making a DVD recorder multi-region

I have stupidly just spent most of my asiamiles redeming a Panasonic DMR ES15 DVD recorder to discover that it is only a region 3 player ( we are moving to NZ in 6 weeks time!)

How can I now make it multi-regional? I have searched the internet but can only find hrlp for region 2 machines, can anyone help me before my husband finds out what I have done!

I'm assuming you mean the DVD recorder/player in your computer? And you want to play DVDs from any region without it "setting" your DVD drive to be able to play just one specific region? Or to be able to allow it to play DVDs from any region regardless?


I had faced a similar problem when I first arrived to Hong Kong and coming from Canada. I had a sizable collection of store-bought DVD movies I had brought along with me from Canada. But, the problem, a DVD player on a computer tends to allow only about 3 or 4 plays of DVD's from different regions before it will "LOCK" the region it can play to only 1 specific type of region. Or the DVD player might already be "LOCKED" to allow playback of only a specific region.


So, I found a great little utility that will let me bypass the Region problem, and now I can safely play any region DVD on my computer without worrying that it will be LOCKED onto just one specific region setting. I use DVD Region-Free, which you can find more info about over at: http://www.dvdidle.com/dvd-region-free.htm


So, I bought the full version, which if you have a large DVD collection from different regions, we'll it's probably worth the investment (it was worth it to me anyways). Though if you're not sure that this utility will do what you want it to do, no worries, thier program allows for a free 30 day trial to allow you to see if it will do a playback of whatever DVD you want. That's what I did first before buying the full version (tested it out to see if it would do what I wanted, and it did). There are other similar utilies that will do the same kind of thing, but this is the best one the I've used.


Hope that will be of help.

If you were referring instead to a stand-alone DVD player that you hook up to a TV, then, if you hunt around you can find some places that you can buy a player that has the "Region protection" removed and will allow playback of DVD from any region code.


Good luck.

A quick search didn't find any method of changing the region using the remote control or inserting a DVD etc. I did find a website that said the only method for the ES15 is to have a new chip inserted. Don't know how accurate the info is though.

BigDon, miklosc: Sigh, why don’t you people read the original question… The original poster was NOT looking to make computer based DVD-drive/writer region-free, but has a home entertainment DVD recorder unit. In that case all the talk about DVD Regio-Free (admittedly a great program) is useless. Also, the unit is unlikely to allow multiple (re-)setting like miklosc suggested.


A firmware upgrade or change might (but is not guaranteed) to help. In general, this line of Panasonic DVD recorders is notoriously difficult to make region-free. For some models you can purchase a special remote that will send some signals to the recorder and removes the region lock, while for others only a chip change will give you the desired results.


http://www.videohelp.com/ is normally a good source for region-free ‘hacks’ for consumer machines, but (so far) has nothing for the model in question.

Beachball "sigh" right back at ya. ;)

As there was no clear indication of such, at the time I didn't know if the "Panasonic DMR ES15 DVD recorder" was a DVD recorder/player for a computer, or a stand-alone recorder/player, therefor IF you had actually read my message, you would have seen the very first sentence I wrote:


"I'm assuming you mean the DVD recorder/player in your computer?"


So most of my advice was for a recorder/player that would be for a computer.


Also later in my original message, I say: "

If you were referring instead to a stand-alone DVD player that you hook up to a TV,..."


So there you have it, before you go "sighing" at people who are only trying to be helpful, maybe it would be better to carefully ready through their whole message first.


Regardless, I still stand by my advice as it still may be helpful to other people out there who ARE looking for a way to have a computer based DVD player/recorder be able to play DVDs from different regions.

beachballz: thanks for the "mature" and insightful posting. You just prove that you don't bother to read people's messages, or that you have "selective reading". Anyways, thanks for the "pi". it's just what I needed. :-)