Moved to a mac but have dvd issues

Hi there,

Still loving my mbp

However I have run into a little issue. The work I do means I need access to dvd playback and capture software and also a region free player. This is total legal and we own all the dvds I would be using to get screen captures from.

On my old pc I used anydvd and Powerdvd with great success but have run into the problem that you cannot have a region free setup on the macs dvd drive.

Whats the best way for me to sort this out? I could get an external drive that would require a flash to make it region free but what is the best software to get movie stills like powerdvd?

ANy thoughts on this would be great.

Apple's DVD Player does have some protection mechanisms to limit screen capturing. The physical DVD drive (and most DVD drives) are where the region limits are imposed (you may only switch regions a certain number of times).

For screen capturing, I'd recommend using VLC Media Player. Not sure how to direct you on the optical drive firmware issue.

For movies in .mov, .mpg, .avi format, Quicktime Pro enables capture and editing. Otherwise, as cwa says, VLC.

There's a lot of debate about firmware to disable region limitations, but much of what I've read is Windows-related. It seems to me that Sony deals with it more than other manufacturers. My preference is for Pioneer drives and I've not read much about a 'flash' for that brand.