Region Free DVD Player Recommendations

H

Harvey

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Does anyone have any recommendations which Region Free DVD player I should get? Or where to get a relatively inexpensive one?

My new Macbook Pro has a DVD player that checks DVD regions via firmware, so I cannot play foreign DVDs using VLC without switching the region anymore. I have a lot of foreign DVDs from various places, so eventually I'm going to run out of switch allowances!

Any help appreciated.

- harvey
 
I feel your pain Harvey. Same story, but we are always with regions 1, 2 (and sometimes 4) ....
I've bought 2 players, first one was from http://www.dvdoverseas.com - I don't remember which model. A plain simple one, and it works great.
A second one we bought for Europe from Amazon.co.uk and also this was a plain model (but plain old TV, and rather nicer computer screens..). Also this is a great one. I forgot which model also that is, but it is currently on M's parents in ND (so it even deals with 100-240 V, even better) so that they can watch all the European movies they are getting. Amazon UK ships to the rest of Europe.
My definition of works great with the DVD players is that it plays the movies I want and have from every region I have, and is easy enough to use.
I'm pretty sure there has to be some part in Japan or at least in Asia where they also make or find the region free players easier. Maybe in Korea, or at least in HK since if I remember right mainland China and HK are in different DVD regions...
 
Thanks for the link Giaguara! They have lots of good gear. I forgot to change my profile, but I got back from Japan in March, so I'm in the states for now.

One question, a lot of these DVD players handle 110 or 220, but Japan is 100, and I think that's one of the places I am likely to go back to. Any idea what would happen if I plugged the Pioneer DV300s into a 100 volt socket?

I'll send them an email as well to check it out.

Thanks for the link!

- Harvey

http://www.dvdoverseas.com/store/index.html?loadfile=catalog87_0.html
 
Since I've lived all over the world I've collected a legitimate collection of DVDs of various regions. I don't understand the region locking. It's just a pain.

So, for years I've been updating my PCs's DVD drives with hacked firmwares. I've done it to a few Macs too. It's worked great. Check out this site for instructions and firmwares:
http://www.powerbook-fr.com/dossiers/dvd_region_free_en_article30.html

2 things.
1 - This will technically invalidate your warranty, though whether an Apple Genius will notice is (to me) doubtful.
2 - These guys know what they're talking about so do read all the instructions (in particular about the sofware/hardware region locks, and about setting the drive region before upgrading).

Lastly, if your drive isn't listed yet, don't lose hope. They do seem to get hacks fairly regularly. Mine wasn't listed when I bought my Macbook Pro but it was a couple of months later.

If you still want to get actual DVD players, HKFlix (http://www.hkflix.com/hardware/) know what they're doing too, and if you chose a DVD player do a Google search for "DVD Region Hack" and the model you're thinking of. Often a remote-control combo will unlock it, particularly those models you see retailers hawking at marked up prices as Region Unlocked!
 
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