DVD drive problem Macrovision Fail

[Matpod]

I was about half way through watching hollow man. And the movie started to freeze up. My roomate tried it on his computer and it works. And while he was doing that I tried some of the other DVDs I own and none of them worked! I was using power DVD. I tried using windows media, Realone and a few other players and they all gave the following error message "Macrovision Fail".

I was just wondering if anyone knew what this is about or how to fix it.

[Xayd]

Macrovision is a pretty stupid attempt at copy prevention that the movie studios contracted out a few years back.

http://www.repairfaq.org/filipg/LINK/F_MacroVision.html

How to get rid of it is tricky.

If you've got a Creative DXR3 or Hollywood Plus card there are tools for those programs to disable it through the players/cards involved. If you've got an nVidia video card there's a tool called TV Tool that'll disable it.

If none of the above apply, about the only option is to rip the DVD to the hard drive with a ripper that can remove the macrovision and play it that way. Take a look at DVD Decrypter (to rip) and Daemon Tools (to mount the ISO you just ripped) for this scenario.

[Matpod]

The TVtools didn't work...I have a nvidia card btw. So, I tried to rip the DVD using DVD decrypter and it took almost 1 hour. I tried smart ripper and vstrip as well. They can only rip now at between 1 and 2 times. I used to be able to do a full rip in like 10-20 mins. Is this hardware or software problem? Did my DVD rom break during the movie?

The other thing is now (after some tinkering) I can get it to play all of my other DVD's but that part in Hollow Man still causes the player to crash(that is every player I have, PowerDVD, real, mpc, zoom, etc).

I was just wondering if the fact that it takes about 1 hour to rip a DVD now means anything. (hopefully it doesn't mean i need a new DVD rom :( )

[Xayd]

If you wanted to have some payback at Hollywood's expense, you should report to the studio that prodced the movie the fact that you have a defective DVD and make them send you a new one.

If something they put on the DVD prevents you from viewing something that you purchased with legitimate software, they're obligated to send you a replacement or send you your money back.

That's what I'd do ;).

Ripping speeds are largely dependant on the speed of your drives assuming they're IDE, and how they're setup. Since IDE can't process reads and writes simultaneously, if your DVD ROM happens to be slaved to the hard drive you're ripping to, it'll take a looooong time to rip (that's the likely reason).

edit: I just read the fact that you had ripped faster before. If it's taking that much longer there's some sort of error happening. Could just be that the DVD ROM needs cleaning, could be a flaw in the DVD itself, any number of things. Try ripping another movie and see if it takes as long? If it doesn't you have your problem, the DVD in question. If it does you've got an issue with the drive, maybe the laser maybe the cable maybe the drive itself, just have to use some trial and error to nail it down.

[Matpod]

It was the IDE channels, I'm currently running XP so I just uninstalled them and then restarted windows and now it works fine.

Just so ya know :)

O btw, I did get TV tools to work, that's an interesting program