Hi guys,

I just bought my first DVD burner PX-712A couple weeks ago. Too bad they announced PX-716A just the week after I got it (I did check a few DVD forums and saw no sign they were gonna released DL burner any time soon and I didn't want to go with NEC or Pioneer).

Anyway, I have this region code question. When I first played a DVD-Video I remember there was a dialog asking about setting region code for the first time out of five and I set it to region 2. I'm not sure if it was the dialog by Windows XP or by Plextools or by Cyberlink DVD Player but I understand that it set the number in the drive's firmware, correct? Now, I have some region 1 DVDs and I wanna play in Cyberlink DVD Player. What's gonna happen when I put a region 1 DVD into the drive? Is it gonna ask me for 2nd region setting? Then what will happen when I play my region 2 DVDs later? Does it mean I can only play different region DVDs alternately for only 5 times and if the 5th setting is for region 1 then I won't be able to play region 2 DVDs ever again?

Thanks in advance. Cheers.

As far as my eperience goes, you are indeed limited of changing the region only 5 times!

I think that he will ask to set your region to 1 because you can't play a region 1 DVD when you have region 2 set. So what you can do is wether change the region again or use a region free application from the internet.
That way you never have to change your region and you still will have 5 times to change your region.


I think what you say is correct. Once you have changed your region for the 5th time, that region will be unchangeable.
As I said before, you can use an application which makes any DVD-drive region free! Go here for more info.
Go here for more info!

Hopefully I gave you the right information, but I know the experts will reply to your question as well!

Greetz

Thanks for your fast reply, AMDtje. So it means that it wasn't XP or Plextools but Cyberlink DVD Player that did set the region code for me the first time?

So, if I use _free_ tools like DVDDecrypter to copy other region DVDs to HD first before using Cyberlink to open DVD files from HD then I wouldn't lose my other four region-changing quota?

Cheers.

Nope you shouldn't as DVD Decrypter removes the region info when it rippes the DVD. Anyway, as AMDtje said there are various software apps out there that remove region info as well. AnyDVD is another well known app. that can do this. Another solution is to flash your drive with a region-free firmware version but this is an unoffial method and it requires you to flash your drive with an unofficial firmware version.. and it may void your warranty as well so I can't recommend you do this.

Thanks, G@M3FR3@K.

So what's the deal with all this? Why Cyberlink has to config my drive's region to match the disc before it can play the disc and why DVDIdle don't have to? Is it some kind of rules that some do follow and some don't?

Also I've seen some models of DVD player sold in Europe have 2 variants, Region 2 and Region Free. They're sold at different prices but not that much different. So why don't they just make all models region free?

Thanks.

Yeah, it's pretty stupid, I agree. Region control was invented by the movie companies to control where movies can be played and where not. This way they can introduce a movie in, for example, the US and Europe has to wait before the DVD is released there. Anyway, PowerDVD is an app produced by a major company and is sold worlwide, even in retail I believe, and thus they have to follow the official rules. Else, they can get sued. Online software such as DVDIdle and AnyDVD are distributed online and have to follow the rules that apply to the country where they operate from only.

The same applies to hardware in a way. Major manufacturers like Sony cannot afford to brake any rules as they would be sued and it would cost them a lot of money. Smaller/unknown brands often don't play by the rules that stricktly and released region-free drives. It's pointless for the movie industry to go after these companies becuase, a) it's impossible to find them and b) if they do find them they don't have any money.

This is putting it very simple but it should give you a general idea of what's going on.

Because that is the way it works, they don't use the same method/commands to achieve that.

Because it would be ILLEGAL, absolutely correctly seen REGION FREE devices shouldn't exist anyway. Those who produce region-free devices and sell them risk a boycott and loss of licensing rights anyway. There are a few holes in the laws for those who know, especially the method to sell devices which can be set to regioncode-free using "secret IR-codes" ........

The region free firmware for 712A that G@M3FR3@K mentioned is here: http://tdb.rpc1.org/#PX712A. I never use it since I haven't got other regions dvd yet, but interested to know how it goes if you decided to use it.

G@M3FR3@K and _chef_: Thanks. Now I understand about software. But for hardware, I wasn't talking about small players. Here for example,
http://www.pricerunner.co.uk/sound-a...n/dvd-players/
you'll find that Philips, Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, Pioneer all have models with two variants with £10-£20 price difference. So these big players are now breaking the rules too? And why don't they just release only the multi-region models when the prices are not that much different?

zevia: Thanks. I'll check if anyone has successfully flashed their drives hehe.

As far as I know, the stores hack the players for their customers. Here in the US you can find some region free players (big brand name) with a little more $$$ compare to region 1 only.

I don't see any report here, everyone is waiting for someone who's brave enough.

G@M3FR3@K, probably Sony is the worse example you can give You're right of course for pretty much any other manufacturer, but Sony is a very special case

Why is Sony such a special case ... simply because of their Sony Entertainment division Since Sony is also a major media provider, it would be stupid of them to mass produce consumer devices which work against their own interests

That's why for example, most Sony DVD Players can't be simply turned as region free via a remote control code / sequence or even firmware change ... to get them region free you will need to actually mod them (change the hardware by replacing some chips which is not that easy to do, nor cheap as you need some rather special soldering/desoldering equipment and of course one or more pre-programmed chips ). This is fairly typical to Sony ... There might be however few odd cases which allow easier RPC changing ... probably due to the fact that they try to keep some sort of ballance between Sony Entertainment interests and the market demand

It would be fun seeing Sony Entertainment filing a lawsuit against the Sony Consummer division though
I can only imagine what kind of battles they have when they have to decide if the next model should be easy to set to RPC1 or not
I just love this kind of dilemas

This is quite a common practice in many places in the world

The risk in doing so is minimal ... there's always a risk when flashing any equipment however ... if something goes wrong and the flashing process is not completed you might have a dead drive ... so when I'm saying that the risk is minimal I'm refering to the case when the flashing process is succesfull (e.g. the new FW is safely stored in the drive). TDB are very good in releasing RPC1 drives, and the likelihood for any bugs is next to nothing ...
I have flashed few DVD-ROM drives with their FW's and never had a problem

However, you have to take into account that by flashing your unit with unofficial FW you loose your warranty ... and you don't want that ... especially with PX712A

My advice would be to use a SW solution like AnyDVD or DVDRegionFree ... is perfectly safe and it works like a charm

I wonder how will plextor knows if we have flashed our drive with unofficial fw? especially if we re-flashed it with official one again.

They probably can't but of course, if you flash your drive with an unofficial version and it goes wrong and your drive is dead, you wouldn't be able to flash it again with an official version...

SONY is a very bad choice if you think to get support like firmware updates for a standalone.
There local division just do it themselves... no customer get them for download. ARGH.

Same problematic with most of their computer drives.

They have something to hide. LOL

Good question.
I would like to know that not only for PLEXTOR, also other manufacturers.
There are only rumours about that yet.