 8

enamic5

Level 4

998 points

Apr 10, 2006 9:01 AM in response to The Cardinal

Makes sense.

Good Question really - since the region code is set in the drive - if that software can go round it.

Reply

Answer 9

Apr 15, 2006 9:07 AM in response to enamic5

Here's another question:

The problems are all to do with the locking on the internal drives. Has anyone connected an external drive and tried DVD Player/VLC?

I don't mind having two drives on different regions...

Reply