WHY THIS DVD WON'T PLAY IN MY MACHINE ?
WHY THIS DVD WON'T PLAY IN MY MACHINE ?
They're supposed to play EVERYTHING! The salesman and the
catalogue promised you that THIS machine can handle DVD's, CD's,
MP3's, JPG's VCD, CD-R's, etc etc etc.
But that DVD movie you bought on the internet from overseas
absolutely refuses to play. With or without an accompanying
error message on the TV screen , you wonder whether you have
just wasted good money.
But who to blame ? Maybe the disc itself was faulty ? Perhaps
the salesman lied about what the machine could do ?
None of the above ! The disc is not faulty and the salesman
didn't lie, though I guarantee he didn't give you the full story.
There are 2 compatibility issues to consider with DVD discs that
you obtain from overseas. Both conditions need to be satisfied
for the disc to play !
REGIONS
The first is REGIONS (or zones).
Your DVD manual will tell you what region your machine is. Many
machines also have a region logo at the back. If your DVD player
is multi-zone, congratulations, it will play all discs from all
countries. Multi-zone is also known as "region zero".
However, if your machine is region locked,it can ONLY play discs
with that particular region code. If the regions don't match,
the disc won't play. The most common locked regions are region 1
(USA), region 2 (UK- Europe) and region 4 (Australia). I should
emphasise here that this issue only applies to foreign discs.
The retailers in your country will only sell DVD's in your local
region designation.
There is an important exception to this rule - some DVD discs
are released as "region zero" or "region-free"or "all-regions".
These DVD's will play fine in any region-locked machine.
BYPASSING THE REGION LOCKING
About half of all locked DVD players can be permanently unlocked
via the remote control. It depends on the brand and model. But
don't go searching for the magic button because it's not there -
the models that can be unlocked require a unique special
sequence of key- presses to be entered. The code-sequences are
one of those ridiculous pretend secrets that consumers are not
meant to be aware of - but if you ask the salesman, or the local
company distributor, or find the right website, the information
can be obtained in a short amount of time.
This is because at the DVD factory the machines earmarked for
various countries are basically the same, except for the
electrical plug and a few software settings such as the region
code eg the machines destined for Australia are software locked
to 4, the machines destined for the USA are software locked to
region 1. By discovering and entering the special sequence, you
are basically emulating what they do at the factory and altering
the region coding. So a person in the USA who has just bought a
region 4 disc from Australia can alter the region coding on
their player to region 4, or more conveniently, region zero,
which means all-regions are accepted. Once made, the change is
written to the machine's long- term memory and does not need to
be re-entered even if the player is switched off.
PAL-NTSC
The SECOND compatibility issue with DVD's is the TV signal.
The DVD player generates a signal and send it to your TV set.
PAL and NTSC are 2 types of TV signal.
Japan and the USA use NTSC signals. The PAL system is used by
Australia, the UK and Europe. These signals were decided upon by
governments 50 years ago.
Practically all PAL and NTSC DVD's will play fine throughout
Australia, UK and Europe. This is because the DVD's and TV sets
sold throughout these countries are dual PAL and NTSC compatible.
THE PAL-NTSC issue is really only an issue for USA and Canada
customers. Certain brands of TV set and DVD players within the
USA do not handle PAL signals at all, while others handle it
badly (eg black and white image).
Many USA customers will successfully play a PAL disc just fine,
but a significant minority will not. For example, USA customers
with a Sony TV set or a Panasonic DVD player are unlikely to be
successful.
Check your manuals for both your TV set and DVD player to
confirm they mention PAL. If you don't have the manual, check
the onscreen menus.
If your player or TV set are locked to NTSC only, they cannot be
changed to PAL.
There is a school of thought that suggests all DVD players
should be able to read both PAL and NTSC media, simply because
the data as written on the disc comprises "1"'s and "0"'s, that
is, digital data. The theory goes that a DVD player is basically
a computer , therefore it can read both PAL and NTSC datasets.
While this is true up to a point, a DVD player also needs to
convert digital input into analog output to ensure compatibility
with most television sets. The problem arises when the factory
has not included the capability (eg a modulator) to generate and
send an NTSC signal from a PAL disc to a non-digital TV set. The
DVD player may be smart enough to know it does not have the
capability to generate a signal, therefore does not attempt to
play the disc.
WHAT KIND OF MACHINE WILL PLAY FOREIGN DISCS ?
Ironically, the cheaper the DVD player, the more likely it is to
be both dual PAL-NTSC compatible AND multi-region out of the
box. This is because the lesser-known and smaller manufacturers
from countries like China do not have "political" or financial
allegiances to the major American movie studios which
"encourage" the region restrictions.
This results in the bizarre situation where you can buy a
Chinese- made $40 DVD player which will not only play all
foreign DVD's, but has just as many functions and capabilities
as a $300 big brand machine. Of course, the big-brand machines
have better warranty support and superior build-quality and
components, so I'm certainly not saying their price is
unreasonable, just be aware that paying out top dollar for a
machine does not necessarily mean it can play foreign discs.
OTHER DEVICES
A quick word on other DVD playing devices - Playstations and
X-Boxes generally will not play foreign discs and have limited
capabilities. Some earlier models won't play dual layer discs,
also known as DVD-9, even from the correct region.
Interestingly it is not commonly known that the PAL-NTSC issue
does not apply at all to computers. This is because your monitor
is not a television set and your video card sends digital
signals, not PAL or NTSC signals.
However be aware that your computer's DVD player is probably
locked to your local region. Many models will allow you to play
5 discs of varying regions without complaint, but will then LOCK
PERMANENTLY to the region of the last disc ! There is software
available to bypass or even hack the DVD-player's internal
software, though Hollywood (via the MPAA) has made legal
challenges against certain DVD manipulation programs .
So next time you find a DVD on the internet that isn't available
in your own country, be sure to check the specifications of your
DVD player and TV set before sending away those hard-earned
dollars.
********************************************** Written by Darren
Robinson, webmaster of moviesearch.com.au
We sell some excellent DVD's that you probably can't buy in your
own country.
This article may be freely distributed with this resource box
included. **********************************************