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Vista Won't Play With Old DVD Drives
tlhIngan writes "From a developer's blog, Windows Vista will no longer support DVD-ROM drives that do not handle region coding in hardware (RPC1 drives) - thus preventing playback of DVDs that are region/CSS encoded with those drives. Not a big problem, as RPC1 drives haven't been officially manufactured since 2000 (and Microsoft claims their drives are all broken), but for those with hacked drives (RPC2 with RPC1 firmware), or move the RPC1 drive to new computers, well, no more DVD movies for you!"
Since we're all a bunch of criminals anyway, this can only help to save us from ourselves. Thanks Microsoft!
would I want Vista anyway?
I have XP and I don't have any need for Vista.
Of couse at on point, support stops for XP. But then Linux for the desktop will hopefully be awesome.
First Goatse of 2006! /.'s 10th anniversary!
Trolls, fire up your keyboards; only 12 months until
what about places like new zealand where it is illegal to sell a region coded piece of hardware. does this count as like rpc1? does this mean Win Vista will not run in new zealand? if not then whatever new zealanders do will be able to be used anywhere else to get region free dvd drives on windows. if yes, then microsoft loses new zealand to linux in ten seconds flat.
...but for those with hacked drives (RPC2 with RPC1 firmware), or move the RPC1 drive to new computers, well, no more DVD movies for you!
Funny reasoning!
So why do you think you have to use Vista?
Or if you think you need to upgrade your OS, why don't you consider Linux which I'm sure offers a better DVD watching experience than Vista on that hardware?
)9TSS
No more DVDs when Vista has come out? I'm sure Vista coming out won't affect my installation of Fedora Core in any way, nor other peoples installs of Windows XP...
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
I never installed XP at home, and don't miss it. I'm certainly not going to install Vista anywhere.
Besides, the easy way to watch DVDs on crippled OS's like Windows is to rip it and re-record it without region codes, or no-skip flags. It makes a backup of your DVD and you can watch it anywhere.
Happy New Year!
- Paul
Why do the big players not get the long tail fact that stopping people from seeing your stuff is suicidal? There is so much other good stuff out there fighting for attention, be it news sites, blogs, podcasts, videocasts, flashfilms, indie films, et bloody cetera.
The money is in editorial branding. And that is because editorial choice is a way of dealing with information overload. It's so freaking obvious, yet none of the majors seem to get it. Even when some english nightclub goes on to form a top selling dance mix brand, just by picking good tunes. This is the way it is done.
Not by making your software even more anti-usable. FFS.
In other words, people who have bought legitimate DVDs now cannot play them (BTW, buying DVDs from a different region is still legimate and not illegal, even if the DVD marketeers don't really like it).
So now I guess everyone in the 'wrong region' will then have to get their movies from bittorrent instead.. yet another instance where big media and big software companies push their legimate customers to "piracy". That's brilliant...
1)shut out legitimate DVD purchases
2)push them to bitorrent
3)????
4)more profit?!?
Gotta wonder about some of these companies...
Message to Microsoft, and to the content providers:
1) Our PC hardware is our private property, fully bought and paid for by us. Our PCs are not just a rented delivery platform which can rightly be controlled by you.
2) The operating system that we run on our PC hardware has the purpose of making our hardware do whatever *WE* want *OUR* hardware to do, and not merely what *YOU* would like *OUR* hardware to do.
If you want a fully controlled delivery platform doing whatever you desire and no more, then set up a subsidized leasing business and we'll rent the content delivery platform from you, at a cost far below the cost of private PC purchase.
In the meantime, our hardware is ours to do with as we please.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
You make baby Stalin cry. :(
By reading this you acknowledge that you have read it.
You're shouting at the wrong people. You should be shouting at your elected representatives (DMCA, etc).
Install an operating system that does make your hardware do whatever you want! Microsoft is under no duty to make the system you wish for, they just make one they believe sells best, but it's up to you to decide whether you want to buy it or not...
Unless I'm misunderstanding something (which is very possible, I don't know much about anything besides Linux and Star Trek), the Windows version of VLC will presumably keep on working, doing all the decoding in software using libdvdcss. So people will still be able to use it to view their legitimately-acquired foreign DVDs.
-Stephen
"well, no more DVD movies for you!" Ha. Well MS, no more money for you! Really, what incentive is there to *achem* upgrade to Vista anyway? 95/98 over W3.1 I get (pain in the ass as it was) ME over 98 ? no fsking way NT over 98 ? not for home use tnx 2k over 98 I get (glad I did) XP over 2k ? I can live without the eye candy Vista over 2k ? take your Trusted Computing and DRM and put it where the sun don't shine thank you very much. Until 64bit apps are the norm and force me to upgrade (like 32/16 with w2k) I can't see buying into this endless upgrade cycle.
1. Using DeCSS technology, copy your region encoded DVD to your PC's hard drive. ...
2. Watch movie
3.
4. Profit! (but remember, this violates fair use policies if you do profit from this).
If you read the article, you'll see that any DVD hardware you'd likely use would have the region-coding in it. Or you get a de-regionalized one from Sony.
This just doesn't look important for the vast majority of Slashdot readers.
http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_
I _upgraded_ most my DVD drives to RPC1.
:)
Having to suffer from region restrictions is not acceptable (locally both region 1 and region 2 dvds were easily available and I also order stuff from both amazon.com and amazon.co.uk.
Of course, I usually play DVDs under linux, so this is not really a problem
When will our governments, and consumers, realise that regionalisation is nothing more than a mechanism of creating continental price disparity and deliberate market manipulation? It has nothing to do with "costs" but maximising profits by restricting parallel imports. It does nothing for quality, or support....
Consumers should respond by simply not buying anything which is deliberately designed to support a cartel. They are only ripping themselves off (The Matrix: US $9.95... Aust $19.48)
Combined with DRM, how many months will we wait after the release of a fully DRM'ed Vista with hardware support before a company threatens its users with an OFF switch unless they pay their $2 per month DVD hardware "licencing" fee, or your CPU/RAM/HDD monthly "licencing" fee?
Refuse to pay? OFF.
Just bought a new quantum computer, but I'm uncertain how it works.
Every true pirate will just download the movie and keep it on his harddrive ... and how is this going to help against copied dvds with the correct region code ?
*an infinite number of monkeys wrote this sig
I'd just like to congratulate anybody who has gotten over 5 years out of a DVD drive.
Can anyone explain how the hardware protection should work anyways? On my powerbook, i can't play DVD's with the wrong Region code using Apple's DVD Player (unless i switch my drives Region code, which would make the drive useless after a while, since you can only switch 5 times). However, if I use VLC instead, it doesn't care which Region code the dvd has. It just works. So it doesn't really seem to be a "hardware" protection, if it can be worked around just by using different software.
llegal drugs are at least a big of a problem as copyright violation in the world today. In fact many of the artists promoted by Hollywood and the American recording industry include many positive drug related references in their scripts and lyrics. So the question is : Would you endorse forced illicit drug testing for all artists, actors and executives involved in content production?
Over 11,000 people die in America each year at the hands of gun violence. The USA has the highest murder rate in the developed world. So the question is : Would you endorse taking away the legal capability of all Americans to bare arms?
In the USA there are over 12,000 speeding-related traffic deaths per year. The technological capability exists to install a "governor" in every new automobile which would deny the driver the ability to exceed the speed limit. So the question is : Would you endorse restricting access to roads and highways to only vehicles that have such a speed restriction system installed?
( If the questioned person says yes to any of the above then pass the quote along to the Hollywood/recording/NRA/automobile media, bloggers and lobby groups etc)
Spam advertising and spyware has become a major problem for computer users. The DRM capability that Intel is offering to content providers would also be available to those wanting to abuse those same user restrictions. Intel is effectively offering the ability to hide malicious content or deny access to content needed to gather evidence for the basis of a complaint. So the question becomes: Why are you offering up this ability to content providers when it denies the owners of the computer the ability to protect themselves?
Whether it is a war on drugs, gun, or road crime restrictive and technological solutions that lock the end users out of the ability to make personal decisions perform actions are effectively a fundamental violation of a person's civil rights, even if taking that action could violate the law of the land.
Even though illicit drug consumption is against the law, wholesale drug testing would be seen as a violation of a persons right to privacy. In fact most American courts would not accept evidence gathered though such an action.
Even though gun related crime is a major problem, taking away the right for any citizens to bare arms would leave them at risk from criminals who would ignore the law as a matter of course.
Even though speeding is a major problem, there are cases it is needed for safety. Overtaking vehicles may require the driver to exceed the speed limit to safely avoid oncoming traffic. Also there are rare cases, such as transporting someone requiring urgent medical treatment, where the even the courts have found that exceeding the speed limit was preferable to the affected person's demise.
While making a copy of copyrighted content may seem trivial in comparison to the examples in the above three paragraphs, remember that Intel along with Adobe and Microsoft is talking of offering this same DRM technology for business, legal and even governmental documents. The ability to blow the whistle on suspect dealings, and pass copies along to the press and even authorities, may be severely restricted in the future.
So the final question to everybody has become: Why should the consumers and citizens have to put up with DRM restrictions on their general purpose computers that they own?
It also doesn't allow RPC2 drives using RPC1, which is an evasive way of saying "drives with hacked region-free firmware."
Take it from me, a very large percentage of the popular drives have this firmware available, and a significant number of users use it. By locking them out, they've just pissed off the end user, and if the end user is a Joe Durr who doesn't know what RPC1 or RPC2 are, they'll start bitching at their nerdy associate for their drive being broken...and, more than likely, just shove it and buy a new drive rather than listening to words like "reflash."
Of course, my personally trained users aren't that stupid...but I know a lot that are.
It's only an insult if it's not true.
You don't get it, do you? The problem is that the drive you can buy at newegg is region-locked, and the region can only be changed 4 times. This means that if I want to watch my American, Japanese and European DVDs, I need to buy three players (and a case big enough to accommodate them).
--
*Art
I don't know why you would want Vista, but for me there is a new networking & audio stacks, XPS & totally cool new printing system, transactional FS, and a lot more interesting stuff. Sure, crawl back under your rock and keep beliving that all what Vista is is Aqua interface AKA MacOS circa 80s ;-P
My other Beowulf cluster is... er...
The ratio of gun ownership in New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the USA is roughly the same, but only the USA suffers from such a high rate of gun related crime. Why is that?
yea, cause DVD drives are like.. older technology... ::rolls eyes::
I think we can keep recursing like this until someone returns 1
You're right. I was totally appalled to learn that one of my favorite Congressmen, John Conyers, and one of my least favorites, Sensenbrenner, have teamed up to cosponsor a law that plugs the "analog hole," making any copy, anywhere, illegal. You can't make a digital copy now, and you can't make an analog one if this bill is passed. I sent Conyers a "Say it ain't so, John" message, and Sensenbrenner a polite cease-and-desist. http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117934938?catego ryid=1009&cs=1
...will it be purposedly hard-blocked or will it be just "unsupported" so that by installing 3rd party drivers you get your old DVD support back?
Vista may of course not support lots of obsolete hardware and there's nothing wrong with that. It's ancient, hardly anybody uses it anymore, developing drivers costs money and time, so cutting back on these costs is understandable. If someone wants to have their ISA gfx card or some obscure SCSI scanner supported, they'd have to write the driver themselves or pay someone to write them to work, cool. But if some hardware is blacklisted as in "This kind of hardware may be used for illegal purposes, we won't allow you to use it", it's a different matter.
Anyway, I strongly believe that in both cases the hacker community will be more efficient that Microsoft.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Isn't regional code locked devices illegal in Australia..? Does this mean that they'll have to sell a modified version here?
"Consider how lucky you are that life has been good to you so far. Alternatively, if life hasn't been good to you so far
"As for pirated movies, MS is not there to help you."
Sigh. This is nothing to do with 'pirated movies'. I live in Europe and have over three hundred region-1 DVDs: Microsoft is now telling me that I won't be allowed to play those DVDs _THAT I HAVE PAID FOR_ on my PC, with a drive that I've paid for, with an operating system that I've paid for.
Pirates, of course, don't need to worry since they'll rip the DVD to a DivX file or copy it to a disk with no region coding. THIS ONLY HURTS LEGITIMATE PURCHASERS OF DVDS!
Grim Fandango came out in 1998, I bought a 50x CD drive for that. It's been used pretty intensely since and is still in tip top condition...
That aside, this is just more good news for Apple. If this bugs you, get a Mac. The new ones with Intel will be able to dual boot Windows, Apple has said, so your usual excuse about not being able to play games doesn't work anymore. Use OS X for work and switch over to Windows for the games, all on hardware that doesn't look like crap. Watch DVDs with any operating system, as long as you use VLC.
The page you linked to is at rpc1.org. RPC1 is the non-region coded firmware which Windows Vista will not be supporting.
What you will need is an RPC2 firmware with the limit on the number of region changes removed.
New Zealand has a higher ratio of non-European population, it also has lower socio-economic areas, a vibrant hip hop community and similar ratio of illicit drug abuse to the USA. It does not suffer anywhere near the proportion of gun related crimes in comparison.
The page you linked to is at rpc1.org. RPC1 is the non-region coded firmware which Windows Vista will not be supporting.
Uhh, yes, that's the domain name. If you spend two minutes browsing the site, you'll see they have plenty of RPC2 firmwares. link
(A bunch of savages in this place, I swear. I'm not even supposed to be here today.)
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Most people should be unaffected by this, as only in Soviet Japan do old DVD-ROMs need people...
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
To be perfectly honest.... i've read threads of all sorts where tons of people have said they won't switch to vista for various reasons. But I'm feeling a bit of deja vu, twice over infact. Tons of people declared that they'd never switch to XP. To go back further tons of people said they wouldn't switch to 98! ***Rant Begin*** The simple fact of the matter is: if widespread use of Vista warrents the end-user changing, either through enhanced or added functionality that just isn't availible in XP or the discontinuation of support, people will switch to Vista plain and simple. It might be one hard long fight, but eventually it will be the standard. The US military in most offices has finally made the switch to XP, and moreover (in some departments) to Server 2003. Heck, even some parts of the military are using Media Center Edition for different types of briefings and training because it works well with media. So for all of you that say this is just one more reason for you *not* to switch to Vista, come talk to me in 4 or 5 years and let's see what operating system you are using. Disclaimer: For you linux geeks out there, I think it's fair to say you don't have all that much of a say in the Vista switch. Granted a great deal of you may use XP as an alternative OS, but you have already made the great leap into the alt-beyond. You have survived and came back to tell about it. For those of us that are comfortable with a Windows environment (and would consider ourselves power-users in the realm) we are the ones that really get a final say as to what is unreasonable and what is not in the implementation of a new OS. ***Rant Over***
What the heck are they thinking??? It's amazing that they still feel they're going to bully consumers into purchasing new hardware and acting a certain way... completely beyond comprehension. What was the story about the old Model T? Any color as long as it's black? People now have options. And one option that I'm sure a lot of IT managers as well as home consumers will exercise is, "Hey, I think I'll just run my old copy of XP/2000... *OR* I'll give that fancypants Linux thing a try! *OR* Heyy... check out those delightful Macintoshes!" Microsoft will declare lower sales than anticipated this year... The market will speak directly to these knuckleheads! Gartner, WSJ and all those other MS fellaters can bank on it!
One of my machines runs Win XP with a DVD burner. I recently started to pick up import Japanese Anime which are set to Region 2. When I got my first import, I put the DVD in and ran DVD Shrink. It insisted on changing the RPC-2 H/W Region Code. Of course, there are a max of 5 changes before the it is permanent. I ended up going out to pick up another DVD drive which is specific for Region 2 DVD's. What a pain !
I would like to meet the a-hole, probably a marketing executive, who thought of this Region coding BS.
On DVD Shrink, it is used for my own purpose of making dups of the DVD's i buy. The originals are kept at home and I play off the copies. I am about done with vacation and I recently bought some new Anime. I made copies and took the copies with me to watch when I have time. The originals are at home safe.
1. i have a region-free dvd player, and i prefer watching stuff on my tv.
2. i will not upgrade to vista anyways.
No, its no more windows for me. Well, not that im runing windows anymore, but you get my point. Why does the default answer to all this DRM 'just roll over and accept it'?
And if the day comes i cant watch what i bought on what i want too, *that* is the day of 'no more dvd movies'. Not that my 'media budget' will bankrupt anyone, but i refuse to participate.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Um, guys, don't forget that there is already a level of region protection built into Windows itself. If anyone here has actually used a RPC1 firmware, you will know that to fully disable region protection, you will need not only a firmware "upgrade", but also some sort of software that hooks into Windows and disables the the region protection on the OS side of things.
So it just means that to get real region freedom, the software will need to do more.
And as mentioned earlier, region protection works simply by getting the drive to refuse to give you the CSS decryption key in the key exchange. Movies that are not CSS-encrypted won't be affected. And software that brute-forces the CSS key won't be affected either.
...of Vista ever shipping?
New monitors needed, now new DVDs, more memory, more disk space. The costs of upgrading are getting out of hand. OK, over a 3 to 5 year interval, hardware replacement may result in a significant change, but on day one who is going to upgrade?
So, Vista may not be the financial bump that MS will need. You have to wonder if it is time to abandon development until the necessary hardware is already in the field.
It really couldn't be considered for Linux.
As I understand it, if you connect an RPC-1 drive to your system, the cdrom.sys driver will emulate the region control. If you look at the drive's properties, it'll say that you have two or fewer region changes left. The region setting is saved in a fairly well-known location in the registry (HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\<random junk>). Vista will remove this emulation, and will probably refuse to pass key exchange messages to the drive. (As an aside, the cdrom.sys driver only checks the RPC level on startup. So, if you change an RPC-2 drive into an RPC-1 drive, Windows no longer shows the drive as being region controlled until the next reboot.)
On the other hand, Linux doesn't have any region control emulation. Since it's not encumbered by any DVD licensing contracts, it can simply pass the key exchange messages to the drive. So, it really wouldn't make sense for it to "be considered for Linux."
I RTFA and don't see what the hell this has to do with Linux. The way the article reads is that the "old" and "new" dvd drives (otherwise known as RPC-1 and RPC-2) handle things so differently that it's impossible to support both. This is not actually the complete truth... in fact to handle either is just as easy and they are almost completely the same. The difference is mainly how the drive responds to requests for a CSS key.
Also, the article is very Windows-dependent and has nothing to do with similar hardware/software in other OS's. For example:
"It was impossible for third-parties to compile their own CDROM.SYS from the source code in the DDK because the region code enforcement code was not included in the DDK."
This means that the source code was not present to include complete support. This is a decision that MS has made because they don't want people re-doing the region protection. That's not a "generic" issue, that's an OS issue. OS code to handle any type of DVD drive is available and (because of the GPL) always will be.
"The region code enforcement code would sometimes mistake a new drive for an old one, resulting in customers unable to play DVDs. Even worse, the driver test team could not reproduce the problem reliably, and the problem went away entirely once a debugger was attached to the system."
Strange how the new code would mistake the drives when the code in every operating system currently available that supports DVD's has no such problems (previous versions of Windows included!). Also, is it really the DVD's fault that their debugger was stopping the code from executing in the same way when it was activated or not? This definitely smells of bovine excrement.
"The code to support the older drives is complex, and the drives that the optical storage team purchased prior to January 1, 2000 are dead or dying. Consequently, testing the code that provides support for old drives has become increasingly difficult, and when the last old drive finally gives up the ghost, testing will become impossible altogether."
Strange, then, that they haven't noticed that almost every new DVD drive has firmware available that'll run it as a RPC-1 (or as they like to coin it, "old") drive. Also, I'm pretty sure that the "more complex" claim would not stand up to scrutiny (check out any OS code that deals with DVD drives, whether in the kernel, libdvd* or other places and see if they differ that much for RPC-1 or RPC-2).
"What does this mean for you? Almost certainly, the answer is "absolutely nothing"." Followed by the quote: "Only if you have an old drive will you notice anything different, namely that encrypted/regionalized DVD movies will no longer play."
That's not "absolutely nothing", especially for the budget-conscious who may well upgrade their PC a bit at a time.
"And since the average drive lifetime is only three years, the number of such old drives that are still working is vanishingly small. Not even the optical drive test team can manage to keep their old drives alive that long."
Strange... sitting here with DVD drives that are much older than that and still working. All of them "original" RPC-1, all of them the cheapest crap I could afford, all of them still reading the disks perfectly. None have died and, whoops, if they did you could always get a new RPC-2 drive and firmware it. This is just an excuse... for this paragraph read "We couldn't be arsed to support it and you're not allowed to use it anyway because you'll just use it to do naughty stuff you're not allowed to do cos the DVD forum said you can't and this sounds like a decent excuse to convince the idiots who are going to buy Vista anyway".
"It is that software enforcement that is going away"
There's your answer - they've made a conscious decision to remove this feature. Why? Because if you believe the above quotes, their dev team is incompetent, can't get already working code to play nicely in Vista and can't find a single RPC-1 drive to test i
I watch movies at 1x.
if you steal from one source, that is plagiarism, if you steal from many, well, that's just research.
All RPC-2 does is prevent the drive from passing through the decryption information from out-of-region discs. So having an RPC-1 drive means 1) faster ripping of out-of-region discs, and 2) the ability to easily play out-of-region discs. I was wondering what the hell Microsoft might be thiking, so I RTFA'd and found out that there were apparently just too many technical problems for them. Hey, they can't even keep their OS secure, so I'm not too surprised. Awwwwww, poor Microsoft.
I suspect all this will do is cause the firmware hackers to start making region-free firmware that speaks RPC-2. I mean, after all, they're already patching RPC-2 firmware.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
I still remember the time when my neighbourhood groccer stopped stocking my favourate cereals. I switched to shopping for what I want from the supermarket. Even though it was a bit further from my home and needed a drive by car, I still got what I wanted and was happy in the process. On a similar note,
If Vista don't allow playing of encoded DVDs on old DVD drives, then it is the right time to give Linux a try. It will allow you to play encrypted DVDs and more. And the good thing is Linux is not at all fussy at all and is very user friendly.
Linux Help
for all things on Linux
Hardly anybody installs Windows. Yeah, I'm sure there are Slashdotters out there who are exceptions. "I have a kickass machine but sometimes I need to need to test my software under Windows, yadda yadda." But that's what you are: exceptions. "Normal" people who run Windows, run it on the hardware that it came with. They also call the "e" icon on their desktop "the internet" and they call their Dell PocketPC their "palm pilot." Yes, really.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
A "nice" first step from Microsoft in the direction of a fully DRManaged PC. Of course we are reaching the critical point where hardware will come with full DRM crap and we'll see which has more weight: the mass dumbness to swallow anything big corps throw at them, or the desire for convenience.
so what's the problem?
Wanna watch a DVD? Dual boot into linux or use a linux live-cd.
Problem solved!
It will be interesting to see how as more commerically available OS's restrict their users, more users will move towards free and open alternatives.
Or you can use a program like DVDidle pro that lets you switch to any region anytime you like.If I'm not mistaken anyDVD and DVD43 will also do the same.I personally like dvdidle pro for the fact that it'll load a movie into RAM so your drive doesn't have to spin so much.Great for saving juice and wear on my laptop dvd drive.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Just change your current system over to linux when you switch to a new box for Windows Vista. What, you expected to be able to run Vista on your old machine? Yeah, right...
I object to this comment. There are computer-illiterates, users, power users, and "slashdot"-level users, and of those four categories, there *is* a population of people who are either users or power users that can re-install Windows despite not knowing what the hell they're doing otherwise.
You forget that the average person gets loads of spyware. Granted, they could just install anti-spyware software, but many just re-install Windows. BECAUSE THEY CAN. Don't be elitist prick.
VLC uses DeCSS to break the encryption. So it doesn't much matter, but WinDVD or any other commercial player will complain because the drive will not hando ver the decryption keys when the region does not match.
Just use VLC
:-)
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
I know because I am in Canada for christmas and we got a couple of european DVD's. Of course no DVD player in the house would play them and the only computers with a DVD-drive were running Windows and would also not play them.
But VLC were installed in a few minutes and worked with a charm.
And a few people realised why I was wearing my "no CSS" thinkgeek T-shirt
I think you are giving new ideas to MPAA.
Besides, that is compromising the copy protection mechanism (region limitation) in DVD, which is illegal in US of A according to that DCMA.
Wanna get on the Internet? Get one of those "Trusted" OSs (you know, the only kind that ISPs will legally be able to allow once the **AAs of the world catch wind of what you suggest).
Problem solved?
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
This is really pretty much a non-story as the whole point of new launches like this is to drive new hardware sales. My local experience is that PCs are largely disposable. Kinda expensive sure, but I've seen quite a few perfectly good PCs get tossed simply because they wouldn't work properly due to spyware, crappy hardware, dodgy network card.
Very very few copies of Vista will be installed on any machine older than a couple of years. What's the point? If an upgrade copy costs $200, only another $200-$400 will get a base Dell that will already have Vista Home installed and sorted out on it.
Slashdot users may do a new install, but let's face it, pre-installed on new hardware is really the only thing that most users can really cope with.
-- "It's not stalking if you're married!" My Wife.
Commercial DVD players (PowerDVD, WinDVD, etc) ask the DVD drive to hand over the keys to decrypt the DVD. A drive that respects region encoding will only do this if region encoding on the disk matches that of the drive. OSS DVD players don't do this, they just use DeCSS to decrypt the DVD, bypassing all of that region encoding crap. That's why you can play all your disks just fine in Linux.
So no, don't throw out your laptop.
Yeah, if you absolutely have to watch your DVDs on a computer. There's still the old-fashioned TV set with a region-free player.
Linux is a mess. A great OS to be sure, but a mess. Linux needs to get the word out. There needs to be a marketed movement on TV, print, internet, radio by a serious linux player that can once and for all, start infecting the minds of the average user. Windows is all people know. MS is being hurt by Apple thanks to the IPOD success and Window's horrible security holes and spyware. When will Linux get its ass in gear and start saying to the world: "Check out our awesome UI, our easy and most advanced home media organizational tools for and audio and video" "Check out our superior software that increases the performance of your existing hardware over Microsoft Windows XP and increases security 100x" "No longer will you have to deal with spyware, adware, or blue screens of death" "It's time to try a better operating system... Linux. We've been waiting for you" "With Linux you have superior networking and internet connectivity at high performance speeds, using the technology that drives 90% of the internet" "Microsoft Windows dictates to you, how you will use your computer... LINUX is a USER based operating system that evovles constantly around the needs of you the user... Not only does Linux adapt to new trends in technology faster, it's also pioneered those trends." "Dump Windows today, and enjoy freedom from the system" "Linux, It's what computers are made for" Essentially, Linux has no marketing and thats because Linux is not one man. It's not one company, It's not one anything. That's its biggest fucking problem when it comes to destroying windows. Until there is a solid unified movement, marketed on tv during superbowls that direct its marketing towards the end user... Linux will lack applications, It will LACK the average users.... and windows will dominate It. I dream for the day whe linux gets is ass in gear and can play with the big boy (MS). But it cant. It has no marketing. You see, we all sit here and bitch about how Microsoft does this and that, and how they use PR to LIE to the user base. But you know what.. Thats the fucking game.. and Linux is not playing it. Linux doesnt have to necceserially lie, but it needs to get out there in a unified force that SLAMS the shit out of windows on national TV. You want more users? YOU WANT PHOTOSHOP? Sony Vegas? 3dsmax? XSI and Maya (yes they're on linux but they're worthless without many other apps that are windows only currently). You want professional audio and video apps? You want to dominate the Office software market? You want to get APPS? You've gotta start playing hardball. These corperations arent developing software for a market that does not exist. Yes linux gets some apps commercially, but many are free open source projects (AND i sure hope that continues... but we need The Adobes of the world) Until then... Hello Vista!... you steaming pile of shit. And thats the way it will be... because no one has the balls to go after the users. So keep bickering about Suse, Mandrake, Redhat, etc etc etc... It's all worthless to the average user. Make it easy to use, and attractive to REAL people. Not just the IT dungeon creatures. You've gotta sell the world on the idea that linux is cool, pretty, advanced, user friendly etc. Apple did themselves a favor with the "Think Different" slogan. Linux could learn a thing or two from apple (I know ironic) Anyways this rant is too long and its falling on deaf ears anyways. Linux will never succeed at winning microsoft's market share. Linux doesnt play the game. You can sell it to buisnesses which is great.... But the second you can convince every highschool kid into thinking running linux is "cool" and running windows is "gay", you might actually hurt Billy Goat Gates. Take a lesson from APPLE and the IPOD. It is possible to shift an entire market into your corner through great marketing and a great product! Marketing and image is key, and the time is ripe. MS is hurting. Vista looks like crippleware and people are sick and tired of windows crashing and becoming infected with all kinds of horrible stuff. Mak
Honestly I will rarely spend money on an official dvd anymore if it's foreign. If it's not a US DVD I will probably just buy the Chinese bootleg for 1/4 the price and with _NO_ region code. What do the companies think they are gaining in this day and age by trying to restrict region access when we have portable dvd players everywhere, laptops all come equipped standard with dvd playback. If I travel to another country they don't want me to play a dvd there? The whole concept is a throwback to a time when instant dissemnation of information was impossible. The comnpanies are trying to maintain an artificial grip on the world's distribution system but in the process they are encouraging not only piracy but also organized crime and the people who own these huge illegal pirating operations throughout the world.
Because the Japanese anime company may eventually sell the rights to market and redistribute the DVD media to some company in the U.S..
That U.S. company may add value (subs/dubs/easter eggs/inserts, etc) to the Japanese media. The U.S. company that goes through the trouble of establishing distribution channels and pays for advertising the Japanese DVD in the U.S. will want "exclusive" rights to the U.S.-- that is, it wants to be sure its DVD doesn't have to compete with the original media being sold by some importer.
This is why they region-lock movies that are not new; it's not always about the DVD beating the box office release date.
Region-locking is about guaranteeing that the locals to a particular market get exclusive rights.
The Japanese anime company probably has no clue as to what they want to do with the anime now. But it region locks just in case the thing turns into a cult hit somewhere in the world. By region-locking, it can get more $$$ by guaranteeing that that average consumer (with a region-enforcing DVD player) has never seen the content-- even if it's "old" in its original market.
I too own "hacked" (because they're old) DVD and Playstation hardware because I (legitimately) own Japanese and U.S. media.
I hate that they do it. I especially hate it because the American re-distributers of foreign DVDs often TAKE AWAY value-- remove certain subtitles and dubs, offer only full-screen and not widescreen versions, etc. It's not a matter of being unwillig to pay these re-distributers their cut. It's a matter of getting the same media. If they just ADDED value (an English track or subs, etc.), I wouldn't have a problem with it.
But I understand why they do it.
And I doubt they'll listen to me-- because for every one of me, there are 10000 who are fine with region 1 DVDs in region 1 players that will never complain.
Oddly enough, I have the tendency to watch movies at 1.1x. Really bad Hollywood schlock gets 1.4x. You wouldn't believe how many pacing problems this can solve.
The ______ Agenda
The anti-Microsoft rhetoric here gets really tiresome
Could be worse, could be a knee-jerk Microsoft appologist.
Of course Microsoft forces their products and upgrades on people, it's what their entire business is based on. Want to keep your OEM discount? Better not install Netscape, or they'll cut your discount and your compeditors will destroy you. Want to play games on your computer? Had to upgrade from 2k to XP to get DirectX. Why is each version of Office not quite backwards compatible? So you'll be forced to upgrade to make sure you can handle all your clients files.
Sure, there are worse companies out there. Monsato comes to mind. But they're still pretty damn bad.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz