R1 and R2 DVD's on one laptop

November 27, 2007 4:29 PM

I'm in the UK. I need to play R1 and R2 DVDs on my laptop - can it be as easy as buying a £15 external DVD drive and setting that R1?

My last laptop played any DVD I wanted, it was fantastic. My current laptop is set R2 and wont play R1 discs. I tried DVD Region Killer and it didn't work, my drive is set R2 and software changes won't appear to alter that. There is no firmware upgrade for the drive, and it isnt practical to switch between R1 and R2 (I think you only get to do that 5 times anyway.) I own a ton of DVDs both R1 and R2 and I plan on buying and watching plenty more.

Can I buy an external USB DVD drive and set that R1? Buy one from the US maybe? Buy an external UK DVD drive and use that for R2 while I set my laptop for R1 and play those there? I get the feeling it can't be that easy. This is for my office and I need to be able to play both regions on my laptop with the minimum of expenditure - the alternative is investing in a region free DVD player and brand new TV which is my very last resort. I'm using XP Pro Sp2. All suggestions welcome.

posted by oxala to Technology (10 answers total)

That should work, but I don't think they're quite that cheap.

You'd need to make sure your laptop has a USB 2 interface. The last notebook computer (but one) I bought turned out to have five USB 1 interfaces but no USB 2.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 4:32 PM on November 27, 2007

Not sure it would work, but I'd try something like DVD decrypter to make an ISO file (image) of the R1 DVD, then use Daemon tool to mount this image virtually.
posted by bluefrog at 4:43 PM on November 27, 2007

have you tried VLC? It should play back the DVDs regardless of what region they are encoded...plus, it's free.
posted by namewithoutwords at 4:48 PM on November 27, 2007

Not sure it would work, but I'd try something like DVD decrypter to make an ISO file (image) of the R1 DVD, then use Daemon tool to mount this image virtually.

Yes, that would work. DVD Decrypter can be set to strip region encoding (I think it's a default actually).
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 5:30 PM on November 27, 2007

Response by poster: I use VLC but the drive won't play the disc. Making an image of the DVD is a good suggestion but I don't want that much hassle.
posted by oxala at 5:36 PM on November 27, 2007

AnyDVD (and really any Slysoft product) is worth every penny. It's absolutely as simple as can be (just a tray app that always runs) and it will strip out region codes just like you want.
posted by mysterious1der at 6:22 PM on November 27, 2007

I use "DVD Region + CSS Free" for this same purpose. Can be bought here, or you know133;
posted by signal at 6:24 PM on November 27, 2007

Best answer:
VLC, DVDRegion, AnyDVD will not work on drives that wont let you read raw-data off an un-authorised DVD. Some DVD makers are known for this problem.

You can replace the DVD drive in your notebook, not always an attractive idea.

You can buy an external USB DVD drive (I did), after researching that it will; either let you read raw DVDs, or, has a rpc-1 firmware.

I went with the 2nd option, bought a IODATA dvr-un18gl, which is an OEM Optiarc (Sony/NEC) AD-7173A, which does have a rpc-1 firmware. (I used Liggy's & Dee's).

But only because the local-shop had one. :) Buying a DVD drive is a two step process. Check models the shop has, Google like crazy to find which can be made regionfree, return to purchase :)
posted by lundman at 6:56 PM on November 27, 2007

Oh, DVD Region even mentions it on their top-page:


NOTE: DVD-RAM, Matshita XX-8xxx, SW-9xxx series DVD drives, and Torisan DRD-Uxxx series DVD drives are not supported now, and there is no plan to support them.
But you can watch and copy CSS encrypted DVD movies when the drive region and disc region is matched on these DVD drives.

posted by lundman at 6:58 PM on November 27, 2007

There is a good chance that you can flash your DVD drive with a hacked firmware.
posted by Chuckles at 7:45 PM on November 27, 2007