I just got a new Apple MacBook Pro and am totally excited about it. As a member of AMPAS, however, I watch lots of “screener” DVDs and commercial DVDs and before I launch the first one, how do I set the regional encoding properly on the Mac?
Sweet! Nice to hear from someone who’s part of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the group that sponsors the Oscars! If you have some spare screeners, send ’em along to our offices, eh? 🙂
In terms of your concern about the region coding on your MacBook Pro DVD player, you’re right to be aware of it: while you can change it from one region to another, you can only do so a half-dozen times, and then you’re stuck with whatever region you last selected.
On the other hand, Apple makes it really easy within Mac OS X to set things correctly. In fact, the very first time you insert a DVD you should see this:
Select the right region (I’m guessing North America, region #1) and click on “Set Drive Region”, and …
Done!
Now I have to say one thing puzzles me: aren’t screeners region-free? I know that they have various steganographic and other methods of tracking per-disc to prevent illegal uploads, but are they also region encoded? If not, that half of your query isn’t a big deal anyway.
My Mac is showing all of this except the select drive region button to the bottom right corner is not highlighted and is not working what does this mean for my Mac? and how can I change it?
That might mean that the drive’s already been “set” to a region. If that’s the case, you’re out of luck, sorry to say. Read this article, you’ll see what I mean: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201705
Chuck/Chris,
In case you’re still stuck, I just discussed this with applecare and they suggested I reset my P ram following instructions on their website. You can do this a total of 5 times yourself before it gets fixed to the last region. At that stage it can only be changed by an apple technician – quite possibly for a fee.
I have question about changing my Mac’s DVD region. I have a relatively new MacBook Pro
, and I’ve never tried to watch a DVD on it until recently. My DVD region is set at 6, and I need to change it to one, but the “Set Drive Region” button is un-clickable. Is there a way to fix this?
I realize this post is older, I got here googling a question I have about changing my Mac’s DVD region. I have a six-month old MacBook Pro, and I’ve never tried to watch a DVD on it until recently. My DVD region is set at 6, and I need to change it to one, but the “Set Drive Region” button is un-clickable. Is there a way to fix this?
Jim, I agree–DVD regions are just a dumb, dumb, dumb idea that barely slows down pirates, but causes no end of aggravation for regular folk, especially those of us who live overseas (I too am in Japan).
However, instead of buying a whole extra Mac, what about buying a lightweight USB DVD player? No matter what, it’s got to be a lot cheaper than buying a second Macbook just to watch movies.
I wish that the whole concept of regionalization could be dispensed with completely and forever. After the fifth switch, our only alternative is to have one dedicated Mac set up for each region whose DVDs we may ever conceivably want to watch.
Its counterpart in the iTMS is that here in Japan we can’t access US content.