Regional Coding

[Dewey]

Greetings all.

I reside in UK and have many region 1 DVDs. Is there any way that one can bypass the region coding on my Sony Vaio (VGN-FJ3S/W) laptop?

I have tried using CSS Free - but this software didn't work for me.

Any suggestions would be highly appreciated.

DN

 

[Ripper]

Running AnyDvd in the background should emulate your drive as RPC1 - ie, Region Free. However, there are ways to make it permanent, like Region Free patched firmware etc. You can get patched firmware (if it is availble for your drive) from here.

~Ripper.

 

[zebadee]

Hi

@ Ripper your info is misleading. TDB patched f/w will work for the drive(If there's one available that is).However it's not the whole answer. You still neeed to deal with the OS & most likely the the s/w being used to access the disc (PowerDVD etc). Both of which are likely to have region awareness built in.

@Dewey a program like AnyDVD :clap: deals with the trio of drive/OS & s/w like PowerDVD.

 

[Ripper]

Reading back I realise that now zebadee.

However it's not the whole answer.

I know; however, I didn't go on to explain fully, merely presuming he had anydvd which would cure the problem for him anyway; hence it being misleading.




~Ripper.

 

[locoeng]

The problem could also be that the Region 1 (USA) discs you are backing up are in NTSC and your laptop being European may be PAL...if this is the case you may need to use a program such as Nero Vision to convert the format to PAL for viewing on your lappy.

cheers

 

[dabbler]

Region Free Drives

Interesting Stuff! I've scanned most of the forum threads on this issue and have hunted hi & Lo for firmware upgrades to make my DVD drive "Region Free' - All to no avail! It would appear that manufactures like Panasonic, Sony are all in cahoots with trying to dictate what end users should or should not watch, when they can watch and where. Having a Matshita UJ831S DVD RAM has been a real pain as I travel quite a lote and like to pick up the odd DVD for the kids from various parts of the world. In some cases there are work arounds, but generally speaking it's a pain. Surely there are some smart cookies out there that can read the firmware in Panasonic drives and patch it to overcome this issue. If one can patch firmware to make the drives more reliable to read different formats, then we should be able to 'customise' our DVD drives/hardware (without limitations of the number of times we can change the region) to suit our needs!

Anyone like to suggest a GOOD DVD DL writer (slimline for a Toshiba laptop) with RPC1 firmware?...Thanks

 

[bjproc]

The problem could also be that the Region 1 (USA) discs you are backing up are in NTSC and your laptop being European may be PAL...if this is the case you may need to use a program such as Nero Vision to convert the format to PAL for viewing on your lappy.

cheers

PC/Laptop drives don't have the PAL/NTSC problem (only region coding), it's only when you start playing them on your standalone players.

 

[locoeng]

PC/Laptop drives don't have the PAL/NTSC problem (only region coding), it's only when you start playing them on your standalone players.

There is alot of confusion and corrections going on in this thread...LOL

I must have confused myself with my own answer, I meant "for viewing in player" instead of laptop...although I did not know about PAL/NTSC not being a factor with the drive, thanks for that information. Also reading back through the thread it is never stated what the OP is using to watch the backup.

 

[bjproc]

There is alot of confusion and corrections going on in this thread...LOL

I must have confused myself with my own answer, I meant "for viewing in player" instead of laptop...although I did not know about PAL/NTSC not being a factor with the drive, thanks for that information. Also reading back through the thread it is never stated what the OP is using to watch the backup.

lol, yes, confusing


the OP states he's in the UK, i know a lot of the UK's dvd players are able to play NTSC discs, well the ones i have, has an option to change them for either or both (i've not tried is as i don't buy R1 disc's). i think it's more of a problem in the US, somebody correct me if i'm wrong.

he's also been giving a link for a RPC-1 firmware site, so that'll make his drive region free (he doesn't state what make/model the drive is)

if it's a lite-on or sony he may just want to use this good little tool, to make the drive region free
http://dhc014.rpc1.org/LtnRPC/LtnRPC.zip

 

[Slith56]

Regional Coding/Protection

I am having similiar problems with my laptop dvd drive. Today I ripped my copy of The Marine with Anydvd+Clone Dvd to my hard drive, then burned it to dvd. I watched the movie on the house dvd player and later on I ran clone dvd mobile - I wanted to put the movie on my ipod. When I inserted the disc in the drive, it didn't show up and anydvd says no disc is present in drive E:. I installed region free and it says, drive has region protection, I also installed region killer, it says drive is not region free. The drive code is set at 1 with 4 remaining. I restarted the computer, then a window popped up, saying windows don't recognize the format which is Sony Dvd-r disc. This happened on my other laptop and I still have not got it working, It said my drive is locked. Have someone had any of my issues. Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks