Region Free DVD (Buyers Guide: DVD Players)

Member Name: ianisme

Product:	Buyers Guide: DVD Players
Date:	07/05/02 (1255 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Easy to do, Costs nothing

Disadvantages: Might annoy the film industry, But then, who cares!

With the cost of DVD players coming down all the time, more and more people are searching the internet for sources of cheap dvd discs. Chances are that the biggest choices are not in the UK but in the US.

The other reason that people may want to shop in the US though is that films become available over here on DVD long before the UK. In fact, they may become available before the film even makes it into the UK cinemas.

Film makers are well aware of this anomaly and, in a bid to protect their own markets, perpetrated a real stitch up on consumers.

Basically all DVD players can play all DVD discs from anywhere in the world. This is because the technical specifications for DVD production were agreed right from the start (unlike videotape). To counter the problem of punters buying the disc before cinema release, manufacturers of DVD machines were forced to regionalise their products. Hence a DVD bought on the net from the US can't work on a UK bought player.

Well, when I say can't, I actually mean "won't". Almost without exception, the frigging of players to play DVD's from only one region is done with a hidden setting. In some cases this setting is done by moving a jumper on a circuit board. In most though it is done from the control panel (either on the unit itself or it's remote).

If you think about it, no manufacturer is going to make specialised hardware that only works in one market when he can make a machine that works worldwide. All you need to know is how to unlock the true versatility of your Digital Versatile Disc player (as they are sometimes known). Now, I am not going to tell you exactly how to do that for 2 reasons:-

1. Not sure it entirely legal to print this information.

2. There are too many machines with lots of different techniques to follow.

What I will do though is suggest that you go to your favourite browser ( I prefer Google.com) and type in som
ething like "regionfree dvd". There are hundreds of sites out there with exactly the information you are looking for. Don't worry about different broadcast standards either as DVD discs are all produced with the same info. It is only your player that decides what output format to use.

A site of no particular interest (nudge, nudge) is www.regionfreedvd.net. Not that I would suggest anybody should go there and found out exactly what to do. No, wouldn't even think about it!

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