Set DVD Region on Drives?

[Geoff]

I have a bunch of HP PCs here. They come with WinDVD, however the region set on the DVD drive is 'none'. Thus when WinDVD first starts up it prompts for a region settings. Obviously this isn't going to work because teachers will probably muck it up.

So I need to set the region some other way. Perhaps a VBS script or a command line tool?

[Michael]

The region is usually set permanently (within the firmware) once you've used the drive 5 times to watch a DVD.

An alternative solution would be to flash the firmware to region 0 (if you know the make and model of drive) and this should play anything without prompting you to change the region. This will of course invalidate the warranty on the DVD drive, but they're dirt cheap to replace as I am sure you know!

[mac_shinobi]

LinVDR

2.3. Setting the DVD Region

All DVD drives (except for [http://www.dvdcca.org/rpc.html] RPC Phase I
drives made in 1999 or before) enforce region playback restrictions in the
drive firmware and consequently are supposed to be set to a specific region
before they can play back discs from that region (and only that region). In
reality, most Linux DVD playback software can bypass the DVD drive's built-in
region locks, but it takes extra time for the software to break the region
lock, and it is better to avoid the complications of region locks if you can.

For the small minority of readers who own RPC-I drives, you do not need to
do anything: your drive is already capable of handling DVDs from all
geographical regions. These drives are old enough by now that everybody who
has one of them probably knows already that they have one.

For the majority of readers who have RPC-II drives, there are several
options available:

1. If you only watch discs from one region, the easiest option is to use the
[http://linvdr.org/projects/regionset/] regionset program to set your DVD
drive to the correct region.

2. If you want to watch discs from multiple regions, you can try to find a
firmware upgrade for your DVD drive in the firmware-flash.com collection
of unofficial firmware files. Note that most of these files require you
to boot to DOS or Windows to install.

3. You can buy a separate DVD drive for each DVD region that you wish to
use. The prices for DVD-ROM drives have dropped low enough to make this
strategy feasible.

4. Of course, you can simply do nothing, and rely on the built-in ability of
Linux software to bypass the region restrictions. Note that even in this
case you should use the [http://linvdr.org/projects/regionset/] regionset
program to set the drive to the region that you will be using the most,
because an RPC-II drive without a region setting behaves as if all the
regions are locked out.
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/doc...Playback-HOWTO



http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...8VS.85%29.aspx


Setting the Initial DVD Region

It is the responsibility of the system manufacturer to select an initial DVD region for the DVD drive in their PCs.
Note Only encrypted discs can be used to set the region.
Windows 98

The system manufacturer can set a Registry key (HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\De faultDVDRegion (binary)) to set the default DVD region for the drive. The value of this key should be set to the region number for which it should be set on first playback. System manufacturers using OPK builds can add this value to the registry during an "audit mode boot," so the end user never sets the initial region. If this key is set before any DVD title is played on a DVD-enabled Windows system, then the Windows components will select that region for the drive on the first attempt to play back a DVD title.
If the system manufacturer sets the default region in the Registry and then plays a multi-region disc that includes the default region, the region is set to the default and the disc just plays. If the disc's region does not match the default region, the user will be prompted to change to the required region. (This will be the only region change allowed for an RPC-1 drive.) If no such default region is specified by the system manufacturer, Windows picks a region based on the Operating System locale, time zone, and other factors. If the first disc played is a multi-region disc, then Windows picks the region based on the locale, time zone, and other factors and looks for a match with the lowest region number. If no region on the multi-region disc matches the region picked by Windows, then the region with the lowest number on disc is selected.
If the manufacturer does not set a region, on first boot the Windows 98 Operating System base components will pick a region based on the Operating System language and the time zone and set the drive to that region. The system manufacturer is free to set the region on the drive and if that is not done during the manufacturing process, it is up to Windows to select the drive's region based on the best guess it can make.
Windows 2000 and Later

Starting in Windows 2000, the default DVD region is selected based upon the locale that the machine is set up for. Windows 2000 will always set the initial region for a DVD drive using this default region as well as the disc's region, if there is a disc is in the drive. The system manufacturer does not have to do anything to set the initial region for Windows 2000 DVD drives.
For RPC1 drives, if there is no disc in the drive during boot up then the default region is set based only on the locale of the machine. If there is a DVD disc in the drive during boot up, the default region is selected to be the drive's region, provided it matches a region of the disc; otherwise the lowest region on the disc is picked as the initial region of the drive. The user (or system manufacturer) has one remaining change allowed, in case the default was not correct.
For RPC2 drives, if during the setup process Windows 2000 finds that the drive does not have any region set (for example fresh drive), it will try to pick a region as above, but only if there is a disc in the drive. (RPC1 drives will choose the region without any disc in drive). Once a region is set for RPC2 drives, it is not auto-changed by either a re-installation or a clean installation of the Operating System.
The registry key on Windows 2000 systems is

HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\<CDROM GUID>\ <instance number>\DefaultDVDRegion(binary)

Taking the above into consideration you could use wmi to obtain the cdrom guid and not sure whre instance number is or how you find that out but you could use vbscript to then write the above registry entry into the registry and that should solve it

srochford should be able to help with the vbscript side and I am also not sure how you would ascertain the instance number w/e that is

[Arthur]

Is using VLC Media Player an option for playing DVDs? It doesn't care about regions and wouldn't prompt staff about setting the region.

[mac_shinobi]

Is using VLC Media Player an option for playing DVDs? It doesn't care about regions and wouldn't prompt staff about setting the region.

I was going to mention that but I always keep getting told that because of the libraries is uses its illegal ( at least as far as schools are concerned etc )

[p858snake]

I was going to mention that but I always keep getting told that because of the libraries is uses its illegal ( at least as far as schools are concerned etc )

...I don't think so, well atleast I haven't heard of it before, I know that the K-Lite codec pack does that though (or used to, i havn't used it in a awhile so no idea. I normally use the CCCP codec pack.)

[mac_shinobi]

I normally use the CCCP codec pack.)

Ive seen FN-GM mention that a few times but Ive never really looked into it

1 - As I use OS X and already have all I need for codecs etc
2 - Have never really looked into what it supports and don't want to start suggesting it at inappropriate times lol

Windows Media Player Classic is meant to be pretty good

Some feedback from Geoff once he sorts it out would be great to see what method he uses