Don't buy Sony DVDs if you own a Sony DVD player

[quzar]

Sony disapoint again, heres the news from the Sonystrikes again blog

YES ! It appears that Sony have done it again. In their zeal to make their DVD movies copyproof (yeah right) they have in fact made their latest releases unplayable on some DVD players, including my Sony DVP-CX995V DVD player. I recently rented “Stranger than Fiction” (2 copies) and “The Holiday” ( please no comments on my choice of movies) both by Sony Pictures. Both load up to the splash title screen and then load no further, then after about 60 secs the player turns itself off!

ALL my other DVD’s and new releases from other movie companies play perfectly

I called Sony Electronics help line and they said to call Sony Pictures 1-800-860-2878 which I did.

The following is a compression of our discussion:

Sony Tech: We know about this problem. Its our new copy protection that’s making these discs unplayable in some players including our own, we do not intend to change the copy protection. The only correction to this problem is a firmware update to your player. The electronics division know about this and should have given you this information.

Me: OK send me the firmware update.

Sony Tech: We do not have one as yet.

Me: OK (a bit frustrated) when will it be available?

Sony Tech: It could be 2 weeks it could be a month, we don’t know.

He then took my phone number and said ”they” would let me know when the firmware update is available, but declined to take my address saying that they would get that when the update was available.

I will say that I got a live person on both support lines within 30 secs.

Here are my questions to Sony:

After spending $350 on a Sony DVD player 3 months ago am I now supposed to avoid Sony Pictures products?

You are still advertising the Sony DVP-CX995V prominently on the Sony USA website but I notice there is no disclaimer that it may not play some new Sony Pictures DVD’s.

Would it not be a good idea to test changes you intend to make on your DVD’s at least on your own equipment so that if you find a problem you could have the firmware update available instead of not only inconveniencing, but alienating your own customers.

I believe this problem is happening on other manufacturers devices, are they working feverishly on firmware updates to accommodate you?

Well thats my rant (yeah I feel a bit better now)

Expect this to be happening a lot more with Blu-ray discs in the future as there are like 4 different version specifications for it.

Way to go Sony.

[DPyro]

Ok...but shouldn't this be in the hardware section, being that this isn't a PS3 topic.

[808]

Erm, just wait for the firmware update?

Seriously, people make a śhitstorm out of anything to do with Sony nowadays

[Triv1um]

Well this is going to sound childish but sony started it.

Why couldnt they just leave things the way they are, they always have to keep poking at things.

[shinymusic]

LMFAO LMFAO, sony get your stuff together.

[The King]

this pisses me of wat are they thinking about they are seroiusly screwed omg i fell like punching them in the face

them=sony

[quzar]

wtf. I posted this in the blog section since it has nothing to do with any video game hardware.

It must have been wraggy or something. -_-

[freitax]

dont really care I have a 20 bucks dvd player and most of sony pictures are big crap...

[White_Hawk_UK]

Yet another example of 'copyright protection' measures adversely affecting the legitimate end-user. Hands-up anyone who thinks that your average common-or-garden variety pirate is going to break a sweat over this new system...

[quzar]

Yet another example of 'copyright protection' measures adversely affecting the legitimate end-user. Hands-up anyone who thinks that your average common-or-garden variety pirate is going to break a sweat over this new system...

Yes and no. This was posted over at another forum, where most people made that same argument, but nowadays it's simply not true. I've worked in computer retail (CompUSA) and know people who have worked at other large retaillers such as BestBuy and you'd be shocked at how many average joes come in asking how to make copies of rented movies.

If you buy a new computer now, unless it's a laptop or you go out of your way, it will come with a DVD burner, and most people just don't see whats wrong with making copies of rented movies. That, combined with the newest rental services that make it possible to pay a relatively small flat monthly fee to get basically unlimited rentals (netflix and blockbuster) create a condition where people just get the movie, copy it and send it back right away. I know about 5 people with netflix/blockbuster, including my mother, who do this. It requires about as much technical knowledge as making vhs copies (watch the movie while passing through a recording vcr), is cheaper, and takes less time.

THESE are the people Sony are trying to stop. The only other possible reasoning would be to delay slightly the ability of pirates to mass copy it because afaik mass for-profit pirates don't actually figure out how to hack copy protections themselves, they wait till some random freeware tool writer does it (a week, maybe two?), and by putting this in they delay the pirates, which, in home video means everything (the highest concentration of home video sales are in the first few weeks of release).

I don't agree with this, I feel that if Sony wants to copy protect their stuff, do so by all means, but they should have corporate responsibility to make it so that it cannot interfere with legitamate use.