[P1] Icebook dvd regionfree ???

[caipirina at mac.com]

Yes, interesting thought Ian .. but that would be to easy, no ? :) I copy
and paste this answer from the faq over at macdvd.com which explains that
there are 2 issues: Software based AND hardware based ... your thought
below would only work if you made the drive regionfree before .. 

Q: What do I need to do so I can play DVD movies from all regions?
A: In order to be able to play commercial DVD movies from all regions
without any restriction in your Macintosh computer you need to circumvent
two separate region locks:

The RPC-2 lock on the firmware of your DVD-ROM drive 
The software lock of the Apple DVD player. 
The first lock is firmware based: this means that it is part of your
DVD-ROM drive's hardware, rather than part of the computer or operating
system. So it does not matter what kind of software or operating system
(Mac OS or Windows) you use, this region lock will always be active. The
only way to circumvent it is to change the firmware of your DVD-ROM drive.

The second lock is particular to the Apple DVD player. This application
stores region information to a part of your computer's memory which is
called XPRAM. This part of the memory remains on even when you switch your
computer off. Normally, you have no way of erasing XPRAM, unless you reset
your computer's motherboard. However there are utilities which allow you to
access this XPRAM and make changes to the settings stored there.

P

From: Ian Sidle macmouse4 at attbi.com

One interesting though is - do you really need the drive itself region 
free?
How about this? The dvd software itself keeps track of how many times 
[3] you've changed the region. If you simply reinstall your system, you 
should be able to do 3 more times. [correct me if I'm wrong] I've heard 
there are patches for the apple dvd player software to allow unlimited 
region changes. Thus, you effectively get the same thing as a 
region-free dvd without the problems with the hardware. True, you would 
have to change settings for each odd dvd you played but thats not too 
much trouble.

thanks,
Ian


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