DVD region question
 

Ok, I need help here. I have a bunch of region 1 DVDs (since I live in US). However, I am curious, whether these DVDs can be played in DVD-ROM drives of computers in Asia/Europe etc. I know that DVD players are supposed to have 'regions', but how about DVD-ROM drives?

Also, how much does a region-free-DVD player usually cost?

Many thanks in advance.

region free dvd players in the US can be purchased for below $40

basically ALL DVDs will play on DVD-ROMs but you may have to change the region settings in the DVD playing software though usually it does it itself.

I don't think so Andy. I know that region free video players used to be quite expensive and I'd think that the same holds true for dvd players. Everything I looked at and the one my bil got was at least $300, but that was a couple of years back.

Also, if you go to Circuit City or some place they often have no clue and might tell you a particular dvd player is region free when in reality it is not. As mine was supposed to be.

Normal DVD-ROM drives allow you to change the region 5 times, so you can go from 2 to 1 then to 3 etc but whatever you are set to for the last change you are stuck with. You can get region free software, but it doesn't always work.

I have 2 drives and use one for region 2 and one for region 1, although I only have a few region 1 discs.

I don't know how much they actually are but "a couple of years back" is a hell of a lot time regarding the topic.

You can get a Sony DVD-ROM drive here for under £20. Like I said they don't advertise them as region free, but you just get some software like DVD Genie to play other region discs.

You can get DVD-RW drives for under £40 now though, so if you can you're better with one of them for future as you can now get DVD-Rs as cheap as CDRs.

where ya been momma

not really, considering that the price for the video player 6 years ago was pretty much the same as 2 years ago. :P

Almost any DVD player can be encoded to be region free. It's usually a code typed in with the remote.

Ice

that's what was done to mine, but not everybody is able to do that by themselves - I, fortunately, have a brother in law with 'skills' :wink: