[mythtv-users] Many new dvd's not working

Rob Verduijn rob.verduijn at gmail.com
Sat Jul 10 15:21:28 UTC 2010


2010/7/10 Glenn Sommer <glemsom at gmail.com>:
> 2010/7/10 Brian Wood <beww at beww.org>:
>> On Saturday, July 10, 2010 08:37:48 am Simon Hobson wrote:
>>> Brian J. Murrell wrote:
>>> >  > I
>>> >>
>>> >>  suspect it's some new stupid copy protection scheme that simply makes
>>> >>  life miserable for people legitimately renting or buying movies...
>>> >
>>> >Indeed.  FWUI, they master the DVDs in violation of the DVD standards
>>> >just enough to trip up DVD-ROM drives (and software) but not enough to
>>> >trip up bona fide DVD players.  If my understanding is correct, I'm not
>>> >sure why DVD-ROM drives/software can't just be more like DVD players,
>>> >but TBH, I don't really understand the details.
>>> >
>>> >  > Is there a workaround?
>>> >
>>> >The only workaround I know of (which I am not advocating) is to stop
>>> >renting/buying DVDs and obtain your material elsewhere where it's not
>>> >encumbered by this stupidity.
>>>
>>> Better still, take it back as faulty and demand a refund.
>>>
>>> Is there any "test suite" available that we could run against a disk
>>> to verify it conforms to the rule book for DVDs ? If so, then run
>>> that, and if it's non-compliant I'd also complain to Trading
>>> Standards that the supposed DVDs are not "as described" - a key
>>> requirement in UK consumer law.
>>>
>>> The key thing is that "just not buying them" won't hurt anyone
>>> because the volumes we'd not buy wouldn't even be a rounding error in
>>> the statistics. But returns cost the whole chain dear, and if we
>>> could get just one prosecution under consumer protection law for
>>> mislabelled "DVD"s then it would raise the profile of what's going
>>> on. Especially if there was a concerted effort to target one large
>>> chain (such as Walmart in the US) such that they decided it wasn't
>>> profitable to stock the output from one studio - now that would get
>>> the studio's attention.
>>
>> A problem with some of these recent "protection" schemes is that they have significant "collateral damage", many
>> "legitimate" DVD players won't play the new disks. They count on the fact that most people won't figure out what's
>> happening, and perhaps blame their "old" player.
>>
>> If people started to return players to the store, complaining that they won't play certain disks, that might get
>> "Walmart's" attention even more than disk returns.
>>
>> But handling a return on a disk that has a profit margin of pennies is a losing proposition for a retailer, a great "stone
>> in the shoe". Good idea.
>>
>
> I've seen this issue in several DVDs rented in blockbuster! :(
> The ONLY workaround I've found is to use VLC on a Windows machine...
> For some odd reason, that seems less sensible to the "broken" DVD
> formats... :(

I've found that vlc is indeed better at playing dvd's than myth's own
dvd player, I've tried mplayer as well but results are even worse.
The only drawback I currently found with vlc is that it does not turn
of power management. So make sure you turn it off yourself before
watching a dvd.


> _______________________________________________
> mythtv-users mailing list
> mythtv-users at mythtv.org
> http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
>


More information about the mythtv-users mailing list