[Ti] newbie question DVD region code

[Trevor J. Hutley]

At 09:51 -0600 1-12-2002, Jerry Kemp wrote:
>Trevor,
>
>Can you post the 'flash the firmware' info that you used on your Rev 
>A?  I also have a TI500 that I would like to make region neutral.
>
>Jerry
>

Jerry - here is my full post from 20-NOV that addressed this issue.
In the second part of the note, I give the step-by-step details of what to do.

To: <Titanium at lists.themacintoshguy.com> (PowerBook G4 Titanium List)
Date: Wed, 20 Nov 2002 07:46:58 +0100
From: "Trevor J. Hutley" <hutley at geneva-link.ch>
Subject: Re: [Ti] DVD question


At 16:05 +0000 19-11-2002, Colin Buttimer wrote:
>Dear All,
>
>I've been patiently waiting for a particular DVD release (Tarkovsky's
>Solaris on the Criterion Collection) and have just read the following in
>their site faq:
>>  I live outside of North America. Will Criterion DVDs play on my machine?
>>  The vast majority of Criterion DVDs are released with North American rights
>>  only. While there are DVD players that have been altered to allow various
>>  region discs to play on them and while many of our releases do not carry
>>  region encoding, we can not ship to addresses outside North America, nor can
>>  we provide technical support to customers outside of this territory.
>
>I'd be very grateful if anybody could tell me:
>1. does this mean my TiBook purchased in the UK won't be able to play this
>DVD, and
>2. if that's the case whether there is anything I can do about it

Colin:

Q1: probably not (as Apple set the region code tothe region where the
Tibook is sold
Q2: there MAY be something you can do about it:

I suggest that you are more specific in your post (Rather than just
"my Tibook"), so that we know what sort of DVD drive you have.
I bought my Ti-500 (Rev A) in California.  I have many DVDs from many regions.
I was able to flash the firmware on my DVD drive (it is a Matsushita
SR-8187) without problem, and now I can play DVDs from any region
without problem.

All has been explained before, on this list, if you check the archives.
I append my post from January this year, when I had to flash my new
drive (the old one died - mechanical failure - and was replaced under
warranty); after which I described step by step what I did.

The key issue is whether a patch exists for the particular drive you have.
I am willing to put all my (freely available) DVD utilities/hacks/url
that I have collected, on my .mac download page, if it could help you
or anyone.  Just let me know.

regards,  Trevor


Geneva, Switzerland - Thursday 17 January 2002


THIS NOTE DESCRIBES THE STEPS TO MAKE MY DVD DRIVE REGION FREE (RPC-1)


Over the New Year, I sent my Ti-500 back to Apple, because the CD/DVD
drive had completely died.

They replaced it under guarantee, with the same type of DVD drive:
from Matsushita, model SR-8187 (I looked in my Apple System Profiler,
under Devices & Volumes).

The new DVD drive was an RPC2 drive, set at Region 2 [Europe].

Since I have DVD from the USA [Region 1] and Hong Kong [Region 3], I
wanted to make my DVD drive region-free again.

I thought that I would summarize the process, for those who are interested.

	THIS IS ALL AT YOUR OWN RISK.
	I AM NOT RECOMMENDING NOR PROPOSING ANYTHING.
	I AM JUST DESCRIBING WHAT I DID AND THE RESULTS.
	READ ALL THE INFO THAT COMES WITH THE UTILITIES NEEDED.

ESPECIALLY MAKE SURE NOT TO INTERRUPT THE APPLE OR HACK FIRMWARE
UPDATE PROCESSES.


This URL (Mac DVD Resource) is the place from which to find all the
utilities and hacks, either hosted there or linked:
	<http://www.WormInTheApple.gr/macdvd/>


THE STEPS TO MAKE MY DVD DRIVE REGION FREE (RPC-1)


1. run DVDInfo 2.0.3 (by xvi) and you will see a result like this:

		Model:    MATSHITA DVD-ROM SR-8187
    		Firmware: HA15
       		RPC-2:    Region locked (Phase II)

2. run  the APPLE "PowerBook G4 DVD-ROM Update" 1.0

<http://www.versiontracker.com/redir.fcgi/kind=1&db=mac&id=11021/_PB_G4_DVDROM_Update.smi.bin>

This updates the HA15 to an HA18 firmware.

Apple System Profiler should show that the DVD drive is now HA18.

3. RESTART

4. run the Matsushita SR-8187 XA18 updater,
    which then updates (hacks) the firmware to XA18

5, restart

6. run DVDInfo 2.0.3, which then shows:

        Vendor: MATSHITA
         Model: DVD-ROM SR-8187
      Firmware: XA18
    RPC Status: RPC-1 (region-free)

The DVD drive is now region-free.

What this means is that it will (should) read DVD from any region.
All mine are OK.
If you put in a DVD from another region, you will be prompted for a
region change.

You can manage the number of region changes with the utility REGION
1.0.9 (also by xvi).

Note that Region ONLY works on RPC-1 drives, so you need to go
through steps 1 - 6 above to get to that type of drive.

I hope that this overview is helpful.

I have appreciated all the input from Fred Clarke on this subject,
who tells me that he has made about 50 DVD drives region free.  I am
a relative beginner, as this is only my second one !

regards, Trevor

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