US DVDs

[Elaine62]

This might seem like a stupid question but i'll ask it anyway. We bought a dvd to try it on our machine last year at home. We changed the dvd player settings to allow it to work and it worked fine. does this mean that all dvds now bought in the USA will work on our machine or is it just a hit or a miss?

thanks

Elaine

[pieman790]

If the DVD you have bought home says region 1 on the case then yes all region 1 DVD bought in the US will work.

[steph_goodrum]

I have read that some machines need to have the settings changed to region free each time it is used and will only allow something like 5 changes then it will stay permanently whichever way the last change was (my daughters laptop was the same).

We changed both our UK ones and our US ones to be region free so that the discs can be played on either machine.

We have foudn a couple though that we have brought back obviously have some other protection as when we have tried to play them here they have displayed the "incorrect region" error but play fine on my daughter US portable DVD, so there is no guarantee the every single one will work but all you can do is try. We usually bring back at least half a dozen my daughter has picked up a year and only 1 or 3 havent worked.

[pieman790]

Laptop and desk top computers change the region setting after 5 uses but normal DVD player once set to multi region will play any region disc until the unit is changed by the owner.
You can make most DVD player multi region by adding a code using the remote control however some require more than this. I bought our home DVD player from the Sony Centre in England and they had the player made multi region before i collected by adding a chip. By doing it this way does not invalidate my Sony warranty as Sony carried out the upgrade.
If your adding a code by the remote, this does not normally invalidate your warranty.

[flyrr100]

I bought a ready made region free multi system DVD player from a seller on ebay for around $50. It was a JVC, new in the box machine. Also dual voltage.
Plays all my DVDs from around the world on my US NTSC TV. Also will work on a British PAL TV.
I just looked, and there are plenty on ebay right now. Most for under $100. With the dollar as bad as it is now that's a steal for any Brit!

[wilfy]

I read somewhere that all dvd players are built region free and then have a little program blown onto a chip to make it for a specific region. When you 'chip' a dvd player or enter a code, it's normally reseting the unit back to factory defaults.

[ShirleyD]

I just put a code in via the remote to change our region to multi region. I think I got it from the internet

[steph_goodrum]

There are some models that you can't do that with, one of ours we found it impossible to find out how to do it.

[flyrr100]

Some can be changed with an easy code from the remote. But some need a new chip put into the machine.

[florida4sun]

To answer your question....
If your 'machine' is a computer then you can only change the region up to 5 times at which point it lock onto that region.
or
If you 'machine' is a dvd player and you have put in code to unlock the regions and it played a USA region 1 disc then it should play any USA disc.
Some dvd players have a code that makes the region free which means they will play any dvd from any country. Some have codes which you have to enter for each region.
Although you can now buy region free dvd players for as little as £20 (we had one from argos).




<blockquote id="quote" class="ffs">quote:Originally posted by Elaine62
This might seem like a stupid question but i'll ask it anyway. We bought a dvd to try it on our machine last year at home. We changed the dvd player settings to allow it to work and it worked fine. does this mean that all dvds now bought in the USA will work on our machine or is it just a hit or a miss?

thanks

Elaine
[/quote]