Does XBMC on Raspberry support all DVD regions?
#1
My parents want to get a "little box that can play ANYTHING, including DVDs from all regions". Their current box is something that was the cheapest thing in the supermarket at the time, so it's pretty limited. Over the years they've started to want more.

I consulted some people (OK, one guy Blush) and he said that almost all of the all-in-one devices will have limitations, and to have true versatility I'll need a HTPC. His suggestion was to find a used laptop with a broken screen (cheaper that way) and use that. But then I found out about Raspberry PI which seems to be a much better choice all round - it's small, totally quiet, uses very little power, etc. And cheaper too, even new.

However now that I start looking deeper, I'm starting to get doubts about it's versatility after all. My original idea was to use VLC player on it, since it supports about every format under the sun, but that apparently doesn't have hardware acceleration support for Raspberry. This in turn makes it extremely sluggish.

XBMC however seems to use something else which DOES have the necessary hardware acceleration support (if I buy a codec licence for a couple of $, which is OK), but I cannot find anything about supported file formats. It does seem to use some of the same libraries that are used by VLC, so that's at least hopeful. Then again some other forum threads make me suspect that it doesn't have the DVD region-free code, which makes it pretty useless for me in that case. Unfortunately I cannot find any definite sources about this.

So - does anybody know how the file format support of XBMC compares to VLC, and whether it has the necessary code to play all region DVDs (independently of what the drive is set to)?
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#2
I don't think any distribution supports CSS decryption on the Pi, so you can't easily play physical DVDs. (There are hacks around to make it possible).
There are also issues with menus on the Pi, so I don't think it's suitable for non-technical parents.

Rip all your DVDs to mkv files (even without reencoding) and the answer would be a lot more positive.
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#3
Unfortunately they are rather non-technical (at least when it comes to computers) and I don't live with them, so ripping every DVD they might ever get is out of the question. Sad They really wanted something easy to use.

OK then, back to the HTPC idea. Too bad - Raspberry seemed so perfect!

On a side note - which Linux HTPC distro would you recommed for PC (that supports all of the above)? XBMC or something else?
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#4
(2013-06-06, 00:27)Vilx- Wrote: On a side note - which Linux HTPC distro would you recommed for PC (that supports all of the above)? XBMC or something else?

I think xbmc on a HTPC will do all you want. OpenELEC is a good choice for a distribution if you want to keep it simple (i.e. not install other packages on it).
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#5
Don't give up on the Raspberry Pi so fast!
Check this:
http://forum.stmlabs.com/showthread.php?tid=7623&page=5

I don't check myself but seems what is working pretty well
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#6
I'm a keen follower of that thread myself.
I think the solution may be a little awkward to use, for people who aren't computer enthusiasts, as you cannot just put a DVD in and say 'play' in the menu that pops up - you have to dive into options on the Videos main entry point.
As to whether it can play 'all regions' CDs/DVDs, that is a bit i haven't chased up, as I'm not sure what I have at the moment (it may be linked to the DVD device capabilities).
I was getting a failure with some magazine DVDs - but they may be encoded with a non-accepted code (I haven't been back to check)
HTH
Derek
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Does XBMC on Raspberry support all DVD regions?0