General Question from a Newbie
08-28-07, 08:07 PM
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General Question from a Newbie
I have a gent that I am looking to trade some DVD's with and I am trying to ascertain if his DVD's are Region 1's. He, however, no longer has the cases for the DVD's. Some of my DVD's have the Region 1 emblem on the DVD itself, but not all do. I do find the "NTSC" marking most of the DVD's. Does this have anything to do with whether it is Region 1, or not? Any other ways that I can tell by looking at the DVD, without actually having it to try playing in my player? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!
Barry Urbanek - PogoCards
Barry Urbanek - PogoCards
08-28-07, 08:13 PM
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Hey PogoCards,
The NTSC marking is in regards to the video playback encoding (I believe that includes the resolution and refresh rates). While we use NTSC in the US, so do a number of other countries outside of Region 1 (Japan, for example, who is Region 2).
Is there any reason you're questioning which region code they are (is he located outside of the US or are these rare/foreign movies?)
One way they could test it (although it would involve a bit of effort depending on the number of movies) would be to put them into a DVD-Rom drive and view the region encoding.
Unfortunately, I don't think there are any required markings (top or bottom of disc) that display this information.
The NTSC marking is in regards to the video playback encoding (I believe that includes the resolution and refresh rates). While we use NTSC in the US, so do a number of other countries outside of Region 1 (Japan, for example, who is Region 2).
Is there any reason you're questioning which region code they are (is he located outside of the US or are these rare/foreign movies?)
One way they could test it (although it would involve a bit of effort depending on the number of movies) would be to put them into a DVD-Rom drive and view the region encoding.
Unfortunately, I don't think there are any required markings (top or bottom of disc) that display this information.
08-28-07, 08:13 PM
#3
DVD Talk Gold Edition
If he no longer has the cases you may be getting some pirated DVD's. I mean - why would a person throw away the cases? It might be interesting to listen to his reason for discarding them.
No, NTSC on the disk does not necessarily indicate that it's Region 1. Wikipedia indicates this:
NTSC is the analog television system in use in the United States, Canada, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Mexico, and some other countries, mostly in the Americas (see map). It is named for the National Television System Committee[1], the U.S. standardization body that adopted it.
Do a search for NTSC on google and it will give you a map too!!
Good luck.
No, NTSC on the disk does not necessarily indicate that it's Region 1. Wikipedia indicates this:
NTSC is the analog television system in use in the United States, Canada, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Mexico, and some other countries, mostly in the Americas (see map). It is named for the National Television System Committee[1], the U.S. standardization body that adopted it.
Do a search for NTSC on google and it will give you a map too!!
Good luck.
08-28-07, 08:20 PM
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Thanks for the info guys. The gent I am trading with is from one of the sports card trading sites that I belong to. He indicated that he takes the movies out of the cases and places them in a CD/DVD notebook to conserve space. I was a little concerned as well, however, he has noted to me twice that they are factory movies, just without the cases and inserts. I am actually trading him some sports cards for his DVD's. I am betting that he has all Region 1's, as he also lives in the US, but he is not certain. We have worked into our deal that we can always reverse the trade, if they are not Region 1's, so I don't really have much to lose, other than some return postage. I was hoping there might be an easy way to tell, without actually having the DVD's in my possession. Again, thanks for the help.
Last edited by PogoCards; 08-28-07 at 08:22 PM.
08-28-07, 09:01 PM
#5
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Well, if he is in the US and has any DVDs that are encoded for other regions, he would have either had to hack his DVD player or have specifically purchased one that is region free in order to view them. If he hasn't done either of those things, you are probably safe.
08-28-07, 11:19 PM
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Originally Posted by kitkat
Well, if he is in the US and has any DVDs that are encoded for other regions, he would have either had to hack his DVD player or have specifically purchased one that is region free in order to view them. If he hasn't done either of those things, you are probably safe.
Simply ask the seller (trader) if he has a region free DVD player. If he doesn't know then there is 99 % chance he doesn't because it's kind of a specialty item.
If he lives in the US and he doesn't have a region free player then you can pretty much bet all of his DVDs are region 1 (or region 0
)
