[X4U] Unlocking DVD for other regions

[Stroller]

On 15 Oct 2007, at 15:41, Eugene wrote:
> On Sat, Oct 13, 2007 at 02:20:11AM CDT, Roy van der Westhuizen  
> <roy at ion.co.za> wrote:
>>
>> Eugene, the film I am after is only available on/in the NTSC  
>> format. So
>> simply put, I want to buy it and play it in South Africa. To the  
>> best of my
>> knowledge, we are region 2, not one. Our TV's are PAL. How that  
>> affects
>> playing NTSC format I don't know. Possibly I can select 'Region   
>> 1' on the
>> machine.
> ...
> Your most practical solution, as mentioned by other posters,
> is to buy one of those Asian DVD players that let you to switch
> region codes and also handle different video formats.  A quick
> Google search brought up plenty of hits.  Here's one (just an
> example, I am not associated with these people at all):
>
> 	http://www.dvdoverseas.com/dvd.htm

Hi Eugene,

Whilst I find myself very much in agreement with your post, I'm  
compelled to remark that I find this supplier's headline prices seem  
a little steep, especially considering shipping. I'm sure you only  
provided them as an example, but I'd just like to point this out so  
that Mr van der Westhuizen doesn't consider them a baseline price.

Here in the UK it's quite easy to pick up a region-free DVD player  
for as little as £20 ($40). My mother bought one for c £22 from an  
online supplier <http://svp.co.uk> but many of those in Tescos and  
other supermarkets can be de-regionalised, too. I am sure this is the  
case for all the cheapest players.

If Mr van der Westhuizen is prepared to do a little homework he could  
surely find a web-forum used by South African DVD / movie enthusiasts  
and find out which models currently on offer in his country's high  
street can be deregionalised. Typically this involves entering a 4- 
digit code using the remote and the unit is then region-free for  
life. He will surely be able to find one for less than $60 US.

Alternatively, he could go into any supermarket or cheap electrical  
retailer, see what models they list & Google the results, appending  
the words "region free". For example I looked up the cheapest two  
players at Tesco.com (UK supermarket) which are priced at £17.69 &  
£22.97 respectively and discovered that both can easily be made  
region free.
http://www.google.com/search?q=Tesco+Value+DVD306+region+free
http://www.google.com/search?q=Technika+DVD1031+region+free

As you say, the NTSC / PAL format isn't important - modern tellies  
will happily play either, as will all DVD players. So the region- 
encoding is the only important matter.

If Mr van der Westhuizen is only interested in one particular movie  
then the cheapest solution is to buy the DVD and use MacTheRipper,  
Handbrake or whatever to remove the region-encoding. I don't need to  
do this myself, so can't remember how it's done, but I have done it  
in the past "as an exercise". I'm sure it only took me an hour or  
two, and I'm sure most of that time is waiting for jobs to finish on  
the computer (so it is time that is not wasted, but can be spent  
doing other things); there are plenty of guides to this on the net -  
one could easily find them with Google.

Stroller.