De-regionalising PowerDVD

Russ · 04-05-2004, 17:53

Does anyone know how/where I can do it? It's the DVD software on my machine and assuming it isn't illegal, I'd really like to be able to play some American films on my machine.

Richard M · 04-05-2004, 17:58

It's not illegal Russ, I asked this a while ago:
http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/showthread.php?t=9098

The only slight problem is that Sharereactor no longer exists, you need a bit of software called "DVDidle" if you can find it.

punky · 04-05-2004, 18:02

Well, technically it is. Thats why the invented the region coding system, otherwise all disks would of been region 0. The following information is provided for entertainment purposes only. Author, or messenger assumes no liabiliy for actions commited therein. Any similiarites between persons alive or dead is purely coincidental. Now that's out the way

http://www.digital-digest.com/dvd/articles/region.html

Basically, it's a 3 step job.

1. Replace the firmware (the code on the chip inside your dvd drive), with a region free version.

2. Remove the region protection in Windows

3. Remove the region protection inside your DVD Software (download a patch)

I've never bothered. If I wanted to watch multi-region disks, I might of bought a region free DVD player, which might of cost me 80 quid from Amazon, which might also play DIVX and XVID files straight off the CD/DVD, which might be handy (If I owned one

)

Edit: I suppose doing it isn't illegal, but playing a region 1 DVD in a region 2 area, must be?

Richard M · 04-05-2004, 18:04

You don't need to do any of those 3 steps though!
All you need is a program that runs in the tray - read the thread I linked to.

jellybaby · 04-05-2004, 18:05

dvd idle - http://www.afterdawn.com/software/vi...vdidle_pro.cfm

punky · 04-05-2004, 18:13

Blimey things have moved on since I last read about it. Thanx for the tip (For eductional purposes of course

)

Russ · 04-05-2004, 18:19

Does DVDidle work with WMP 9?

Russ · 04-05-2004, 18:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Russ D

Does DVDidle work with WMP 9?

edit - so it does...I've installed DVDidle but WMP still won't accept the DVD

Quote:

Windows Media Player cannot play this DVD because a compatible DVD decoder is not installed on your computer.

jellybaby · 04-05-2004, 18:24

should work

From their site : -

Quote:

In addition, the program can also disable region check for software-based DVD players and offers built-in support for PowerDVD, WinDVD, ATI DVD Player, DirectDVD, NVDVD, CinePlayer, Windows Media Player, PCFriendly Player, InterActual Player and TheaterTek DVD. You can manually add additional players to the list.

Richard M · 04-05-2004, 18:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Russ D

edit - so it does...I've installed DVDidle but WMP still won't accept the DVD

Do you use a 5.1 speaker system or soundcard?
If so then forget about WMP9 - I used to use that until I realised that my DVDs were only running in stereo sound!
Configure PowerDVD to use SPDIF because then the signal will be passed to your soundcard for mixing and will sound much better.

Does it work in PowerDVD BTW?

EDIT: Russ, it does that if you do not have the hardware or software decoder installed.
Is PowerDVD (software decoder) installed correctly?

Russ · 04-05-2004, 18:29

Hang on...I thought I had PowerDVD but I don't. I'm using Soundblaster Live! and it looks like maybe you're right.

RealPlayer DVD won't take it either....I'm starting to get the impression I've been DVDiddled......

Sipowicz · 04-05-2004, 18:34

Have a look at the forum at DVDRhelp.com, lots of help and advice (just like here!) but DVD related ;-)

Indians · 04-05-2004, 19:02

You could always rip it to your hard drive using DVD Decrypter and play it from there, DVDDecrypter removes region encoding, for backup purposes only of course, works a treat for me.

http://www.dvddecrypter.com/

Xaccers · 04-05-2004, 19:09

The regional thing is just a marketing thing so they can spread the releases.
With VHS this was done because of the different technologies, like PAL/NTSC/SECAM but DVDs don't have that problem so they invented the regions.
IIRC the australian courts are dealing with this on behalf of consumers as over there the manufacturer has no right to dictate to the consumer how to use products.

Russ · 04-05-2004, 19:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Indians

You could always rip it to your hard drive using DVD Decrypter and play it from there, DVDDecrypter removes region encoding, for backup purposes only of course, works a treat for me.

http://www.dvddecrypter.com/

Looks like that's the way to go, tbh.

I've had PMs from people advising me to look on Kazaa for a 'solution' but I'm not really comfortable with doing that.

Cheers Indy