Question about "Regions" and "Forced Subtitle" settings

[CountryBumkin]

When I start to rip a BD movie (AnyDVD HD and CloneBD) I get a popup about selecting the "Region". So I get out my magnifying glass and scan the BD cover for this info. However I can't find anything telling me the region.

Question 1: what happens if I select "Region A" or "No Region" and I'm wrong? Does the selection of the Main Movie track fail or provide incorrect info?

I'm in the USA and I don't see a region symbol on most of my movies. Perhaps its as simple as if the BD cover does not show the "region symbol" (the "globe with an A") that just means there is No Region.
But if I get it wrong what happens?

Question 2: Regarding Forced subtitles (for showing "alien" or "non-english" dialog on English language movies) what is the correct way to set up the movie rip? Should I always check the "Forced track" and "Forced Only" boxes?

I'm using CloneBD to rip to MKV format for storage and display/playback on my computer and TV. I know there is a popup information box when I hover over the check box, but I don't understand the info/message.

Do I check the "Forced Only" box or not? Meaning, I just want the dialog for the Indians in "Dances With Wolves" movie or the alien dialog in "Avatar" for example but no captions for the English language dialog.

Thanks

 

[SamuriHL]

If you're buying movies in the US, they'll be region A (or potentially region free). So nice that they dropped this stupid concept on UHD. Selecting the wrong region will only impact you if you're keeping the disc structure and playing it on an official player. Making MKV's makes region completely irrelevant.

As for forced subs, I have CloneBD create separate forced subtitle tracks. That way when I play them back I can set a default subtitle track in my players of choice (JRiver MC and Plex) and they'll remember what I set.

Hope this helps!

 

[CountryBumkin]

Thanks for the info. That helps a lot.
I'm running JRiver 26 too (although I don't frequent that forum anymore since the program is running fine).

 

[SamuriHL]

So yea JRiver doesn't care about region codes. It ignores them. That's true for MKV (where there is no region coding at all) or for playing a full disc structure (ISO, folder backup, actual disc with AnyDVD running, etc). It's only official players that will care.

 

[James]

So yea JRiver doesn't care about region codes. It ignores them. That's true for MKV (where there is no region coding at all) or for playing a full disc structure (ISO, folder backup, actual disc with AnyDVD running, etc). It's only official players that will care.

This is not true. Every player playing full menus must check region codes. Official or not. Otherwise, it wouldn't know, what to play.

 

[SamuriHL]

This is not true. Every player playing full menus must check region codes. Official or not. Otherwise, it wouldn't know, what to play.

Really? Hmmm. I was under the impression that they didn't care about region. Interesting. That's twice I've learned something new today.

EDIT:

Yea, I just tried it on one of my region B discs with region coding turned off. You are correct! Not that I doubt it, I just wanted to confirm for myself. JRiver does not like it. Of course you can bypass this behavior by playing the title directly but that's without menu support. Fascinating!

 

[coopervid]

I wouldn't call it fascinating even if I were Spock. It's pure BS and the root cause why many players like VLC and MPC don't suppot menus but play the main title etc just fine.

 

[Ch3vr0n]

Not entirely, they need to support java too. Which many disc menu's are created in (afaik any animated menu or even preloader indicates a java based menu). And where's the region code stored? Right, inside the java code.

 

[James]

Not entirely, they need to support java too. Which many disc menu's are created in (afaik any animated menu or even preloader indicates a java based menu). And where's the region code stored? Right, inside the java code.

Sorry for being anal, but just say "code", not "Java code". There are tons of discs which do the region check even before Java starts. Or which don't have Java code at all.

 

[Ch3vr0n]

True, though in this case discs without Java I believe are supported in vlc just fine I believe. That was the point.

Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Tapatalk

 

[Pete]

Really? Hmmm. I was under the impression that they didn't care about region. Interesting. That's twice I've learned something new today.

It's not like a check the player makes "is it the correct region? -> play, else -> don't". That would be something, that can be ignored or not.
The region code is more like a variable - if player's region code is A, continue on this path, is it B, continue on that path, etc...
Since it's very difficult to tell, which path is the "right" one (one will eventually play the movie, the other will "play" the wrong-region-card, both will "play" something), the player can't just ignore it.

True, though in this case discs without Java I believe are supported in vlc just fine I believe. That was the point.

No difference here. HDMV code does just the same. AnyDVD can guess the correct region on HDMV discs with an accuracy of maybe 98%, because HDMV is much simpler - meaning it still can get it wrong even then. And the algorithm is not simple.
Only when players ignore menus altogether and simply play the playlists, the region code can be ignored.

 

[SamuriHL]

It's not like a check the player makes "is it the correct region? -> play, else -> don't". That would be something, that can be ignored or not.
The region code is more like a variable - if player's region code is A, continue on this path, is it B, continue on that path, etc...
Since it's very difficult to tell, which path is the "right" one (one will eventually play the movie, the other will "play" the wrong-region-card, both will "play" something), the player can't just ignore it.

This makes sense. I never really thought about it in detail because until jriver started supporting menus I ignored them. It's essentially using similar logic to what goes into screen pass protected discs. Not the same I know but similar in that it's a choose your own adventure based on the environment the disc's code is running in. As I said before... I'm so glad uhd dropped region coding.

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

 

[James]

True, though in this case discs without Java I believe are supported in vlc just fine I believe. That was the point.

No difference. Java ist supported in VLC, too. And yes, you can set the Blu-ray region in VLC. Maybe you can set it in JRiver, and @SamuriHL just hasn't found it yet.

Edit: And the point was "And where's the region code stored? Right, inside the java code" is simply not accurate.

 

[SamuriHL]

I haven't had a chance to look yet but I had the same thought that maybe JRiver has an option in there after I learned that it matters yesterday. Really had no idea until this discussion that it was an issue outside of official players. Obviously I get it now but haven't had a chance to investigate.

 

[SamuriHL]

Indeed JRiver has a Region setting in the Settings, Video section. So that's sweet.

 

[coopervid]

Not entirely, they need to support java too. Which many disc menu's are created in (afaik any animated menu or even preloader indicates a java based menu). And where's the region code stored? Right, inside the java code.

You really should consider to recommend the best Belgian waffles .

 

[Steve55]

I wouldn't call it fascinating even if I were Spock. It's pure BS and the root cause why many players like VLC and MPC don't suppot menus but play the main title etc just fine.

actually, vlc plays 99% of java menus just fine in my experience

 

[coopervid]

actually, vlc plays 99% of java menus just fine in my experience

I can't argue. It's been really a while I tried to play original discs from a computer and VLC has surely made progress.