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New DRM Scheme To Make Current DVD Players Obsolete

Oneflower writes "ExtremeTech reports that a proposed new DRM scheme could make current DVD players obsolete. The scheme, from Hewlett-Packard and Philips, targets DVD+R and DVD+RW and is an attempt to enforce the FCC broadcast flag on DVD recorders."

14 of 544 comments (clear)

  1. No Big Deal by mr.henry · · Score: 3, Informative
    For example, the VCTS the DRM solution will only work with the single- and dual-layer versions of DVD+R and DVD+RW media, not the "-R" counterparts.

    DVD-R is the preferred recordable DVD flavor for movies these days. It's cheaper than +R and more compatible with DVD players.

    FU CARLY

    1. Re:No Big Deal by pthisis · · Score: 2, Informative

      Pay attention to the people warning against Bose.

      B&W has good values in truly great speakers--you can get brilliant sound for $300 or so (and when I say brilliant, I mean even Stereophile and places like that rate it very high, AND it just plain sound great). Or Hale, or Paradigm.

      If you really want to spend thousands, look at the Magnaplanar 1.6Q or the Vandersteen 2ce signature.

      --
      rage, rage against the dying of the light
    2. Re:No Big Deal by Golias · · Score: 2, Informative

      I have the very set of B&W speakers you are talking about, and I'll back you up on that.

      They are unremarkable-looking bookshelf speakers, but they sound absolutely breathtaking, with or without the subwoofer they designed for them.

      I've also heard the Paradigms, and agree that they are also pretty darn good, and worth a listen when you are shopping.

      You won't find B&W at Best Buy of Fries... You need to go to those little downtoen hi-fi boutique stores. They are worth the trip, though. Many of them have terrific listening rooms, and also 1-month no-questions-asked return policies (because they believe you should try out speakers in your own listening room before you decide for sure that you will buy them for good.)

      --

      Information wants to be anthropomorphized.

  2. Re:So? by OECD · · Score: 4, Informative

    And a hack will be made, a firmware update released and in the end we will be back to what we are doing today.

    Weird thing is, they seem to acknowledge that:

    From TFA: "In large part, the issue with the new players will solve itself," said Chris Buma, an A/V program manager with Philips Consumer Electronics, at a press conference held by the DVD+RW Alliance here. "It is a restriction, but a restriction that can be overcome."

    --
    One man's -1 Flamebait is another man's +5 Funny.
  3. And when the Boradcast Flag is ruled illegal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative
    the market will become even more confused. The American Library Association suit against the FCC http://www.ala.org/ala/washoff/WOissues/copyrightb /broadcastflag/FCCbrf110404.pdf
    is a must read. The FCC is going to lose this one because they clearly don't have the authority to require the Broadcast Flag.

    Thank your local bespeckled "digitally-savvy" Librarian for this one (and yes, I'm trained as a Librarian -- we do care about ensuring digital rights).

  4. Re:Not new by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 2, Informative

    My Panasonic -R recorder has already refused to record several movies because it detected a copyright flag.

    This is a standalone unit and you were trying to record from an analog source right? Sounds like macrovision.
    You were probably trying to record another DVD or VHS tape by playing it into the panasonic.

    This new stupidity from HP is about digital recordings only.

    BTW, for about $60 you can buy a "video clarifier" from radio shack which will effectively strip macrovision from the analog video allowing you to record it.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  5. But they have to standardize on the new scheme by Billly+Gates · · Score: 2, Informative

    By law June 2005 is the last month any equipment can be made to ignore broadcast flags.

    This is the new standard whether we like it or not since many dvd makers will be fined if they do not include the drm.

    Isn't corruption great?

    1. Re:But they have to standardize on the new scheme by Dachannien · · Score: 2, Informative

      That's okay. It isn't actually law in the US, either. Rather, this is an example of an executive-branch agency (the FCC) attempting to emulate legislation - and then, over a domain where their jurisdiction is anywhere from tenuous to nonexistent.

  6. Re:DivX WTF!?!?!? by Ironsides · · Score: 3, Informative

    Uh... No, not confusing acronyms. DivX was a Circit City invention of a variant on DVDs that required you to pay money for everytime you watched a disk after the first three times. The players would dial home to a central server and bill your credit card. The idea failed miserably and in its honor the DivX codec was named. I have had troubles with this at work where people thought I was talking about the circuit city product and not the codec.

    --
    Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
  7. Nothing to do with players .... by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Informative
    This is never going to happen, no one is going to go and buy a new DVD player for some new crappy wannabe-standard. They'll try it and fail, next please!


    Actually, from R'ing TFA, the article headline is very misleading. This will not make any change to current DVD players. It makes changes to make the recorders obey the evil bit/broadcast flag.

    The fact that they expect the media and the players to cost more once this is in place (so Hitachi can get their royalties of course) is going to slow adoption of this.

    Cheers

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    1. Re:Nothing to do with players .... by writertype · · Score: 3, Informative

      Actually, that's not exactly true. If you burn protected content on a protected player, and then try to play back that content on an old unprotected DVD player, it won't work. So this affects playback as well as recording.

  8. Huh? The +R format is compatible BY DESIGN by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    DVD-R is the preferred recordable DVD flavor for movies these days. It's cheaper than +R and more compatible with DVD players.

    ROFL. Slashdot man speaks with forked tongue.

    DVD+R was designed specifically to have a format that is compatible with the DVD-movie standard. In other words, a DVD movie player doesn't even need to know about DVD+R to be able to play movies written to a DVD+R disk. It's hard to get more compatible than that, and I'm proving the compatibility daily on my antique DVD movie-only players.

    No other DVD format is compatible with DVD movie in this way. All the other formats require the player to have been programmed explicitly to handle them.

  9. Hm... Seems to me that you have no reasons... by Svartalf · · Score: 2, Informative

    1) DVD handles chapter forward and back (a VHS doesn't DO that...) and via the remote (and in some cases, on the front panel...) you can fast-forward/reverse in at least 4-5 different speeds and slow-forward at at least 2-3 different speeds. Now some discs have some obnoxious feature that prevent you from doing this sort of thing to the "previews" (ads?) on the disc- but they're actually in the very small minority of late because people bitched about that... Item 1 on your list has pretty much been a non-issue since the beginning- always HAS been.

    2) Tape's much worse- haven't you seen VHS tapes strewn across roadways by rowdy teenieboppers? All it'd take to ruin a tape is to give it a couple of swirlies, moosh food or spill juice/kool-aid into the thing, or stick one's fingers into the loader gaps in the door (which little fingers would be adept at doing) and PULL (ooh... Such fun that!). DVD's can be snapped and scratched up- the other "mishaps" that would trash a VHS tape don't even figure into a DVD, they're non-problems. Light to medium scratching can usually be ignored by a player and when it isn't, one can typically resurface the optical portion of the disk with various products on the market, which do, amazingly work well.

    Simply put, neither of your reasons work as being valid concerns. (And the people that modded you up as "Interesting" never went through this little mental exercise to see if you really were "Interesting"...)

    --
    I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
  10. Re:Huh? The +R format is compatible BY DESIGN by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative
    Bullshit. Check this page and see how many players can read -R but not +R.

    +R is significantly less compatible.