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A 'Region' issue?

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Whilst having a clean-out the other day, I rediscovered a (legal) DVD I purchased from the US a few years ago. I'm sure when I ordered it, I ordered the copy appropriate to AUS, but I've never been able to play it, so suspect I may have been supplied a US-region copy. It's sat on the shelf for quite some time collecting dust...

I popped it into my MBP this evening to see if it would play for me. Alas, the drive spun (at a very slow speed) briefly, then just spat the disc out. So I put it back in and had a look with both Finder and Total Finder, but apparently the disc is not even recognised before it gets spat out.

A web-search revealed VLC may be the answer, so started that, popped the disc back in -but same result.

It's a movie I've been looking forward to seeing for a long time, since it had such rave industry (aviation) reviews, entitled One Six Right. Since the disc has never been played, it's physically in pristine condition.

I would really appreciate any advice anyone could offer that may allow me to view the movie!
 

chscag

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VLC doesn't always work to play a "non-region" DVD. The DVD you purchased is as you say probably coded for the US-Canada and your optical drive firmware is looking for Australia.

What you can do is switch regions in order for your optical drive to play the DVD. Or do like many folks do who have large collections of DVDs from other regions. Keep an external drive handy which is coded to play using the other region code. I know it's a pain but then so is the whole region thing.

What I don't understand is why the DVD ejected from your optical drive. It should not have done so. You might want to blow some compressed air in the drive to make sure that dust is not obscuring the lens.
 
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Thanks for the advice chscag. I'll give that a go... just one more nubbin question, for this topic anyways: how do I switch regions?

The disc spitting out like it does causes me some pause also. I know it shouldn't do that and in fact, any other DVD's I pop in the drive are fine; no problem at all. It's just this one that gets spat back. Hence the note re the physical condition of the disc.
 
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Interesting...

I still have my old Win7 PC here too -1st time I've started the thing in months (took over an our to get it going!!! But that's a whole other story) and it won't read the DVD either! All it tells me is there is no disc in the drive! Seems my problem may be with the way the DVD is written. Off I go back to the 'net to see if I can find the original supplier and discuss the issue with them!
 
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When you open the DVD Player with DVD that has a different region code a window should open asking you to switch the region. Careful though, this can only be done 5 times.

Not sure about the spitting out issue either, my brothers MBP did this awhile too with one self burned disk.
We stuck a cleaning DVD in and let it run awhile, and did a DVD Firmware update that was in Software Update. It read the disk after that, but it still took forever in mounting it.
 
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Thanks McYukon. Unfortunately, I'm not getting even that far -the disc simply won't mount -in either OS-X on my MBP or Win7 on my old PC.

I'm currently chasing down a resolution with the original supplier, which appears to be Sporty's in the US.
 

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