Questions about Region Free DVD Players

[wuggles451]

I tried doing some research on my own but came up empty, so i figured I'd ask the board. Do any companies in the use make region free players, if so who? If not is it illegal for me to have my current player modified?

Thanks for any info you can provide.

[Hamish]

www.vcdhelp.com check for a hack for the one you have at the moment

most dvd players now days are multi-zone

[dean]

although most dvd players are multi zone, i'm always annoyed when i try and watch my friends dvds he gets from china [and usually they arent released here yet! ] but they are in black and white.  i'm guessing its an incompatible tv [i just change tvs and it works fine, but its annoying]
am i right or is there another reason?

[Brother Ragnarok]

How reliable are these hack things that change the region coding?  I've heard they exist, but no one I've ever asked has heard of them.  What are the chances they just completely destroy your DVD player?  I have a region 1 player and really want to get a region 0 or make mine 0.

Brother R

[Pete B6K]

As far as I understand, every DVD player is originally manufactured region-free. It is then adjusted to its region of sale, or left region-free and sold as such. The adjustment is often made using simple codes through the remote, and people have found out these codes, and can use them themselves, these are the most common kinds of region-hack. I have successfully hacked 2 out of 2 players using these hacks and made them from region 2 to multi-region. In fact when buying the second player, we were deciding out of three players, and I checked the internet to see which one we could hack, and bought it for that one reason, as near half of my DVDs are region 1.

'DVD Region Hacks' has most of the well known hacks.

There are also some players that can't be hacked this simply, and there are companies who offer to make them region-free by adding chips and adjusting the actual hardware. I don't know too much about all that and personally it's not the kind of thing I'd have done.

[wuggles451]

Thanks for the info. Im gonna go try and hack my player with a code i found. If it doesnt work...well i guess i'll save my pennies for an all region player.

[Jim H]

That's because the video are NTSC, and you're in a PAL zone (best guess).  I'm assuming you're in Europe?

[Brother Ragnarok]

I checked out the page, and directions were given for only one Sony player (not the same model as mine).
There's also a blurb about damages resulting the following of the hack codes.  What could these things do to your player?

Brother R