The Hardware-Region-Hacking Thread (DVD/BD Players, Games)

[A Pal]

Hello,

This is the Hardware-Region-Hacking Thread. Its purpose is to collect tips of bypassing regional restrictions of DVD/BD players and of games.

This Thread is to

- give people an easy-to-find place to post their Region-bypassing tips
- help people find Region-bypassing tips easier, so they no longer have to search in the whole Forum

In this Thread you can post questions and answers how to unlock standalone DVD/BD players and games.

(A word about Region-coded ink cartridges: HP, Lexmark, and Epson have decided to region-code its ink cartridges to control their prices [perhaps other printer manufactures have followed / will follow the example].

There are 4 HP Regions:
1 Americas, Greenland, Australia, New Zealand, North/South Korea, Mongolia, Afghanistan, East Asia;
2 Europe, Turkey; 3 Africa, Near East, Russia, Japan; 4 China [except Hong Kong and Taiwan] and India

There are 5 Lexmark Regions:
0 Worldwide; 1 Americas; 2 Europe, Near East, Africa; 3 Asia; 9 Undefined

HP printer's Region can be changed 3 times with the help of the HP service. There is no working firmware patch known so far, and since a printer is an often-needed appliance, it seems too valuable for experiments (filling the ink of cartridge from Region X into an empty cartridge from Region Y). Since there are many region free printers available, the best tip seems to avoid region-coded printers and to buy a region free product.Check before buying.)

For software-based Region hacking (DVD/BD software players, Region-restricted websites), please see my Software-Region-Hacking Thread in the section "Third-Party Products."

And now happy posting,

A Pal

 

[A Pal]

The Hardware-Region-Hacking Thread

First (Pseudo-) Multi-Region DVD/BD-Players Available

On the Internet there is the message that there are the first (pseudo-) multi-region DVD/BD players available,

Sony BDP-S300 (for 599 euros) / BDP-S500 (for 899 euros)
and Samsung BD-1400


They support the DVD Regions 1 and 2 and the BD Regions A and B. (The DVD Regions 3-6, or: 3-8, [unlike the rest of EU, the Baltic states have DVD Region 5; Australia/New Zealand are in DVD Region 4] and the BD Region C [Russia, most of Asia) are NOT supported] ).

Since they are expensive, do not support all Regions and since there seems to be no test report available, it seems better to wait for better models.

 

[A Pal]

The Hardware-Region-Hacking Thread

BD-Region Workaround for PS3 Found

On http://www.avforums.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6201430&postcount=1 , a British PS3 user says he has found a Region workaround for PS3 that allows him to watch some US-BDs:

Hello,

I got a region A (American) copy of Shoot 'Em Up which is region locked(which i did'nt know about at the time).After i put it into my UK PS3 and clicked onto the filmes icon (BDMV), the machine thought about it and a message came up in big letters saying REGION INCOMBATIBILITY Then it goes back to the PS3 menues. Tried it a few times and it done the same over and over again.So on the last try when the "region incombatibility" message came up i pressed the triangle on the controller, which brings up the pop-up menu and clicked on "TOP MENU" then BINGO: the films menu came on. Everything on the film works OK and the film plays all the way through I dont know if this would work on other titles. But it works on this.

EDIT

Other reported region A (region locked) titles that also work are (which are all from New Line):

Hairspray
Mr Woodcock
Rush Hour 3