Veggie Dave

I'm just wondering if multi-region DVD players are generally available in the US yet? And if they are how many of you have got one?

Y'see, I've converted our new film from PAL to NTSC and it looks **** (to me anyway, and that's enough), so I'm wondering if there's anyone in the US and Canada who can actually watch PAL DVDs?

Saturnin

yah dude..u can get em anywehre for cheap......the most current one was the Malata player 393
http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...=&newdeptid=11

you can buy it for 59dollars and u can unlock it to play all region..... beats spendin 300bux for some piece of **** brand name....when this little guy does the job :D
also the old apex models had an unlock feature... you can get all the info u need on any dvd players http://www.nerd-out.com/forum/

Nefarious

One has nothing to do with the other.....

Veggie Dave

So, you're saying a standard 29.97fps NTSC DVD player will happily play a 25fps PAL DVD if there's no region code on it?

Nefarious

nope not what i said.... look into what region coding actually is does and refers too and i think you will see my point

Nefarious

he geographical regions are as follows:

REGION 1 -- USA, Canada
REGION 2 -- Japan, Europe, South Africa, Middle East, Greenland
REGION 3 -- S.Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Parts of South East Asia
REGION 4 -- Australia, New Zealand, Latin America (including Mexico)
REGION 5 -- Eastern Europe, Russia, India, Africa
REGION 6 -- China
REGION 0 or REGION ALL -- Discs are uncoded and can be played Worldwide, however, PAL discs must be played in a PAL-compatible unit and NTSC discs must be played in an NTSC-compatible unit.


ie PAL and NTSC have nothing to do with regions

Veggie Dave

I know what regional codes are, I know why they were originally used - therefore a multi-region DVD player is capable of playing both PAL and NTSC formats, which is why I asked the question in the first place

Veggie Dave

Except if a player can play both region 1 and region 2 then it can play both NTSC and PAL, hence the question...

Nefarious

wow... did you stop and read that.....

REGION 0 or REGION ALL -- Discs are uncoded and can be played Worldwide, however, PAL discs must be played in a PAL-compatible unit and NTSC discs must be played in an NTSC-compatible unit.

REGION 0 or REGION ALL -- Discs are uncoded and can be played Worldwide, however, PAL discs must be played in a PAL-compatible unit and NTSC discs must be played in an NTSC-compatible unit.

REGION 0 or REGION ALL -- Discs are uncoded and can be played Worldwide, however, PAL discs must be played in a PAL-compatible unit and NTSC discs must be played in an NTSC-compatible unit.

Nefarious

again.. mutli region isnt enough to make it work....

you would need... either an inline converter or a multi format tv etc and still has nothing to do with regions

Veggie Dave

I'll type slowly for you so you can understand

Consumer DVD players that can play both the NTSC and PAL formats are commonly known in Europe as multi-region DVD players

The fact that it's not a pedantically correct definition is not my fault

Nefarious

Well.. I can only answer the question as asked... I gave up trying to read minds after the first girlfriend.....

Veggie Dave

I know

Jesus, I was just asking a simple damn question - can people in the US play PAL DVDs...

Nefarious

ps you type plenty slow as it is.....

Nefarious

well then if you already know, then you already answered your own question right? Dont see many people running out to get a new dvd player just for one or two titles in PAL even at 100-150$

Veggie Dave

Multi region / multi format DVD players are the norm over here in Europe. I'd heard that standard DVD players in the US and Canada were now following the same trend (because manufacturers then only have to make one unit for world wide sale), so I asked the question to see if this was true

So no, I don't know the damn answer otherwise I wouldn't have asked!

Nefarious

Well I only wanted to clear it up.. language barrier or elsewise... look at the dvd player already listed...

From what I saw on that site... that player would indeed NOT do the job you are inquiring about..

after reading about it on yet another site, i concide it does do pal conversion

Veggie Dave

What we in Europe call Multi-Region, you seem to call Region Free

So, I'll re-phrase the question: are region free DVD players becoming the norm in the US and Canada?

And, to Nefarious, as I know you're in the trade - do you know of a pro PAL to NTSC convertor with acceptable interpolation so the converted MPG2 file looks like it's always been NTSC rather than having an incredibly annoying ghosting effect from the interpolation?

Nefarious

I would first suggest converting it while its still DV an not MPEG2, because at the point it seems your at now your looking at a third gen of compression...


as far as here in the states... region free has been around for a while, do all region free dvd players have converters built in, hardly.. are they avalible, yes.

Veggie Dave

Cheers Saturnin, but I'm not after buying one - I'm hoping in vain to not have to convert my film to NTSC so you guys can watch it, as at the moment the converted-to-NTSC version looks crap