libdvdcss and region codes

[Andru Luvisi]

My apologies if this question is not appropriate here. I tried
subscribing to ***@videolan.org and got a "No such list" error, even
though it is in the results from the list server's "lists" command, and
the list recommended in the README file. My searches in the archive were
unsuccessful but that could be because I did not know what to search for.

Am I correct in understanding that with libdvdcss I should be able to play
DVDs with any region code?

I am using an Apple PowerBook G4 with a UJ-815 DVD-R drive, and I seem to
only be able to play region 1 DVDs, both in Mac OS X using VLC 0.5.2-test2
and in Linux using xine and libdvdcss 1.2.6.

Both in OSX using VLC and in Linux using xine and libdvdcss 1.2.6 with
DVDCSS_VERBOSE=2 I get "libdvdcss error: ioctl ReadDiscKey failed"

I have tried the "key", "disc", and "title" methods, all with no success.
Looking at src/css.c it appears that the error above is printed before it
gets to picking between the three.

Any ideas or pointers to information that might be of use?

Thanks,
Andru
--
Andru Luvisi, Programmer/Analyst

Quote Of The Moment:
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
( Whatever is said in Latin sounds profound. )

[Christophe Massiot]

Post by Andru Luvisi
My apologies if this question is not appropriate here. I tried

It is fully appropriate here.

Post by Andru Luvisi
I am using an Apple PowerBook G4 with a UJ-815 DVD-R drive, and I seem to
only be able to play region 1 DVDs, both in Mac OS X using VLC 0.5.2-test2
and in Linux using xine and libdvdcss 1.2.6.

That's the same case for all PowerBook G4 owners. But your experiment
is very interesting : we didn't know if it was the drive or the OS
which prevented us from reading a different region DVD. Since it
doesn't work either under Linux, I suppose it's a problem with the
drive.

There is no known workaround, though under Linux the contents of your
'dmesg' and system logs might give us a clue.

[Andru Luvisi]

On Wed, 19 Mar 2003, Christophe Massiot wrote:
[snip]

Post by Christophe Massiot
There is no known workaround, though under Linux the contents of your
'dmesg' and system logs might give us a clue.

[snip]

I am attaching my dmesg output and the output from /proc/cpuinfo. Let me
know if there is anything else I can provide or test.

dmesg shows my drive as both hdc and a SCSI drive because I am using SCSI
emulation via a boot-time "hdc=ide-scsi" argument so that I can burn CDs
with cdrecord. I see the exact same behavior whether I use SCSI emulation
or not. That is:

With SCSI emulation:
/dev/dvd -> /dev/sr0
Plays region 1
Can't play region 2 ("ioctl ReadDiscKey failed")

Without SCSI emulation:
/dev/dvd -> /dev/hdc
Plays region 1
Can't play region 2 ("ioctl ReadDiscKey failed")

Thanks,
Andru

[Gildas Bazin]

Post by Andru Luvisi
Both in OSX using VLC and in Linux using xine and libdvdcss 1.2.6 with
DVDCSS_VERBOSE=2 I get "libdvdcss error: ioctl ReadDiscKey failed"
I have tried the "key", "disc", and "title" methods, all with no success.
Looking at src/css.c it appears that the error above is printed before it
gets to picking between the three.

I'd really be interested in having the full log of:
DVDCSS_VERBOSE=2 DVDCSS_METHOD=title ./vlc dvdold:

Could you send it to this list please ?

--
Gildas

[Andru Luvisi]

On Thu, 20 Mar 2003, Gildas Bazin wrote:
[snip]

Post by Gildas Bazin
Could you send it to this list please ?

[snip]

I am attaching two script sessions, one from xine under Linux and one from
vlc under MacOSX.

Andru

[Gildas Bazin]

Post by Andru Luvisi
[snip]

Post by Gildas Bazin
Could you send it to this list please ?

[snip]
I am attaching two script sessions, one from xine under Linux and one from
vlc under MacOSX.

Thanks,

Could you try this patch against libdvdcss cvs version ?

--
Gildas

[Andru Luvisi]

On Thu, 20 Mar 2003, Gildas Bazin wrote:
[snip]

Post by Andru Luvisi
Thanks,
Could you try this patch against libdvdcss cvs version ?

[snip]

Where can I find instructions for building the cvs version? I checked it
out but there is no configure script and autoconf and automake have all
sorts of complaints.

Andru
--
Andru Luvisi, Programmer/Analyst

Quote Of The Moment:
Churchill's Commentary on Man:
Man will occasionally stumble over the truth,
but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on.

[Andru Luvisi]

On Thu, 20 Mar 2003, Gildas Bazin wrote:
[snip]

Post by Andru Luvisi
Thanks,
Could you try this patch against libdvdcss cvs version ?

It seems to have gotten farther, although it still did not work. I am
attaching a bunch of the errors from dmesg and a log of my xine session.

Andru

[Andru Luvisi]

I compiled vlc for linuxppc linked against the cvs version of libdvdcss
patched with the patch Gildas Bazin sent to the list and have attached the
output from:

DVDCSS_VERBOSE=2 DVDCSS_METHOD=title vlc dvdold:

It doesn't mean anything more to me than the xine log, but I figured I'd
send it in case it is of use. The dmesg errors are the same as the ones I
sent in my last post.

Andru
--
Andru Luvisi, Programmer/Analyst

Quote Of The Moment:
C. A. R. Hoare once said that ``One thing [the language designer] should
not do is to include untried ideas of his own.'' Ratfor follows this
precept very closely -- everything in it has been stolen from someone
else.
-- Brian W. Kernighan, "RATFOR: A Preprocessor for a
Rational Fortran"

[Christophe Massiot]

Post by Andru Luvisi
dmesg shows my drive as both hdc and a SCSI drive because I am using SCSI
emulation via a boot-time "hdc=ide-scsi" argument so that I can burn CDs
with cdrecord. I see the exact same behavior whether I use SCSI emulation

You don't have any kernel error when you try to read a region-mismatched disc ?

[Andru Luvisi]

Post by Christophe Massiot

Post by Andru Luvisi
dmesg shows my drive as both hdc and a SCSI drive because I am using SCSI
emulation via a boot-time "hdc=ide-scsi" argument so that I can burn CDs
with cdrecord. I see the exact same behavior whether I use SCSI emulation

You don't have any kernel error when you try to read a region-mismatched disc ?

I didn't think to look. Yes, I am getting one, and I attached it. This
one is from a boot without SCSI emulation. The error is at the end.

Andru

[Andru Luvisi]

Oh and by the way. I don't think it matters but just in case I should
mention that the region 2 DVD I am testing with is in PAL format.

Andru
--
Andru Luvisi, Programmer/Analyst

Quote Of The Moment:
Appel's method avoids making a large number of small trampoline bounces
by occasionally jumping off the Empire State Building.
-- Henry G. Baker, "Cheney on the M.T.A."

[Andru Luvisi]

My apologies if this question is not appropriate here. I tried to
subscribe to ***@videolan.org and got a "No such list" error, even
though it is in the results from the list server's "lists" command, and
the list recommended in the README file. My searches in the archive were
unsuccessful but that could be because I did not know what to search for.

Am I correct in understanding that with libdvdcss I should be able to play
DVDs with any region code?

I am using an Apple PowerBook G4 with a UJ-815 DVD-R drive, and I seem to
only be able to play region 1 DVDs, both in Mac OS X using VLC 0.5.2-test2
and in Linux using xine and libdvdcss 1.2.6.

Both in OSX using VLC and in Linux using xine and libdvdcss 1.2.6 with
DVDCSS_VERBOSE=2 I get "libdvdcss error: ioctl ReadDiscKey failed"

I have tried the "key", "disc", and "title" methods, all with no success.
Looking at src/css.c it appears that the error above is printed before it
gets to picking between the three.

Any ideas or pointers to information that might be of use?

Thanks,
Andru
--
Andru Luvisi, Programmer/Analyst







Quote Of The Moment:
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
( Whatever is said in Latin sounds profound. )

[Gildas Bazin]

Post by Andru Luvisi

Post by Gildas Bazin
Could you try this patch against libdvdcss cvs version ?

[snip]
Where can I find instructions for building the cvs version? I checked it
out but there is no configure script and autoconf and automake have all
sorts of complaints.

you need to run:
./bootstrap
./configure
make
make install
then check /usr/local/lib is in your /etc/ldso.conf
then run ldconfig

--
Gildas

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[Gildas Bazin]

Post by Andru Luvisi
I compiled vlc for linuxppc linked against the cvs version of libdvdcss
patched with the patch Gildas Bazin sent to the list and have attached the
It doesn't mean anything more to me than the xine log, but I figured I'd
send it in case it is of use. The dmesg errors are the same as the ones I
sent in my last post.

Ok, one last attempt. Could you try the attached patch against a clean libdvdcss cvs tree. If this doesn't work than I guess it won't be possible to get around the region protection scheme of your dvd drive because it would mean we can't even have read access to the disc if it is of a different region.

I'd be interested in seeing the logs in all cases.

Regards,

--
Gildas

-------------------------------------------------------------
NetCourrier, votre bureau virtuel sur Internet : Mail, Agenda, Clubs, Toolbar...
Web/Wap : www.netcourrier.com
Téléphone/Fax : [phone] (0,34 € TTC/min)
Minitel: 3615 NETCOURRIER (0,15 € TTC/min)

[Andru Luvisi]

On Fri, 21 Mar 2003, Gildas Bazin wrote:
[snip]

Post by Gildas Bazin
Ok, one last attempt. Could you try the attached patch against a clean
libdvdcss cvs tree. If this doesn't work than I guess it won't be
possible to get around the region protection scheme of your dvd drive
because it would mean we can't even have read access to the disc if it
is of a different region.
I'd be interested in seeing the logs in all cases.

[snip]

Alas, it doesn't seem to have worked. I have attached the logs.

For what it's worth I can mount the DVD and can see and read several .vob,
.bup and .ifo files, so some form of read access is available... or are
you talking about read access to some magic place on the DVD other than
where the file system is stored?

Andru

[Andru Luvisi]

On Fri, 21 Mar 2003, Andru Luvisi wrote:
[snip]

Post by Andru Luvisi
For what it's worth I can mount the DVD and can see and read several .vob,
.bup and .ifo files, so some form of read access is available... or are
you talking about read access to some magic place on the DVD other than
where the file system is stored?

[snip]

I take that back. I can see .vob, .bup, and .ifo files, but I can't read
most of the .vob files. Under both Linux and MacOSX I can only read
VIDEO_TS.VOB. All of the others (VTS_[0-9][0-9]_[0-9].VOB) give me an
input/output error. I tested this in both Linux and MacOSX with
"for i in *; do cat $i > /dev/null; done".

I also tried creating a raw image of the DVD, and on both
OSs I got an input/output error before I had read even a full megabyte.

Thanks for all the effort.

Does anyone maintain a list of "you're screwed" drives that I should check
in the future, and get the MATSHITA/Panisonic UJ-815 listed on to warn
others?

Andru
--
Andru Luvisi, Programmer/Analyst


Quote Of The Moment:
Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from
mediocre minds.
-- Albert Einstein

They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers.
But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.
-- Carl Sagan

[Gildas Bazin]

Post by Andru Luvisi
Does anyone maintain a list of "you're screwed" drives that I should check
in the future, and get the MATSHITA/Panisonic UJ-815 listed on to warn
others?

I don't know of any but this would be a good addition to the libdvdcss web
page.

Also you might try to check if the firmware for your drive has been cracked:
http://forum.firmware-flash.com/

Regards,

--
Gildas

[Adam Jones]

Post by Andru Luvisi
Does anyone maintain a list of "you're screwed" drives that I should
check in the future, and get the MATSHITA/Panisonic UJ-815 listed on
to warn others?

I'd imagine that this would happen with *all* RPC-2 drives. The changes
from RPC-1 to RPC-2 were to move the region checking into the drive
firmware and to only allow 5 region changes before permanently locking
the region code. All new drives since RPC-2 was introduced a few years
ago are RPC-2, annoyingly.

Basically, you need to hunt around on the net and see if you can get
some RPC-1 firmware for your drive. There's something out there for
almost every drive I've ever encountered.

[H}kan Hjort]

Post by Adam Jones

Post by Andru Luvisi
Does anyone maintain a list of "you're screwed" drives that I should
check in the future, and get the MATSHITA/Panisonic UJ-815 listed on
to warn others?

I'd imagine that this would happen with *all* RPC-2 drives. The changes
from RPC-1 to RPC-2 were to move the region checking into the drive
firmware and to only allow 5 region changes before permanently locking
the region code. All new drives since RPC-2 was introduced a few years
ago are RPC-2, annoyingly.

Infact this is not the case. Reading the DVD Device spec (SFF8090)
one can see that the drive should check for region mismatch when one
requests the title key, no the disc key. Also reading a block should
be alowed when AFS=1, AFS gets set to 1 when the READ DVD STRUCTURE
(disc key) is successfully retrived. SO you see if one doesn't need
the title key to decrypt the VOB contents (it's cracked or cached
instead) then there is a loop hole. Requestiong the Disc key should
be ok, and reading the contents should be ok once you have requested
the Disc key.
So this drive goes agains and beyond the specified behaviour in the DVD
Model (but perhaps more in the spirit of CSS / region protection).

Post by Adam Jones
Basically, you need to hunt around on the net and see if you can get
some RPC-1 firmware for your drive. There's something out there for
almost every drive I've ever encountered.

There isn't for this particular drive, maybe someday...