Powerbook lombard Question

macg4 said:

Now i realize that a 333mhz model lombard powerbook doesnt have support on the motherboard for playing dvd movies, only the 400mhz model does. i was reading online that when it was new you could get a 2x dvd drive with the 333mhz model. now my question is, even though the 333mhz model doesnt support dvd playback because of a lack of a onboard decoder. would a combo dvd/cdrw drive in a 333mhz model still allow you to install software off dvd's or not? i know you couldnt watch any movies, but i would think you could still install off dvds right or read ones with data on them?

Click to expand...

Yes.

By the way, I believe all Lombards required a DVD decoder card. I was under the impression Pismo was the first with onboard decoding hardware.

Interesting... learn something new every day.

macg4 said:

Now i realize that a 333mhz model lombard powerbook doesnt have support on the motherboard for playing dvd movies, only the 400mhz model does. i was reading online that when it was new you could get a 2x dvd drive with the 333mhz model. now my question is, even though the 333mhz model doesnt support dvd playback because of a lack of a onboard decoder. would a combo dvd/cdrw drive in a 333mhz model still allow you to install software off dvd's or not? i know you couldnt watch any movies, but i would think you could still install off dvds right or read ones with data on them?

Click to expand...

Yes, you can do this... in fact, I did it with my Lombard back when it still worked right (I dropped it and cracked the screen... the machine still ran though!). I got a combo drive with 24x CD burning capability, and I believe 6x DVD read. Worked great, and you still can play DVDs using VLC... just don't expect it to be usable.

Another thing to mention is that since the decoder hardware doesn't work under OS X... the Lombard cannot play DVDs in OS X (very well) at all. You need the particular DVD Player version that supported the hardware, and run the thing in OS 9 in order to playback DVDs on the Lombard.