Sunday, October 01, 2006
Those digital media and their bizarre machines.
A couple weeks ago I decided to replace the cheap DVD player I acquired a few years ago, with (an even cheaper today, it turns out) DVD player that can play PAL format DVDs from other regions. I'd finally get to watch those Almodovar, Hillcoat, and Fassbinder flicks that are not available in NTSC formats in the living room--they play fine on the PC in the office. I did some research on features and customer feedback and settled on the Toshiba SD-3990. Then I shopped around for the best price, and ordered one from Crutchfield.
It arrived, I replaced the old player, popped in a DVD, and got a message: "Wrong region disc". I emailed Crutchfield and they replied that they are only allowed to sell Region 1 players. I checked their web site more carefully and sure enough, they make zero claims about their player's region. But, and here it gets weird, other vendors selling the same player, exact same model number, emphasize its ability to play all region DVDs. And I found one page that explained that if your player doesn't play DVDs from a particular region, to type 24039609 on the remote with the tray empty and open, and then reboot. That worked, so I won't be returning the player to the vendor.
It's bizarre to sell a machine that won't play certain media, when that media is playable on the same machine from other vendors or on other machines. I don't know what or how much Crutchfield gets, nor from whom, for selling a device that has been crippled, but I'm certainly not going be their customer as long as I can remember this incident. ¶ 7:43 AM
A couple weeks ago I decided to replace the cheap DVD player I acquired a few years ago, with (an even cheaper today, it turns out) DVD player that can play PAL format DVDs from other regions. I'd finally get to watch those Almodovar, Hillcoat, and Fassbinder flicks that are not available in NTSC formats in the living room--they play fine on the PC in the office. I did some research on features and customer feedback and settled on the Toshiba SD-3990. Then I shopped around for the best price, and ordered one from Crutchfield.
It arrived, I replaced the old player, popped in a DVD, and got a message: "Wrong region disc". I emailed Crutchfield and they replied that they are only allowed to sell Region 1 players. I checked their web site more carefully and sure enough, they make zero claims about their player's region. But, and here it gets weird, other vendors selling the same player, exact same model number, emphasize its ability to play all region DVDs. And I found one page that explained that if your player doesn't play DVDs from a particular region, to type 24039609 on the remote with the tray empty and open, and then reboot. That worked, so I won't be returning the player to the vendor.
It's bizarre to sell a machine that won't play certain media, when that media is playable on the same machine from other vendors or on other machines. I don't know what or how much Crutchfield gets, nor from whom, for selling a device that has been crippled, but I'm certainly not going be their customer as long as I can remember this incident. ¶ 7:43 AM
