Changing the region code on a dvd

[dtopp]

I was recently given a DVD movie made in Europe. I can play it on a computer, but not a standalone dvd player attached to the tv. I am wondering if there is software available to change the region code\ content on the dvd since I cannot alter the standalone player's region code. The computer I could do this on has an AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+ processor running at about 3 Ghz, 4 gig of RAM, using Windows 7 (32 bit). Thanks for the help.

[Guest]

Worst case, just extract the streams and re-author a DVD using MuxMan or equivalent.

There's probably an easier way but I'm not very familiar with all this DVD stuff. :)

[setarip_old]

@dtopp

Hi!

Unfortunately, changing the Region Code, which can be easily accomplished, is the least of your problems. Most, if not all, European DVDs use PAL format, while North American (including Indiana) DVDs use NTSC format. The major differences between the two are resolution and refresh rates.

Do a search here for "PAL to NTSC" to see the "professional" (read "complex") way to perform such a conversion.

If you should find that methodology to be beyond your ken, you might want to try the following:

http://85.230.118.136/showpost.php?p=1282721&postcount=5

[dtopp]

Worst case, just extract the streams and re-author a DVD using MuxMan or equivalent.

There's probably an easier way but I'm not very familiar with all this DVD stuff. :)

Thanks for the tip. Could you direct me to a source of information that will identify the streams that musted be extracted? Thanks,

Dan

[dtopp]

Thank you for the tip. I will try it.

DT

[laserfan]

dtopp you said it was a movie, and if what you want is to re-make the movie to play in your settop player, this is how I did it (once, way-back-when):
1. Open with VideoReDo and Save As elementary streams

2. Use DGPulldown to convert the PAL 25fps to 29.97fps

3. Re-mux (re-author, that is, I used IfoEdit, for reasons I don't recall i.e. normally I'd have used MuxMan but that probably didn't work)

VideoReDo is not free, but you can use it free for two weeks, or maybe someone here knows an easy way to demux the VIDEO_TS.

[Revgen]

Buy a cheap multi-region PAL/NTSC DVD player for 50 bucks.

[Ghitulescu]

This is always the advice I'm giving myself to anyone, however I'm in EU and here the things are different, the gear usually play both standards. We also pay double for them :(

So, while in EU was enough for a player to master PAL60 (actually a NTSC signal but with PAL color encoding) to achieve NTSC-compatibility, I'm not aware of any US gear that does NTSC50 :) - in other words you also need to buy a multistandard TV.

nb: In EU the best compatibility was achieved by using multistandard gear. The second best was PAL60 (also works with a PAL-only TV). The third best were the standard converters.

[zilog jones]

You can use DVD Shrink to re-author the DVD (set "No Compression" in Compression Settings if you have the space), and by default it will make a region-free disc.

@dtopp: How is your DVD player connected to your TV? If it is with HDMI or component you may be able to play a PAL DVD alright. If it is s-video or composite you're more likely to run into problems with colour (you may get a black & white picture). If your TV set is quite old and you get a rolling or scrambled picture you may be out of luck and will have to convert to NTSC like laserfan said.

So, while in EU was enough for a player to master PAL60 (actually a NTSC signal but with PAL color encoding) to achieve NTSC-compatibility, I'm not aware of any US gear that does NTSC50 :) - in other words you also need to buy a multistandard TV.

We also have the advantage of commonly available RGB connections, making PAL/NTSC colour issues redundant.