dodo Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 According to this blog post: http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/.../09/502014.aspx Microsoft are ceasing support for "DVD drives manufactured before 2000", that don't have hardware region coding. It is not clear if they are banning ALL RPC-1 drives or just old hardware, however from reading the article it certainly appears that the banning of region-free drives is what they are about. This means that anyone who has flashed the firmware or modified their DVD-ROM drives (or DVD-RW drives) to make them region-free will find that they no longer work in Vista (including Vista Media Centre). So much for watching your region 1 DVDs on your Windows Vista-based HTPC.
AdrianW1503559681 Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 So much for watching your region 1 DVDs on your Windows Vista-based HTPC. I should think that the ACCC will have something to say about that!
jokiin Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 So much for watching your region 1 DVDs on your Windows Vista-based HTPC. No big deal, drives are that cheap these days just put in one for each region
ajm1503559545 Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 Dontcha just lurve what DRM does to protect us from them danged pirates?
AlexF Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 No big deal, drives are that cheap these days just put in one for each region That'll make everyone from the DVD Forum very happy - get 6x the license fee.
jokiin Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 Yeah maybe, I wouldn't be needing six drives though, 3 maybe, region 1,2 and 4 would do it.
tonygib Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 Well, there's one more reason to not worry about vista. All in all, its a pitty that someone doesn't lodge a protest in the WTO, since region coding has nothing to do with copy protection and everything to do with preventing free trade. O' wait, silly me, its only not free trade when it isn't in the interests of the USA!!!!!
AlexF Posted January 2, 2006 Posted January 2, 2006 (edited) There should be some kind of pollution penalty imposed upon any technology that forces consumers to buy more than one device/media for the same purpose. For example, if the only way I can watch Kill Bill 1 in Australia and in Netherlands is by buying two disks (because of the region coding), then the licence holder for region-coding should have to pay a penalty for focing me to buy the second disk. That'll sort most of DRM out. Edited January 2, 2006 by Alex
ero Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 couldn't stop software based region coding such as AnyDVD could it??
hottoddy Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Unfortunatley we will need to find a way around this a Microsoft will no doubt use their clout to "suggest" (read:force) OEM's and software manfactures to produce products that will only work on Vista and by stealth force everyone else into obsolesence! I love the idea of a drive for every region! What a top idea!
Bob Raymount Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 And just how long do you think it will take for those smarter than us out there to tell Mr Gates where to shove it by creating a hack. Ain't nothing been made that can't be hacked. Bill may give a few 14 year old whiz kids a few hours work but I am sure it will be done.
DavoNogo Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 I'm certainly in the clear as one of my drives (purchased in Australia) is stuck on Region 2 even with 5 changes remaining with absolutely no way to change it (region free software only works 1 out of 5 times)
joeybloggs Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Whilst I certainly intend to tell Bill and his mates where to shove it Don't be deluded into thinking that this technology will be easily hacking in a few hours. It has been engineered at every level to be very secure and involves multiple levels of protection from the hardware, firmware, drivers, operating system and on up. The only real defense is to refuse to buy it in the first place.
Seak Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Reality check? I wonder how many of us still use pre 1 January 2000 DVD ROM drives in our PC's? I suspect very very few! If you read the blog carefully only such drives are affected ...
MELso Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 (edited) I think this is quite a positive move (and I HATE region coding). This tends to suggest that Microsoft will be relying on hardware based region coding (easily bypassed with hacked firmware), rather than a combo of hardware and software. It will make the job of bypassing region coding easier, not harder... EDIT - see http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/archive/DVDregion.mspx for more info on how Windows currently treats RPC1 and RPC2 drives... Edited January 3, 2006 by samuelowens
tonygib Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Reality check?I wonder how many of us still use pre 1 January 2000 DVD ROM drives in our PC's? I suspect very very few! If you read the blog carefully only such drives are affected ... Got one in use in my "newer" P4 internet connection machine. Since I was moving along on upgrades, i just took the DVD-ROM out of the old comp and put it in the new one. I had no need for another burner and why buy another DVD-ROM drive at the time when a perfectly good one basically wasn't going to be used anyway. Up to my very recent upgrade, I still had a whole pre 2000 computer being used, all be it not every day, but still, it works and did the job (more then enough) that was needed.
PURITyKin Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 FFS, If this is true (being that it came from a blog), I cant tell you how angry ill be. Seriosuly, I cant even listen to my new korn CD on the bus because i'm a portentual pirate.
DavoNogo Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 Up to my very recent upgrade, I still had a whole pre 2000 computer being used, all be it not every day, but still, it works and did the job (more then enough) that was needed. It's "albeit".. still pronounced the same, just not spelt right
tonygib Posted January 3, 2006 Posted January 3, 2006 It's "albeit".. still pronounced the same, just not spelt right OK, just cut that out, thats twice now, I'm dyslectic, leave me only
dodo Posted January 3, 2006 Author Posted January 3, 2006 (edited) Reality check?I wonder how many of us still use pre 1 January 2000 DVD ROM drives in our PC's? I suspect very very few! If you read the blog carefully only such drives are affected ... And if you read between the lines, the reason they are affected is because they lack hardware region coding. There are many of us that use firmware fixes to remove region coding on DVD-ROM drives, and in fact my local PC store was selling region-free DVD-ROM drives the last time I was in there. So you tell me if it means "only pre-2000 drives" or whether it really means "RPC-1 aka region-free" drives!? By the way, I have no idea whose blog it is, I got the link from an Inquirer article. Edited January 3, 2006 by dodo
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