Frequently Asked Questions


We constantly get asked for help on a number of subjects so we've drawn up a list of frequently asked questions which should help to answer your questions. They are divided into a number of sections:- What is a DVD Region, What is RCE, Handset Hacking, VCD/MP3/DVD-RW Playback, Sound Formats, Information on DVD365.net and our Contact Details. 

Click on the above links to be taken directly to the relevant sections

What is a DVD Region?
When a DVD player is manufactured for a particular country or geographical region it is assigned a region code. This means that the player will only allow playback of DVD discs that are released by the distribution companies in that region. For example, a disc purchased in America will not play on a machine purchased in Europe. Certain manufacturers have put backdoor routes into their players to allow the region locking to be defeated. Whether this is deliberate or a simple method of configuring a player after manufacturing is open to opinion.

There are eight DVD regions available with the world is split into six regions. Region seven is spare whilst region eight is to be used by in-flight airline movies and other modes of mass transport. Computer users may appreciate why there are eight regions, with a simple bit-mask used to determine the region of both the player and DVD discs.

Most handset hacked or chipped players can only play discs from region one to six although some companies claim that their modifications will open up all regions. With most in-flight movies being heavily censored to avoid offending the wide diversity of passengers there won't be much demand for these discs.

The six regions are as follows:-

1

 Region One America, Canada and U.S Territories. Most titles are released here first and they tend to have better features. This discrepancy between the regions drives the player chipping market, especially in Europe and Australia. In an attempt to thwart these player hacks certain film distribution companies are using a technology called RCE (Region Coding Enhanced). 
2 Region Two Region Two Europe, Japan, South Africa and the Middle East. After a shaky start in Europe, DVD is finally taking off in a big way with month on month sales of both players and discs exceeding the last. The grouping of these countries and continents is a strange one. Most region two encoded discs are also encoded to play on region four manufactured machines.
3 Region Three Asia and Hong Kong. Although VCD is well established in the region DVD is starting to take hold. As with VCD the demand for DVD appears to largely come from the illegal pirate market. However, all this may change as Governments in the region start to tackle the pirates.
4 Region Four Australia, New Zealand and South America. Similar to Europe DVD was slow to take off due to the related problem of disc availability and price. Things have now improved with titles being released at an increased rate, although the pricing policy is still causing many complaints from consumers.
5 Former Soviet Union, Indian subcontinent, Africa and North Korea. Little or no titles are available in this region. However, some multi-region discs include this region to save future duplication costs.
6 Region Six China. The worlds biggest consumer marker is yet to embrace the DVD technology to the fullest. However, similar to Asia there is the problem with piracy. Surely a market film distribution companies are keen to exploit now that China is a member of the WTO
0 Region Free Some special interest and music discs are usually encoded for all regions. This means that they can be played on any machine in the world.

If you ever use our review database search engine you'll quickly be able to see which region the reviewed disc will play in by the symbol  used above. If the disc is capable of being played in more than one region then each region will be displayed. 

Whenever a disc is reviewed it is always scanned with a wonderful PC package called DVDGenie. This packages enables us to identify which regions the disc contains. If you have a DVD-ROM equipped PC you may find this tool useful. It can be downloaded from an external downloads site by clicking here 

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What is RCE?
RCE, or Regional Coding Enhancement, is a special program that is stored on the 'boot' section of the DVD. In an attempt to thwart those people with region free players this program interrogates your DVD player and checks what regions it can play back. If the player reports more than one region can be played then the DVD will refuse to play, instead displaying a world map along with an explanation of the region areas.

This can be a problem with handset hacks that make the DVD player totally region free or players that automatically switch regions and is a sight many multi-region DVD player owners dread. Players that have internal modifications and handset hacks that allow a region to be manually selected tend not to be troubled by this annoying feature. 

More and more film distribution companies are starting to protect their discs with RCE. These companies include Columbia Tri-Star, Warner and Buena Vista. It is worth noting that as soon as the DVD format was released various companies were boasting of their ability to make players multi-region. Naturally, it didn't take long for these same companies to come up with methods of defeating these RCE encoded discs.

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Can My Player be Handset Hacked ?
Most lower end DVD players can be hacked by using a combination of buttons on the fascia, remote control or both. Have a look on our Hacks pages to see if your player is listed. If not, try searching some of the DVD newsgroups. If you have any handset hack instructions which are not listed on our hacks page then please do let us know so we can post them on the site for the benefit of all. Remember, unlike some sites, we list our hacks for free.

If you find your player listed in the hack section and successfully change the region of your player then you may find that Region 1 discs are played back in black and white. This is not a fault with your DVD player or television but you need to check your television and DVD handbook to see if it can be set to reproduce NTSC signals correctly. If your TV is not NTSC compatible then you need use a SCART cable to connect the player to the AV socket on your TV. You also need to ensure that the player is set to output RGB on the SCART socket.

Certain DVD players cannot be hacked by the remote control. They require an internal modification that will invalid the warranty. However, most companies offering modifications will offer a new warranty on the player. Sometimes these modifications unlock other facilities such as enabling RGB output and disabling of MacroVision.

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Can I Play VCD's, Copied DVD's or MP3's?
If you can't already play copied DVD's or MP3 files on your player then it is very unlikely that by hacking your player you will then be able to do so. This is all down to the fact that the laser pickup on your player may not be compatible with the various recordable DVD formats. Likewise, playback of MP3 or WMA files may also not be possible because the players chipset may not have the necessary circuitry. Fortunately, most recent players support recordable DVD and MP3 files whilst more and more are now starting to support WMA playback.

Hacking your player may not necessarily automatically permit playback for VCD's. You may need to enter an additional code to permit this. However, beware, the internet is a buzz with people complaining that entering codes to allow VCD playback have completely locked up their player and rendered it useless. Always ensure you know what version of firmware your player has and whether there are any known problems before entering codes. Remember, you always enter codes published on DVD365.net at entirely your own risk.

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Sound Formats
Apart from the picture quality, another major advantage the DVD format has is the sound. Whilst video can only offer pro-logic stereo and although Dolby Digital and DTS is available on laserdisc it requires special demodulating equipment as well as a decoder. Fortunately, the DVD format has sufficient space to accommodate a number of audio tracks. 

For the general home user DVD comes with either a simple mono or two channel soundtrack that can be replayed through a television or hi-fi system. The DVD can also carry additional Dolby Digital and DTS soundtracks which require additional decoding equipment to unleash the full potential of the format. However, as the popularity of format has exploded, the price of such equipment has been dramatically reduced over the years and a full blown home cinema can be created even with a modest budget.

The various audio formats are described in more detail below, including the symbols used in our reviews to indicate the primary sound formats on the DVD.
Mono is a single audio channel played through one speaker. When replayed through a home cinema set-up it will be replayed through the centre speaker although certain soundtracks may contain dual mono audio tracks that are replayed in the front speakers. Mono material is normally associated with early films or classic television series. Most distribution companies tend to remaster the soundtrack to give at least a basic stereo soundtrack, although this is not always the case.
Stereo is two channel audio played through a left and right speaker. A two channel stereo track is nearly always found on a DVD to allow audio reproduction on equipment without a suitable decoder. Adequate results can be obtained by connecting the stereo output jacks on the rear of the DVD player to a hi-fi system or stereo television.
The pre-cursor to pro-logic offering two channels of stereo sound with a single rear mono channel. Most mainstream American television series of the early nineties offered surround sound including series such as the popular Simpsons and The X-files.
The addition of a fourth channel, the centre channel, improved the surround format by locking the speech to the centre. The format became popular for many years and found its way to many televisions series, sell through video releases and PAL laserdiscs. The format is popular for digital satellite television broadcasts as the amount of bandwidth required to accommodate the soundtrack is kept to a minimum. Many amplifiers and receivers are now equipped with Pro-logic II, which is Dolby's new and better sounding pro-logic decoder.
Similar to pro-logic with front two channel stereo. The are two other possibilities with the other channels - a centre channel with mono rear channel or stereo rear channel without a centre channel. Although there are a few DVD's with Dolby Digital 4.0 soundtracks they are far and few between.
With the addition of a fifth channel the rear channels finally become stereo and offer the viewer the full cinema experience. However, the low frequency effects channel is still missing and these lower frequencies are either omitted or distributed in the other channels. Again, it is quite rare to find a soundtrack in this format, although some Disney releases such as Tarzan were released in this format.
This is technically six channel sound although the additional channel is solely used to provide the low frequency effects used by a sub-woofer to generate additional bass effects. This sound format was initially only available on NTSC laserdiscs and was called AC3 before the DD5.1 name was adopted. Europe nearly missed out on this format as Philips was pushing for its own 5.1 MPEG sound format to be used. Fortunately, sense prevailed and a global standard was established.
DTS is a rival format to Dolby Digital that uses less compression and thus uses more space on a DVD. DVDs that contain both Dolby Digital and DTS soundtracks normally contain a DTS soundtrack at a lower bit-rate of 768kb/s. Similar to Dolby Digital it offers five channels plus a sub-woofer channel for the low frequency effects.
Just when you though the sound couldn't get any better Dolby launched EX with the addition of a rear matrixed centre channel. An additional decoder and amplifier will be required in order to extract the additional channel. Plenty of EX equipped amplifiers and receivers are available to suit most budgets and more and more Hollywood blockbusters are being released on DVD with EX soundtracks.
Another rival format to Dolby EX with an additional rear centre channel. Rather than being a dedicated channel this information is digitally processed. Again, similar to the Dolby version, additional equipment will be required and integrated AV amplifiers equipped to decode Dolby Digital EX may not necessarily support the DTS version. If you are in the market for a new AV amplifier ensure that it has both EX and ES badges on its fascia.

Which Format is Best?

Ah, the aged old Dolby versus DTS argument. Each side constantly battles each other with claim and counter claim over the various amounts of compression and enhancements made to the soundtrack in order to boost various frequencies. However, it all boils down to personal taste and whether you can tell the difference between the two formats.

DVD365.net ran a poll on the question and the results were in favour of DTS by a massive 10 to 1. If you have decoder equipped with DTS and Dolby Digital then I suggest you listen for yourself. Try to avoid titles with dual soundtracks as they will have been compressed in order to fit them both onto the disc. Try something like Jurassic Park or Saving Private Ryan and listen for yourself. One thing is for sure though, the argument is not going to go away for a long time.

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Just Who The Heck Are You?

DVD365.net is a non-profit hobby site which is run on a passion for all things DVD by just one overworked person. The site is not tied to any commercial company, although we are a member of Amazon's affiliate scheme and by ordering your DVD's and CD's from them you'll help keep this site running and providing you with handset hacks, news, reviews and competitions completely free of charge.

The site has been verified on Microsoft Windows and Linux platforms using Netscape Navigator, Firefox, Opera and Internet Explorer. It is best viewed in 1024x768. Unfortunately, some of the JavaScript code used by the site seems to cause Opera problems, although version 7 onwards seems to work OK. Problems have also been reported whilst using Mac OS. If you experience any problems then please do drop us a line and tell us which browser, version of the browser and OS you are running on.

At present DVD365.net uses extensive JavaScript and DHTML scripts to create a client side review and link database. Once the time and resources permit we will be moving to server side CGI. Not only will this improve site maintenance but it will speed up access times. In order to use this site to its full potential you need to ensure that your browser has JavaScript enabled.

Please note that we collect no information about your browser, computer or browsing habits. If we run a visitor survey then we may collect information about your browser and operating system in order to optimize the site.  This information, using standard JavaScript instructions, will be clearly indicated on the page before the results are submitted to us. We have nothing to hide!

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Contacting Us

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