当然如此，看看下面这个论坛的讨论，转贴这自
http://forum.inmatrix.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard/topic.cgi?forum=2&topic=241Andres 5:00 pm on Sep. 8, 2001
I have a more basic question than the region-freedom, although that of course is the eventual goal... Namely, I cannot change the drive's region code at all, even disregarding the counter issues, etc.
I am running under Win Me (waiting for the XP upgrade). I have tried Hitachi's own and Toshiba's RPC setting programs (the latter is said to work for all drives). They both return error messages saying that the operation did not succeed. A similar message, clearly pointing to the drive, was returned by the PowerDVD player. The WinDVD that came with the PC has all region-related stuff greyed out.
My GD-S200 is a RPC2 drive, currently set to reg. 1 and reports 4 changes left. I found a firmware patch that can reset the counter, so if I could actually change the drive setting, I would (hopefully) be set. Any ideas what lies in the way? Could this be related to some registry setting?
I have tried an advice from another thread here to use a PowerDVD player, but this also refers to the drive being locked.
Another bit of info, from van den Berg's site, was that Win Me may not allow some operations because of the lack of a "true MS-DOS" environment. Could this be an issue?
Thanks for any suggestions.
Andres
Andres 5:54 pm on Sep. 8, 2001
Perhaps this additional detail is useful:
the computer in question is 燼 Sony VAIO laptop, PCG-FX215
Joegib 2:10 am on Sep. 9, 2001
(1)Access to a "true MS-DOS" environment is only an issue where you need to install firmware using a DOS-type flash utility. This is easily overcome by running the flash utility from a bootable DOS floppy also carrying the firmware. (If you can't run floppy and DVD at the same time, you have to burn a bootable CD holding the DOS System files, flash utility and firmware file and boot from this).
(2) At the moment, though, this is academic for you because according to "The Firmware Page" there is no patched firmware available for your drive. See here:
http://perso.club-internet.fr/farzeno/firmware/ (2) However, the entry for your drive on that site does have a link to a "Region changing utility by Whacker" which may be worth a try. The utilities you have tried so far simply aim to force a region change until you have used up the official allowance of 5 changes. The "Whacker" utility is presumable designed to give you unlimited changes.
(3) All that said, the symptoms you have described suggest a configeration problem of some kind so maybe someone with a Sony Vaio can help with that.
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joegib
Andres 5:28 am on Sep. 9, 2001
Joe,
Thanks for the advice. The Whacker utility seems to have done the trick. This is actually the same one I thought would let me reset the counter once the allowed changes were used up, but it apparently does more than it advertises.
The utility set the drive's code to reg. 2, but both reg. 1 and reg. 2 DVD's now play without requiring any region change actions when switching. The Driveinfo utility still shows that the drive is region protected, and set to reg. 2 (even while a reg. 1 disc is playing), but both WinDVD and PowerDVD handle both regions just fine without any manual intervention.
Perhaps an unexpectedly convenient result, but I'll certainly take it. Hope there are no other kinks.
Thanks again,
Andres
