Tip about encrypted DVD playback

kyouens · 2009-03-24 19:53:07

Hi all,

I just wanted to share a tip about encrypted DVD playback, since I had some trouble and just figured it out. I'm running an updated X86_64 Arch install on a new Lenovo Thinkpad T500, and I now have DVDs playing fine in Totem. After doing the usual things recommended in the Wiki :

 
#gpasswd -a USERNAME optical
#pacman -S libdvdread libdvdcss libdvdnav

I was still unable to play DVDs at this point, Totem froze, and I got endless errors about how the DVD encryption couldn't be cracked. I read on the Ubuntu forums about a program called regionset that sets the DVD drive's region code (in its firmware, I believe). There is a package for regionset in AUR, which I compiled after changing the PKGBUILD to allow X86_64 architecture. After installing and running regionset, I determined the problem. There was no region code set in my drive's firmware. (I suppose most people don't run into this problem because they run Windows on their machines prior to installing Linux, and I'm supposing the Windows install sets the DVD player's region code at some point? I removed Vista from this machine from Day 1.) I set my region code to "1" (for North America). A word of caution: Most drives only allow you to change the region code 5 times before it is locked forever, so be cautious when changing your region code.

Anyhow, after I set my DVD region, all was well. I can now watch my Looney Tunes Golden Collection perfectly. Hopefully this tip might be useful to the next person who comes along.

.:B:. · 2009-03-24 20:03:24

The region setting is part of the firmware. Most people never stumble upon it because they only watch DVD's with the same region code .

My laptop originally came from the US, so I had to set the drive to region 2 to get it to read/rip DVDs. Normally you can change region code up to five times, then it locks the last setting. Some drives can be made region-free though.

Linux vs Windows has nothing to do with it. It's in the firmware and although Linux (and probably Windows too) has tools to influence the setting, it does not depend on it. So for 99% of the users setting the region is unnecessary. It is quite strange though your drive didn't have any setting at all (i don't know how a region-free drive reports itself).

kyouens · 2009-03-24 20:08:30

Yes, it does seem that for most people the region code is not ever an issue. I tried everything else I could think of, and this was what did the trick. I don't know why my drive didn't seem to have a region code set. Odd.

R00KIE · 2009-03-24 20:20:46

If the drive has never had a region locked dvd inside that needed to be played then no region is set as a default.
And it's like you say, for most people its set once and forget.
On the matter of region free drives, if I'm not mistaken, when queried they say they are RPC-I or that they don't support that feature.
Google a bit for rpc1 region free and I'm sure you will find lots of interesting info

Edit:
Speaking of this, anyone knows of any nice tools to get that info from the drives along with all the other capabilities as well as atip information from the inserted media?

Last edited by R00KIE (2009-03-24 20:22:48)

Arch Linux

#1 2009-03-24 19:53:07

Tip about encrypted DVD playback

#2 2009-03-24 20:03:24

Re: Tip about encrypted DVD playback

#3 2009-03-24 20:08:30

Re: Tip about encrypted DVD playback

#4 2009-03-24 20:20:46

Re: Tip about encrypted DVD playback

Board footer