It is recommended as the best free DVD playing software also since it is a free Blu-ray player to playback all Blu-ray discs (regardless of disc protection and region codes), a free HD media player to play up to 1080p and 4K videos, a music player to tune in favorite music.
2006 – A while back, I wrote an article about making your Mac’s DVD player region free. Much has changed with the introduction of Intel Macs, enough that an update is in order.
- Part 2: Top 7 Free DVD Players Software for Laptop: Windows PC and Mac: 1. VLC media player is available for free as an open source media player and it works like a cross platform type multimedia player. It follows standardised streaming protocols and can play almost all multimedia files.
- To be the free DVD player downloaded on Mac, you can still get multiple functions, to enables users to edit and play all kinds of media files for free, including webcams, devices, streams and etc. In another word, VLC Media Player is your free video player, to accept any media files without additional charges.
In the original article, I went over drive replacements and a utility, Region X, to reset the region counter in OS X, as well as a software alternative called VLC.
Those same solutions are all available with desktop Macs, and there is even a Universal Binary version of Region X, though the PowerPC version works fine under Rosetta.
The Intel Mac mini and iMac both use standard-sized drives, and while the Matsushita drives that Apple likes to supply are not flashable, Pioneer drives and others (check www.rpc1.org for your specific drive) can be flashed from RPC2 to RPC1 – region free.
The Mac Pro is even easier to modify, and with its extra optical drive bay, there are many options for those who don’t want to update firmware or replace what Apple supplied. In fact, if all you want is multiregion playback, you can hit eBay with $10 and buy an old 1x or 2x DVD-ROM drive from 1996 or so that is RPC1 by default, as all region coding was handled in software at that time.
So what do you do if you don’t want to flash firmware, or, worse yet, you’re using a portable for which there are no flashable drives available? (MacBook and MacBook Pro computers use 9.5mm drives, which at this point are only made by Matsushita, and thus are not upgradable.) You have two options – and while both work, neither are particularly elegant.
Use VLC
The first option is the same one I had recommended for PowerPC laptop owners who didn’t want to replace their drive, and that is to use VLC. VLC performs even better on an Intel Mac than it does on PowerPC, and just like on PowerPC, it doesn’t care about the region counter in OS X or whether your drive matches the disc you are trying to play.
The key to using VLC is to go into the system preferences CD/DVD pane and and deselect DVD Player as the default application for DVD movies. When you insert a DVD movie, it will simply mount on the desktop like any data disk would, and then you can manually launch VLC if your movie is from a foreign region.
For home region movies (US is region 1) you can still use DVD player, but the program will no longer launch automatically.
Many people like VLC, and it’s the simplest solution to the problem. VLC is not, however, a full-featured or particularly slick DVD player. When I had my MacBook, I had VLC installed, but I actually preferred method two, which I will describe next.
UPDATE 2006.09.18: It would seem that Matsushita has revised their firmware such that VLC is no longer a working solution on recently built ‘Books. My early-production MacBook worked fine with VLC, and its late-production replacements worked fine with Windows XP and DVDRegion+CSSFree, though to be honest I didn’t test VLC on the late production MacBook as I’d already moved to the Windows solution for foreign region playback.
The moral here is that you have to try it for yourself, and that depending on which Matsushita drive is in your Intel Mac, your mileage may vary.
The Windows solution bypasses the region code of the disk entirely, so for MacBook owners looking to watch foreign DVDs on their internal drive, this may be the only option.
Windows XP?!?
Intel Macs, in addition to their blazing speed, add one very significant feature that previous Macs never had: the ability to natively run Windows XP using Apple’s Boot Camp Beta. Windows XP, like Mac OS X, is a commercial operating system for which commercial applications are sold.
Just as Apple’s DVD Player is a very nice, integrated, and slick program for watching DVD movies, so too are the many commercial DVD programs available for Windows. The bundled Windows Media Player cannot play DVDs by default, but you can buy an add-on codec to enable it from the same company that makes WinDVD, my preferred Windows DVD software.
Other popular choices are PowerDVD and the same VLC software described above for OS X.
When I travel with a laptop, I generally don’t want to reboot my computer, as rebooting wastes precious battery runtime. If you’re travelling with an Intel Mac, however, I honestly think it’s worth the sacrifice. I compared WinDVD 7 and Apple’s DVD Player on a 2 GHz MacBook, and honestly, the Windows solution is better even without the region issue.
High-end applications like WinDVD and PowerDVD offer a lot of functionality that Apple’s DVD Player lacks, including controls to adjust color outside of the OS settings, sound settings, and terrific utilities to capture still and short clips to video and image files on your hard drive.
Apple’s DVD Player expressly blocks OS X’s screen capture capability, where the commercial DVD players give you terrific controls to pull content from a movie. Bookmarking scenes and enhanced navigation features are other benefits to using a commercial DVD player.
When I travel I tend to use my laptop more for games and movies during flight than for work (unless I’m forced), so the Boot Camp solution is a good option for those looking more for entertainment than productivity while sitting in coach.
Worth the Price
The reason I preferred the Windows solution for DVD playback is that VLC is a freeware program, and, like much freeware,it just doesn’t have the polish of a good commercial application. Of course, the advantage is that it’s free, and this being Low End Mac, that is important.
Personally, however, I prefer to pay for quality and stability than to save some money and sacrifice either stability or ease of use.
Making Windows Region-Free
Now if you want to try the Windows solution, we aren’t in the clear yet. You will need an application called DVDRegion+CSSFree or one of its equivalents. This little program cost me $19.95 about five years ago and has been upgraded many times (for free) since then.
This is a one-trick-pony that is sorely needed in an OS X version. Simply put, when you insert a DVD movie into your drive, this program reads it before the OS and then tells the OS that it’s region 1 (or whatever region you select). Your computer, Windows XP, and your drive don’t know any better and happily play your foreign DVD as though it was a regular Region 1 disk.
This is by far the most elegant approach to defeating region coding, and in five years I’ve never had a disk or drive that this program couldn’t deal with.
Who knows, if enough of us write to the company asking for an OS X version, perhaps we’ll be rewarded with our own native OS X version. This is the kind of utility that Macs are famous for, something that adds a needed function at little cost and with no penalties in ease of use. In short, it’s very Mac-like.
Until then, we’re stuck with VLC or booting into Windows XP.
Parallels Is Not Good for DVDs
One word of warning about the Windows solution, and that is that I wouldn’t recommend trying it under Parallels or any other emulation. So long as OS X has control over your drive, VLC is the only safe bet – and even with VLC there have been reports of drives changing region.
Remember, your drive can only change region a limited number of times, and once it’s done, it’s done. Getting Apple or anyone else to reset the hardware counter is very expensive, if they’ll do it at all, and that worry is another reason why I went with the Windows and DVDRegion+CSSFree solution when I had my MacBook.
Of course, the good news here is that you can try VLC, and if it never changes your drive’s region, you’re in luck (most people fall into this category). If it does change your region, chances are unless you’ve played with regions before, your Mac has three more switches, so you won’t be stuck and can just switch it back manually and then try another solution.
If you have a Windows box lying around you can play with the Windows software described above (WinDVD and PowerDVD both have free trials available, as does DVDRegion+CSSFree), so you can try before you buy.
One More Solution
One final option for those not looking for ultimate portability would be to buy an external DVD drive and run it from your FireWire, USB 2.0, PC Card, or Express Card connector. You can get a flashable drive or just set the external drive to the region you use less often, then with Region X you can reset OS X’s region counter and switch freely between your internal drive for your home region and your external drive for the second region.
Back in the day, I used a similar solution with my Lombard PowerBook, carrying two DVD ROM drives, one set to region 1 and the other to region 2. Using Region, the OS 9 version of Region X, I had the same functionality. Again some drives are old enough (WallStreet owners should check this out) to just be RPC1, and with Region or Region X you are good to go.
There you have it, an Intel-oriented look at multiregion DVD playback on the Mac.
I’ll add a final option for those with a lot of time to tinker, and that is a copy solution (I use Toast Titanium) and a CSS ripper (I prefer Mac The Ripper). Using my ancient G4 Power Mac and its RPC1 drive, I could make Region 1 copies of my Region 2 DVDs, and did this back in 2003 when I moved from a region-free ThinkPad T20 to my first 12″ PowerBook.
Which option works best for you depends on how often you play foreign region DVDs, and where you play them. For movie rentals while traveling, an internal solution like VLC or Windows software is the best option. For playing the foreign-region movies in your own collection, an external or second internal DVD-ROM drive makes a great, low-cost option.
For the most integrated option, swapping in a an RPC1-flashed replacement for your RPC2 internal drive gives you the best of all worlds, though at the highest cost – and unavailable for the MacBook and MacBook Pro. Finally, if you do have an RPC1 drive and still want to watch movies in Windows, just as you need Region X to maintain the region counter of OS X, you will need DVD Genie to do the same function in Windows XP.
Whichever approach you take, the situation is a lot better than it was three years ago when your only option for region free on an Apple laptop was VLC, which back in the 1 GHz PowerPC days provided jittery playback in addition to its unstable interface and frequent crashes.
Today you have a variety of options, from an Intel-optimized and greatly improved VLC to some outstanding software players under Windows XP and Boot Camp. While we don’t yet have a region-bypass utility for OS X like we do for Windows, it’s still undoubtedly the best we’ve ever had it for multiregion movie playback on a portable Mac.
The Latest on Region Free DVD Viewing
- Watching DVDs from Different Regions on Your Mac, Andrew J Fishkin, Best Tools for the Job, 2008.12.04. Hardware and software solutions for watching DVDs intended for a different region.
Keywords: #regionfreeedvd
Short link: http://goo.gl/Y6XLZI
searchword: regionfreedvd
To watch a DVD movie on Mac, you need an external DVD drive which you can purchase on Best Buy, for there is no built-in DVD Player on Mac. Another thing you should do is to download professional DVD Player software on your Mac.
To help you select among the countless Mac DVD Player app on the market, here we picked the Top 5 free DVD Player software for your MacBook Pro after an all-around review. Just read the following contents carefully and choose one that best suits you.
Part 1: Top 6 DVD Player Software for Mac
Top 1: Blu-ray Player for Mac - Best Mac DVD Player
Tipard Blu-ray Player for Mac is a versatile DVD playing software through which you can play DVDs and Blu-ray discs on your Mac. If your QuickTime DVD Player can’t work on Mac, just throw your DVD video into this app, then you can enjoy the 1080p HD images. Moreover, you can also control the DVD playback and capture the screenshot you like at will.
- 1. Enjoy the 1080p HD videos with a widescreen.
- 2. Adjust video and audio settings for a better experience.
- 3. Fast forward or step back to your targeted plot freely.
- 4. Capture your favorite screenshot during the playing process.
- 5. Easy to use with and high quality a clean interface.
Step 1Load DVD movie
Launch Tipard Blu-ray Player for Mac on your computer after installation. Select the Open Disc to load your DVD.
Step 2Adjust the playing settings
Choose the chapter you want to watch. Then you can select a desired audio track and subtitle at will. Moreover, you can disable the audio track and subtitle if necessary.
Step 3Play DVD movies
After you finished all the settings, just click the Play Movie button to start playing your DVD movies.
Top 2: Free Mac Blu-ray Player - Full-featured Mac DVD Player
Free Mac Blu-ray Player is a full-featured Mac DVD Player to play videos, DVDs, and Blu-ray discs. If you download this app as your DVD Player on Mac, you can enjoy various commercial DVDs, homemade DVDs, Blu-Ray discs, etc.
- 1. Offer screen modes such as full, half, normal, and double.
- 2. Capture favorite images while you watch the video files.
- 3. Support Blu-Ray, DVDs, HD videos, video, and audio formats.
- 4. Deliver a comfortable watching experience with high quality.
Top 3: VLC Media Player - Free and Open-source Mac DVD Player
As a free and open-source Mac DVD Player, Windows Media Player, and other platforms, VLC Media Player can play DVD, CD, VCD, general video, and audio files. You can customize it by adding skins, creating skins with VLC skin editor as well as installing extensions.
- 1. Provide beautiful skins, themes, plugins, and more.
- 2. Possess hardware decoding on most platforms.
- 3. No spyware, advertisements, and user tracking.
- 4. Provide a basic and clean user interface.
Note: One thing you should pay attention to is that when you play a DVD with VLC, there will be VLC not working on your Mac and other related issues.
Top 4: QuickTime - Built-in Mac DVD Player
QuickTime is the default DVD Player on Mac devices through which you can play DVDs on your Macbook Pro. Being one of the best options for Mac users, it supports commonly used video and audio formats. There are also bonus functions such as video and music recording, editing, and streaming.
- 1. Handle multiple pictures, video, audio formats.
- 2. Compatible with all files you purchased from iTunes/Apple TV.
- 3. Unload directly to various social channels.
- 4. Easy to use with a clean and intuitive interface.
Note: The support video formats are very limited and you need to upgrade them frequently. And you may failed to open MP4 on QuickTime player.
Top 5: Mac Media Player - HD Mac DVD Player
Mac Media Player is an all-in-one free media player. It supports playing almost all types of media formats. As an excellent Mac DVD player freeware, it can accelerate the hardware. Featuring a high definition of up to 1080p and DTS5.1 audio system, the Mac DVD Player can play DVD and other formats on Apple Mac with amazing quality.
- 1. Play HD DVD movies directly as DVD Player for Mac devices.
- 2. Playback position recording and resuming.
- 3. Share movies or video information anywhere and anytime.
- 4. High-Definition video player with hardware acceleration.
Note: It may use up plenty of your system resources when you play a DVD on Mac.
Top 6: Apple DVD Player - Default Mac DVD Player
Code Free Dvd Player
Apple DVD Player is also a default DVD player in Mac OS X. It not only supports all standard DVD features like multiple audios, video, and subtitle tracks but also be compatible with DVDs authored by DVD Studio Pro and iDVD.
- 1. Provide navigation buttons to make the control easy.
- 2. Provide all kinds of standard DVD features.
- 3. Change the DVD subtitles and skip the unwanted chapters.
- 4. Compatible with DVDs authored by DVD Studio Pro and iDVD.
Note: The free DVD player for Mac will be restricted by DVD region codes and encryption techs.
Part 2: FAQs of DVD Player Software for Mac
1. Why can’t my Mac DVD Player show videos?
Well, this is not a solution for the built-in DVD player app on Mac, but it will allow you to play DVDs and other video files properly with 64-bit mode. You can use the 64-bit version of VLC which can be downloaded from its website, and it will play a DVD just fine.
2. What can I do when my audio is OK but nothing visible except a black screen on Mac Media Player?
To solve your Mac DVD Player not working with the black screen issue, you can try to reset the PRAM and SMC first. It would rule some settings issues out to bring things back to normal.
3. Why can’t my MacBook Pro SuperDrive read DVD?
Region Free Dvd Drive Mac
Sometimes, the reason for MacBook Pro DVD drive not working or the iMac DVD player not working could be that there is too much dust on the lens. This problem can be easily fixed without re-purchasing the replacement of Superdrive: just apply a special CD lens cleaner or a minute brush to clean the left side of the DVD drive.
Conclusion
Best Region Free Dvd Players
If you are looking for reliable DVD Player software for your Mac, then the above-mentioned Top 5 Mac DVD Player software, as well as the Blu-ray Player for Mac should be your first choice. You can use it to play 4K Blu-ray movies. With these handy Mac DVD Players, you can enjoy a majority of blockbuster DVD movies freely. If you have any questions, you can leave a message on the website.