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Region free mac?

james1758

james1758

macrumors regular
Original poster
May 26, 2013
196
11
UK
Hi guys,

Does anyone know of a way to region un-lock the MBP Mid 2009 for free? So that I can play both region 1 and region 2 dvds on my MBP.

Is the only option to replace the dvd drive on the mac (which I won't do), or is there any software that means i can region un-lock my MBP for free?

Thanks in advance :)
 
Aww, I might have spoken a bit hastily here after all. I know that VLC has a feature to circumvent DVD region lock. However, it seem that it does not work for all drives. I have no idea which one applies to your computer. I suggest that you try it out. If it doesn't work, you can still look into flashing the drive :)
 
Complex subject. As I recall, the Mac disk drive itself is region locked, would have to be rewritten by firmware, which nobody has cracked.

In the past, the solution was to buy an external Pioneer burner, which could be region-unlocked. The person who did this retired many years ago, don't know if anyone took up the challenge after that. I've got an external burner from that era which I unlocked.

You can buy various region free DVD players, eg

http://www.world-import.com/sony_region_free_dvd_player_DVP-SR320.htm

A bit hard to carry on the road with you?
 
This thread made me look into unlocking.

I now have a region free drive--mid-2012 cMBP with UJ-8A8

Don't need Windows to do it, just using Terminal--which can be a bit nerve-wracking if you've never used Terminal before. For example, I thought I'd bricked the drive, but a restart cured it.

That part about bricking the drive is why I hesitate to post the links here, however they're easy to find via google.
 
Idefix said:
This thread made me look into unlocking.

I now have a region free drive--mid-2012 cMBP with UJ-8A8

Don't need Windows to do it, just using Terminal--which can be a bit nerve-wracking if you've never used Terminal before. For example, I thought I'd bricked the drive, but a restart cured it.

That part about bricking the drive is why I hesitate to post the links here, however they're easy to find via google.
Click to expand...


Idefix, can you provide more info how you did it?
I have the same UJ-8A8 and wants to make it region free..
Thanks!
 
james1758 said:
Hi guys,

Does anyone know of a way to region un-lock the MBP Mid 2009 for free? So that I can play both region 1 and region 2 dvds on my MBP.

Is the only option to replace the dvd drive on the mac (which I won't do), or is there any software that means i can region un-lock my MBP for free?

Thanks in advance :)
Click to expand...
Maybe just easier to torrent what you are looking for.
 
Sorry for adding nothing meaningful, but i never understood region lock. What a terrible terrible idea.
 
I think region lock was introduced by the movie companies and they done this because not every country
would get to see a cinema/dvd movie at the same time. Most of the time the U.S.A sees the cinema/dvd movie
months before the rest of the world (back in the day). So if there was no region lock people outside of America
could buy the movie DVD from America before the movie being shown in cinemas outside of America. Movie
companies make less money.

I made my iBook G3 466 Clameshell region free years ago as I had a lot of U.K dvd and I live in Australia.
 
Another interesting point here is that movies for the US market (Region 1) are sometimes cut to achieve a better rating. For example, the movie Vicky Christina Barcelona is only available in PG-13 rating (even though the dvd ad on Amazon says unrated) but if you buy it Region 2 it is unrated.
 
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