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Domain: cdfreaks.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to cdfreaks.com.
Stories · 24
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Pirates Promise Improved Version of DaVinci Code
Y'arr, Matey writes "CD Freaks is reporting that pirates are not happy with the quality of the DaVinci Code. According to the article, "A sales assistant at one Shanghai DVD shop said the initial copies were 'pirated overseas' and that 'better quality' versions would probably be available early next month."" -
Muzak Encoding at Home?
zonker asks: "I work for a company that requires Muzak to be played over the speaker system all day long. However, I work into the night, well passed closing time, and often just crank up my own tunes on a computer with a nice set of speakers. I've been curious if anyone has developed any software that allows you to encode and burn to whatever format Muzak is using to make their discs. I've scraped around the net and haven't seen anything like it other than other people in similar environments that would like to make their own Muzak discs for their own after hours enjoyment. That thread has some interesting informational tidbits for starters. Does anyone on Slashdot know anything more about this?" -
Pay-Per-View to Provide DVD After Viewing?
Anonymous Coward writes to tell us that Comcast is entertaining an idea that would allow digital cable customers to purchase a pay-per-view movie for roughly $17 that would also include a hard copy in the mail a few days later. From the article: "The only snafu in the entire idea is the fact that only 40% of Comcast cable subscribers have the required digital box at this point in time. But still, that is 40% of 21 million customers which is not too bad. DirecTV and Dish, are you listening?" -
Pay-Per-View to Provide DVD After Viewing?
Anonymous Coward writes to tell us that Comcast is entertaining an idea that would allow digital cable customers to purchase a pay-per-view movie for roughly $17 that would also include a hard copy in the mail a few days later. From the article: "The only snafu in the entire idea is the fact that only 40% of Comcast cable subscribers have the required digital box at this point in time. But still, that is 40% of 21 million customers which is not too bad. DirecTV and Dish, are you listening?" -
RIAA Suit Rejected With Prejudice
yfarren writes "According to cdfreaks.com the RIAA has lost the case against the mother of a 13 year old girl accused of file-sharing violations." From the article: "The case was dismissed with prejudice, which prevents the case from being advanced against the defendant. Finally, the RIAA tried asking the Judge to amend the judgment in order to allow them to sue the child through a Guardian Ad Litem. However the court denied [the] RIAA's request." -
DVD-Audio's CPPM Circumvented
Bodysurf writes "After DVD-Video's CSS encryption was broken in 1999, the music industry chose a much more secure copy-protection method for DVD-Audio called Copy Protection for PreRecorded Media (CPPM). This protection scheme has remained publicly uncracked, but it was circumvented recently, providing the ability to save the unencrypted digital audio data. CDFreaks has the details." -
DVD Decrypter Author Served With Take-Down Order
the-dark-kangaroo writes "The DVD Decrypter author has announced that he has been served with an order to cease his development of DVD Decrypter. The developer has been forced to hand over all source code and the domain that he was using. It is thought that it could be Sony who have served this notice, as it is rumoured that he broke their new copyright protection within 72 hours of its release." -
iTunes Expands In Europe
jawtheshark writes "I found just out today that Apple launched the iTunes store in serveral more European countries. Countries include : Austria, Belgium, Finland, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, and Spain. Apparently it launched 26 october 2004, making this a late submission. Articles at cdfreaks.com and AppleInsider " -
Upgrade Doubles +R Speed For Some Lite-On Drives
Binsbergen writes "Owners of a Lite-On 451S (lowest price $ 69.50) and a Lite-On 851S can load the firmware of the Lite-On 832S and burn their DVD+Rs at 8x speed and also write to double-layer media. Before this seemed impossible, because many manufacturers have told us that upgrading a 4x drive to a double-layer writer was impossible due hardware differences. Of course it's important to note that 'overclocking' voids your warrantee and should be done after have carefully read the instructions. Read more about the procedure, the results and others experiences in the official 451S@832S, 851S@832S -- It works! thread. That's a dirt-cheap upgrade!" (Sounds similar to the NEC upgrade mentioned in May.) -
Upgrade Doubles +R Speed For Some Lite-On Drives
Binsbergen writes "Owners of a Lite-On 451S (lowest price $ 69.50) and a Lite-On 851S can load the firmware of the Lite-On 832S and burn their DVD+Rs at 8x speed and also write to double-layer media. Before this seemed impossible, because many manufacturers have told us that upgrading a 4x drive to a double-layer writer was impossible due hardware differences. Of course it's important to note that 'overclocking' voids your warrantee and should be done after have carefully read the instructions. Read more about the procedure, the results and others experiences in the official 451S@832S, 851S@832S -- It works! thread. That's a dirt-cheap upgrade!" (Sounds similar to the NEC upgrade mentioned in May.) -
First 16x DVD+R Recording Tests Available
An anonymous reader submits "CD Freaks.com has made a first preview of 16x DVD recording. Many people wondered if 16x DVD recording would be too fast and data could not be delivered by the hard disk. The first tests show that this is not a real problem. 16x DVD recording means that a DVD disk is written in about 6 minutes . The test drive, a BenQ DW1600, also supports dual layer writing and writing at 16x to 8x media." -
First 16x DVD+R Recording Tests Available
An anonymous reader submits "CD Freaks.com has made a first preview of 16x DVD recording. Many people wondered if 16x DVD recording would be too fast and data could not be delivered by the hard disk. The first tests show that this is not a real problem. 16x DVD recording means that a DVD disk is written in about 6 minutes . The test drive, a BenQ DW1600, also supports dual layer writing and writing at 16x to 8x media." -
First Look At S-ATA Optical Storage Drive
An anonymous reader writes "CD Freaks has a first look at a S-ATA optical storage drive. Although several S-ATA HD's have been released lately there have been no signs of S-ATA CD-RW and DVD-R/DVD+R drives. S-ATA seems to be the solution for the data transfers involved with 16x DVD recording and the fast 52x CD-RW drives. However there seem still to be some compatibility issues. " -
Nokia N-Gage Cracked
According to Mr. Belvedere over at CD Freaks, the Nokia N-Gage has been cracked. From the article: "The games that were designed for the N-Gage will of course only work with the Nokia device but not anymore. Now that the security on the N-Gage has been cracked the games can be played on other mobile phones as well such as the Siemens SX1." The article notes that Sonic N is the only game seen in public yet, but others are sure to follow soon. It'll be interesting to see how Nokia handles this. -
Nokia N-Gage Cracked
According to Mr. Belvedere over at CD Freaks, the Nokia N-Gage has been cracked. From the article: "The games that were designed for the N-Gage will of course only work with the Nokia device but not anymore. Now that the security on the N-Gage has been cracked the games can be played on other mobile phones as well such as the Siemens SX1." The article notes that Sonic N is the only game seen in public yet, but others are sure to follow soon. It'll be interesting to see how Nokia handles this. -
iRiver Announces A New Ogg/MP3 Player
An anonymous reader writes "CD Freaks and Mobile mag are reporting that iRiver has unveiled a new Ogg-capable mp3 player. Featuring 20 GB of HD space and USB 2.0 connectivity, the iHP-120 might just be the answer to the question all us Apple-fearing geeks have been asking... Although the new product has yet to show up on their website, the older model iHP-100 is similar in design but with half the storage space (10gb). New software will be released in October to update it and other players from iRiver with ogg compatibility as well." -
Diamonds & the RIAA
eaglebtc writes "After reading the previously-posted article on cdfreaks.com about the rapid erosion of cheap CDR's, I found another equally scintillating write-up about the economics of music CDs written by Richard Menta, founder of MP3 Newswire. Sure, we've all heard the whining about how CDs are so expensive, but Mr. Menta takes a unique perspective on the issue by comparing the RIAA to DeBeers. He argues that both companies control distribution of products in their respective markets with an iron fist, and by so doing can artificially raise prices. Coincidentally, the bubble is beginning to burst in both markets: the RIAA is fighting against the uprisings of P2P software, and the diamond cartel's lawyers are losing sleep over the $5 diamonds produced in a lab." -
Say Goodbye To Your CD-Rs In Two Years?
Little Hamster writes "According to an article on cdfreaks.com, a test done by the Dutch PC-Active magazine showed that among 30 different CD-R brands tested, a lot of them were already unreadable after twenty months. This is shocking, and makes me wonder how should I backup my data, photo and music collection." -
(CD) Pirates Take to the Ocean
rammstein_rulz writes "www.cdfreaks.com reports that asian CD pirates now produce thousands of pirated VCD's on anchored ships in international waters to avoid getting caught. Malaysian marine police have been asked to be on the lookout for pirate ships" -
Hot-Rod Your CD-RW Drive
Anonymous Coward writes: "Currently almost everyone with a computer has a CD-ROM drive and also a big part of them have a CD-RW drive. But what if you want to spend less time on writing a CD-R ? You have to buy a new one, or, if you are a real geek, you just overclock it! Seems to be to good to be true ? It's not! Currently a lot of cheap manufacturers of CD-RW drives are using the same parts in their 32x,40x, and 48x drives and start to sell them at 32x, later to 40x and in end as 48x. and with a little upgrading of the firmware (totally legal) you will have a faster drive, because you remove its limits! It currently works on drives from Lite-On (who also makes drives for Memorex, TDK, Iomega, Cendyne, TraxData and Pacific digital all overclockable) And the list goes on as there are also overclock tricks for LG (32x -> 40x) and Sony drives (32x -> 48x). If you don't believe it, read all the reactions and the postings on the forums mentioned above!" -
Hot-Rod Your CD-RW Drive
Anonymous Coward writes: "Currently almost everyone with a computer has a CD-ROM drive and also a big part of them have a CD-RW drive. But what if you want to spend less time on writing a CD-R ? You have to buy a new one, or, if you are a real geek, you just overclock it! Seems to be to good to be true ? It's not! Currently a lot of cheap manufacturers of CD-RW drives are using the same parts in their 32x,40x, and 48x drives and start to sell them at 32x, later to 40x and in end as 48x. and with a little upgrading of the firmware (totally legal) you will have a faster drive, because you remove its limits! It currently works on drives from Lite-On (who also makes drives for Memorex, TDK, Iomega, Cendyne, TraxData and Pacific digital all overclockable) And the list goes on as there are also overclock tricks for LG (32x -> 40x) and Sony drives (32x -> 48x). If you don't believe it, read all the reactions and the postings on the forums mentioned above!" -
Hot-Rod Your CD-RW Drive
Anonymous Coward writes: "Currently almost everyone with a computer has a CD-ROM drive and also a big part of them have a CD-RW drive. But what if you want to spend less time on writing a CD-R ? You have to buy a new one, or, if you are a real geek, you just overclock it! Seems to be to good to be true ? It's not! Currently a lot of cheap manufacturers of CD-RW drives are using the same parts in their 32x,40x, and 48x drives and start to sell them at 32x, later to 40x and in end as 48x. and with a little upgrading of the firmware (totally legal) you will have a faster drive, because you remove its limits! It currently works on drives from Lite-On (who also makes drives for Memorex, TDK, Iomega, Cendyne, TraxData and Pacific digital all overclockable) And the list goes on as there are also overclock tricks for LG (32x -> 40x) and Sony drives (32x -> 48x). If you don't believe it, read all the reactions and the postings on the forums mentioned above!" -
Hot-Rod Your CD-RW Drive
Anonymous Coward writes: "Currently almost everyone with a computer has a CD-ROM drive and also a big part of them have a CD-RW drive. But what if you want to spend less time on writing a CD-R ? You have to buy a new one, or, if you are a real geek, you just overclock it! Seems to be to good to be true ? It's not! Currently a lot of cheap manufacturers of CD-RW drives are using the same parts in their 32x,40x, and 48x drives and start to sell them at 32x, later to 40x and in end as 48x. and with a little upgrading of the firmware (totally legal) you will have a faster drive, because you remove its limits! It currently works on drives from Lite-On (who also makes drives for Memorex, TDK, Iomega, Cendyne, TraxData and Pacific digital all overclockable) And the list goes on as there are also overclock tricks for LG (32x -> 40x) and Sony drives (32x -> 48x). If you don't believe it, read all the reactions and the postings on the forums mentioned above!" -
Macrovision CD Protection Bypassed
LoPan writes: "The defective CDs that have recently arrived on the market have already had their copy protection broken according to The Register. What I'd like to know is if the discs do not conform to the Red Book standard, and if so, can they actually be sold as audio CD's, with the logo? Are they marked, warning consumers that they're buying a defective product?" The cdfreaks article referenced by the Register article tells you all you need to know. It's Windows-centric, but give it a few weeks and I bet cross-platform answers will show up.