External DVD Drive to Read Blu-ray / HD DVD

It seems to me the most suitable group for my post, if it's the case, accept my apologies and disregard this post.
Is there a external drive that can play Blu-Ray and HD DVD on a MAC? As anyone here been able to do so already?
I can see an interesting Addonics Zebra Super Multi Blu-ray and HD DVD Drive based on LG GGC-H20N technology apparently that claim it's OS X 10.4 compatible but there is no playback software currently on MAC for Blu-Ray.
I own several MACs, and I'd like to kill a flock of bird with one stone: ideally to get an external drive I can use with either of them, that can burn CD/DVD, that could play Blu-Ray and HD-DVD movies, and (that would be the Graal as I lived in both Europe and USA and own several zones DVDs) can be/become region free.
Anyone going through the same research/investigation?

I don't own a Blueray Burner yet since it isn't supported on most macs. But if I were to consider Blueray then I look into Roxio Toast or DVDSP.
Roxio Toast will allow you read / write Blueray on a Mac (so I've read) but it will not allow for playback apparently (not without some improvements to apple's DVD Player app).

Similar Messages

Sony Optiarc BD Rom BC-5500S is not reading blu ray disks

I have a pavilion dv7-1070ev and upgrade from windows vista home premium 32bit to Windows 7 home premium 64bit.The laptop came with the optical drive Sony Optiarc BD Rom BC-5500S with Firmware version 1.83.The problem is that the bd-rom is not reading blu ray disks. When i put in CD's/DVD's everything is fine -> drive starts to spin up and a little later the disc is readable/available in windows. When i put in a BluRay disc -> drive just makes a very short silent spin effort (to identify disc?),and no disc is available in windows. When i double click my drive icon (in my computer) it pops up a window asking me to insert a disc.Note that it is the first time I put blu-ray disk to watch blu-ray movie.I have never used the bd-rom when the laptop had windows vista.
The drive is compatible with windows 7 b4bit
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/compatibility/Windows-7/en-us/Search.aspx?l=en&type=Hardware&s=bc%2...
When the laptop had windows vista hp said that the drive is working only with hp quickplay software.This is not compatible with windows 7
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/compatibility/Windows-7/en-us/Search.aspx?l=en&type=Software&s=HP%2...
The software i am using for windows 7 is the hp mediasmart dvd.
This is compatible with windows 7
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/compatibility/windows-7/en-us/Search.aspx?l=en-us&type=Software&s=H...
Searched in forums I found these solutions :
A clean registry
1. To begin the process, start the Registry Editor.
    Click START,click RUN, type REGEDIT, and then click OK.
    Click the plus(+) next to the following folders in the left side of the window pane:
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
    SYSTEM
    CurrentControlSet
    Control
    Class
    (4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318)
2. Look for any of the following names in the right side of the window pane:
    UpperFilters
    LowerFilters
3. If any of the items above are listed, right click on the item and select DELETE.
4. Be sure to restart your computer after you have deleted the files in the registry.
B.new firmware
1.Download the latest version for the retail version of this drive from sony at:
http://www.sony-optiarc.eu/uploads/media/WinDL_BC5500S_V106_02.zip
Sony says that you can only update from Firmware versions 1.01, 1.02, 1.03, 1,04 and 1.05. Previous firmware version(s) other than mentioned here are probably OEMs and therefore cannot be updated with this file. Contact your PC manufacturer (FTS, DELL, HP....) if you require firmware updates for these drives.
I have HP version 1.83 dated December 2007 so I cannot update.
C.Uninstall/install bd-rom
Uninstall bd-rom from device manager ,restart the pc and then looking for drivers.
searching not found something.
My driver is up to date (21/06/2006) and the driver is 6.1.7601.17514
D.Clean the laser lens
I put a cd cleaner to clean the lens, but that didnt help
I have used the solutions but the problem is not solved.
Can anyone help ;

QuickPlay is made by Cyberlink who also makes Power DVD 10, 11 and 12 products.
You have to uninstall QuickPlay and all Power DVD products (don't use QuickPlay anymore, it's outdated and it will not be updated as it's been long discontinued). There is also a Power DVD folder(s) that needs to be deleted as well.
After you have uninstalled everything, run CCleaner as many times as necessary and delete what it finds in its registry cleaner.
http://www.filehippo.com/download_ccleaner/
Here is also a link for Power DVD11 cleaner as well, use this after CCleaner.
http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/16915.page (restart after all of this)
Are you running the trial of DVD or have you paid for it ? If you want to purchase some Blu-ray software then stay away from Cyberlink, I use Total MediaTheatre 5 and it's much better.
Also available for free is Power DVD 10 for HP owners, when installed correctly, it's OK, but it's not with out its problems.
If you want to install Power DVD10, then post again.
The other thing that worries me is your Sony drive, I have had many people here that I can't get the Sony drive to read Blu-ray's. I don't know if its firmware is out of date (there is no firmware update) or if the new updated Blu-ray players have become incompatible.
You may be forced to buy a Pioneer or HP Blu-ray reader.

EMac External LACIE DVD Drive not reading.

eMac External LACIE DVD Drive not reading.
eMac 700 MHz running OS X 4.4
Came without DVD or modem internal
Has 256mb memory
Bought a used Lacie 1394 Firewire DVR External.
Was able to burn DVD’s and CD’s with Toast 6 Light.
Cannot find the “DVD Player” on the hard drive.
It will read data DVD.
eMac will not read any movies burnt or bought.
I was told I probably need more memory?
Thought running IDVD would fix the problem.
No Soap.
This machine was giving external modem problems before Tiger was installed.
Before we spend more money or just get ride of the eMac.
What is the DVD problem?
This same Lacie burner reads and writes DVD and CD fine with our iMac 450 DV 320mb memory. Running 9.2 and X.3

OS X 10.3.x / 10.4.x natively support data burning to external DVD drives but video payback requires software such as iDVD which isn't installed by default on models without an internal DVD drive (the installer sees no internal drive and thinks it's unnecessary). Try downloading VLC Player and see if that will let you play movies.

Unable to play Blu-Ray or DVD through MediaSmart on HDX 18

My drive has the Blu-Ray symbol on it, so I know it's supposed to have Blu-Ray capabilities, but every time I put a Blu-Ray OR DVD in, MediaSmart DVD pops up and says "No disc loaded in drive." However, I am able to run DVDs through Windows Media Player. So, what's wrong with my MediaSmart? Is there another way to play Blu-Rays?

I have been having this problem for close to 10 months (since I bought my HP laptop). I didn't care initially because I could use other players to play regular DVDs and CDs. I was in a fix when I tried to watch my first movie in Blu Ray disc. I tried multiple installs and re-installs but couldn't get it to work. I however got to a point where it would say the "Disc is ready, hit the play button", but when I hit the play button it just flashed the screen (adjusting screen display) for a second and then did nothing. I finally called HP support and they walked me through regular install and install as per their process. When the initial instructions didn't work, I on my own did two things while on call.
1. I first Un-installed my antivirus software, just to make sure it doesn't interfere with any of the other activities being instructed by the support staff since they were related to drivers.
2. I had a Divx player and converter installed in my machine. Just on random thought of driver conflicts I went ahead and un-installed all the Divx related software. It asked me for a restart and bingo. When the machine rebooted, HP mediasmart DVD was able to play the Blu Ray disc.
I don't know which of the un-installs did it. My guess is it probably was Divx or a combination of both. I then asked HP support to stop going through rest of the process. He advised me to update the BIOS and software for fingerprint device which I did and it solved another problem for me. I saw the whole movie without too many issues. Once issue I found was when I paused the play using keyboard and resumed the sound went away. I then had to close and restart the movie. Based on above experience, I would advice anyone else having same problems to first un-install all the free DVD/CD/Blu Ray player software from the machine, then proceed with un-installing antivirus (if necessary at all. You can install it back again). I haven't tried re-running the blu ray disc after re-installing the anitvirus. I will re-post any problem here if I find any issue. That would also nail down the culprit.
Hope this helps so some of you.

FCP X fails to share to blu-ray or DVD, no chance to trash com.app...plsit from lion, what to do?

I burned some Blu-Ray before with my new FCPX, now I get a "Failed" message when I try to share both Blu-Ray and DVD to hard drive for an image or actually burn a disc. I saw one answer was to trash the com.apple.final...plist files but I do not know how to do it from the new Lion OS, any help?

Tom,
Thank you so much. It trashed the files and now FCPX is burning my Blu-Ray :-)

Dvd Player to support Blue-Ray and HD-DVD

Hey,
i am planning a homecinema and have thought about buying a Mac Mini as Dvd /Multimedia Player. Becuase, to this moment, we don't know, which new HD Dvd Format will come in the future... Blue Ray or Hd-Dvd... is there a possbility I can play those new dvds with the normal dvd drive and maybe just some new drivers or software???
Thanks ver much

No, you cannot play a Blu-Ray or HD DVD disk in a DVD drive. They both require different hardware than DVD drives have.

Upgrade to Blu-Ray Optical DVD-RW for HP DV-5

Ok, thanks to MumboDog my hard drive issues are fully resolved. Thanks MumboDog. Now my next question is I've been having problems with the button not opening my optical drive. I can bypass the button with the paper clip trick, but who wants to carry a paper clip with them?
So I was wondering if I could remove this drive and install a blu-ray optical dvd-rw for the HP DV-5? Anyone have suggestions on where to buy, model no., or any suggestions as to a temporary fix to my current situation. By the way, the drive shows up in the BIOS but its currently not reading any cd's or dvd's. Could I be missing a driver? I did install the LightScribe drivers, got all current updates and installed Windows 7.
Thanks in advance for any and all of your thoughts and suggestions.

Use device manager to uninstall the DVD drive, reboot and let windows reinstall it automatically, see if it works now.
The problem with upgrading optical drives in notebooks is the the tray bezel is unique to each model, and some are not removeable so you cannot transfer it to the new drive.
I use to buy generic optical drives from electronics retailers to replace broken ones in notebooks, take the old bezel off and transfer it to the new one, this way it looks like it belongs on the notebook like the original, but I have noticed they are no longer removeable on some models, so if you want it to look right you need to order it from HP.
USA
http://welcome.hp.com/country/us/en/contact_us.html
Everywhere else
http://welcome.hp.com/country/us/en/wwcontact_us.html

HP MediaSmart DVD won't play Blu-Ray's

I'm hoping someone can help me out in trying to figure out why my HP HDX 18 won't play Blu-Ray movies using HP MediaSmart.
When I pop a Blu-Ray in the optical, HP MediaSmart starts up and it looks like it's going to the play the movie however, it proceeds to ask me if I want to "activate" the app. I click YES thinking it's the first time I've used it so I guess I need to activate it.....however, it then pulls up a browser that directs me to download a patch from CyberLink.
I download and attempt to install the patch however it tells me that MediaSmart is currently installed and the patch requests to uninstall the previous version.
I agree to do so and after a few seconds, it comes up with an error message (error!! the product definition file lost).
I retry MediaSmart thinking this time I'll press NO, I don't want to activate and when I do this, nothing happens at all.
When I open My Computer, I can see the Transformers Blu-Ray in the drive and can right click and Explore the Blu-Ray as well so I know the drive is seeing it.
I called HP support and while the guy was nice enough, he was at a complete loss in trying to figure out why my Blu-Ray player would not play any movies. He tried multiple steps from going to the MSCONFIG and disabling all programs at Start Up, disabling Windows Installer (not sure why he wanted to try this step), to trying to recover the program from the partition itself. Nothing worked.
His final resolution was to perform a complete system recovery which I balked at as I have multiple programs installed (that would have to be reinstalled) and don't feel it necessary to perform a system recovery to "fix" my Blu-Ray issue.
And just to clarify, yes...my optical drive is indeed Blu-Ray optical drive.
Any advise or direction anyone can point me in would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for your time.
Shep

The first link leds to a cyberlink page where i can't continue because theres nothing to click on.
mediasmart is up to date with me, but the cyberlink BR advsor means my laptop doesn't habe a BR Player neither a software.
i'm using Win7_64. Any suggests?

Best workflow for burning Blu-ray and DVD

Hi,
What's the best workflow for effciency sake for burning both a Blu-ray and a DVD of the same project?
Essientially I'd like to export and create a menu once, then be able to downrez to DVD. However, I'm not sure that is possible since blu-ray and DVD are differnt codecs.
Thank you

The only way that you can get acceptable re-scaling of menus is to go from BR to DVD, and do the editing in Photoshop. Simply re-scaling the menu here will not give acceptable results.
I usually copy the various button layers from the BR menu to a new DVD menu file created using the provided Photoshop preset. You will still have to do some manual re-scaling and alignment. The thing that has given me the most trouble over the years is round button highlights - a segment is often chopped off. Font sizes will probably need adjusting too.
Unless you are adept with handling layers and groups within Photoshop, it may be easier to start again.
Any attempt to convert within Encore is unlikely to produce acceptable menus in my experience.

When I import my Sony video, which is in m2ts format, the file size is a few times larger. This affects the volume of clips for creating the blu-ray or DVD discs. How can I squeeze the file size without sacrificing the quality of output?

When I import my Sony video, which is in m2ts format, the file size is a few times larger. This affects the volume of clips for creating the blu-ray or DVD discs. How can I squeeze the file size without sacrificing the quality of output? Is there any other ways of achieving this?

wongrayd wrote:
Thanks. I do not have the experience on burning discs from iMovie for the movie after editing (ie for video discs players). It seems that i cannot find the relevant command in the tool bar for this purpsoe. Would you please show me the way?
The command is gone because iDVD has been discontinued by Apple. After Apple discontinued iDVD they removed the iDVD burning link from iMovie. I still use iDVD sometimes, only because I have an old copy.
wongrayd wrote:
You have mentioned about Handbrake as a converter. What is the RF no. (under Constant Quality) meant? It seems that the smaller the no. is, the better quality will be. What is the optimal no.? or should we use the Average Bitrate? Again, what is the best rate? Furthermore, which format is more suitable or the best: H264 or mpeg 2/4?
I don't know what RF means. When I have used HandBrake, I've used presets that apply to what I want to do, so I don't know the meaning of each individual setting. However, it appears that many of them are listed in the HandBrake User's Guide that is linked from the Help menu in the program:
https://trac.handbrake.fr/wiki/HandBrakeGuide
wongrayd wrote:
For iMac, except iMovie, what other software is the best for the amateur? I have read Photoshop. Can this support m2ts files and user friendly?
Photoshop is not amateur-level software, and although it can edit a video, it cannot burn a DVD. Unfortunately, because I still use iMovie, I haven't tried anything else. You might want to read the reviews of various DVD-burning applications in the Mac App Store.
And maybe another forum member will jump in and help us here!

My DVD drive not reading DVDs, but can read some DVDs with data on it. Device manager shows no error

My DVD drive not reading DVDs, but can read some DVDs with data on it. Device manager shows no errors.
I tried to reinstall driver.
I downloaded new codec
I tried Microsoft FIX IT
Nothing worked.
Need some help.
Thank you!!
Paul

Hi Albos, This is a known problem. These superdrives die after a while. See the various threads on this site and the internet. I have the same problem with my Imac 20" 2.16 ghz. Just wants to burn and read cd's. Its has to do with the laser. For DVD an CD are two different laser and the one for DVD's has probably died in yours (as it did in mine). I bought an external LG burner and problem solved. (And a lot cheaper than replacing the superdrive)
Hope this helps you.
Robert

HP Pavilion dv7 MediaSmart Not reading Blu-Rays

Thanks for reading!
I love this notebook however it can't play my Blu-Rays! I think it messed up my Fast 5 Blue-Ray disc..
So I bought a cheap blu-ray movie (thank you Black Friday) and still nothing! It loads up fine until the movie actually plays then nothing happens, for awhile until I open task manager..
here are the specs:
Yes I have the latest MediaSmart update since I've attempted to update but was not available.
It seems others are faced with this problem and have even downloaded different players.
Oh yes one more thing, the DVD player itself works fine. It's just the Blu-Ray player..
Again thanks for reading and will answer any questions..Thank you!

Hi,
If you're using HP MediaSmart DVD to play the Blu ray disc, try the following.
HP now provides a version of Cyberlinks PowerDVD 10 which seems to be a better solution. Download the installer for this on the link below and save it to your Desktop.
ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp53001-53500/sp53029.exe
When the download has completed, open windows Control Panel, open Programs and Features, right click the entry for HP MediaSmart DVD and select Uninstall - when this process has completed, restart the notebook.
When windows has reloaded, double-click the installer for PowerDVD 10 to start the installation. When this has completed, see if your Blu ray disc now plays OK.
Regards,
DP-K
****Click the White thumb to say thanks****
****Please mark Accept As Solution if it solves your problem****
****I don't work for HP****
Microsoft MVP - Windows Experience

CD/DVD Drive only reads DVDS Not CD But the computer reads it as a DVD RW Drive!

CD/DVD Drive only reads DVDS Not CD But the computer reads it as a DVD RW Drive.the drive door say RW DVD+R DL,Compact Disk Rewritable,Ultraspeed,DVD Multi Recorder.I was Wondering if Windows Loaded the wrong Driver?My Laptop S/N IsCNF62612TZ And P/N Is EZ601UA#ABA And The Front Of My Monitor says Hp Pavilion Dv 1000 Entertainment Notebook PC,And The Service Tag Is dv1738od and the Sticker On The Back Of The monitor say Hp Pavilion dv5- 1235dx Entertainment notebook PC.it Cme Factory With Win xp and when i got it the os was corrupted.i tried to reinstall xp but disk said no hard found.so i booted it up with vista ultimate and then downloaded the drivers and stuff from the here.should i had downloaded the 64 bit set as well?

della wrote:
My toshiba tecra a2 can only read DVDs. I cant read any type of cd. Ive tried so many things. My laptop is running on xp service pack 3 with a mat**bleep**a DVD RAm UJ 820s. I can burn/run any type of DVD but cant do anything with cds. Ive tried unistalling the drive and that didnt work. Ive uninstalled the IDE drivers and that didnt work. Nothing seams to work. I cant use recovery cds because there CDS. Please Help!!!!!!!!!
It's probable that the CD 'side' of the combo drive has failed. That you cannot boot from the recovery CD is pretty much proof of the failure.

External Hard Drive Becomes Read Only

I have a LaCie Hard Drive that Time Machine has been backing up to for about 4 days now. All of a sudden, the external hard drive is read only. When I go into Get Info for the hard drive, I can't even change the read/write permissions - it's all grayed out. This is the second time it's happened. The first time was on a Western Digital MyBook. TM fried that drive. At least this drive hasn't disappeared like the last time.
I've now changed the Time Machine backup to my second hard drive on my Mac Pro (which is screaming along, as opposed to the FW800 [!!] backup on my La Cie, whose file transfers are slo-o-o-w).
The idea behind backing up onto the external was so that if I ever needed to leave during a fire or earthquake, I could bring this with me and not worry if my computer was destroyed. Insurance would replace the computer, and I could replace my system.
If it weren't formatted properly, it wouldn't have been backing up for the last few days.
Can anyone help?
Message was edited by: Theresa Mesa

Thank you to everyone who has posted about this issue -- it just happened to me AGAIN this morning (this is my 3rd time), after I installed the 10.5.2 update. The first two times were right after I hooked up my external Iomega 500GB drive to use with Time Machine and I thought it was something I was doing. Then it seemed to work fine for a couple months so I thought the problem was over. Guess not! It is frustrating because I just lost about 2 months worth of backups. So finally I searched Apple's discussion forums and saw that I am not alone. However, no one was really posting a solution other than to say "reformat the drive".
So I did a Google search about this topic and encountered the following article. I have just gone through the steps he outlines and although I won't know for awhile if it works, I figure at this point it can't hurt to try. I hope this proves useful to others as well. (One note -- in his article, he says to skip the Erase tab and go right to the Partition tab. If you don't see the Partition tab, first erase your corrupt Time Machine backup disk and then follow his steps.)
http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/apple/leopard-disk-utility-format-issue-screws-with-t ime-machine-but-theres-an-easy-fix-316573.php
Cheers ~
Message was edited by: sneebish

A205-S7464 DVD Drive doesnt read cds!

I have a A205-S7464 Laptop. running windows vista home edition sp1. my dvd drive doesnt read any cds! i dont know whats wrong. Could it be a driver issue? does it need to be updated or is the drive defective all together? the drive shows up in windows explorer and in the hardware devices it says its working properly! the drive is HD TS-L802A ATA. Driver 6/21/2006 ver. 6.0.6001.18000.
I just restored my system with the recovery disc. it read that fine. then i updated to vista sp1. didnt check if it read any cds before the update but doesnt read any cds now.... i think its a software issue the drive tries to read the cd but never actually reads it....
Message Edited by Polski85 on 02-19-2009 08:52 PM

Hi-
Try downloading and installing the Patchburn Utility. It might help your media reading. I assume this is a disk that someone burned? Could be your drive doesn't like the media, itself, or the burn speed was too high for your 5x DVD=ROM to read.
If Patchburn doesn't help, may be time to move up to a more modern drive to replace your antique.....
There is a real nice,Pioneer DVR-112 replacement you might consider.
G4AGP(450)Sawtooth, 2ghz PowerLogix, 2gbRAM, 300gbSATA+160gbATA, ATI Radeon 9800 Mac OS X (10.4.8) Pioneer DVR-109, ExtHD 160gb x2, 23"Cinema Display, Ratoc USB2.0, Nikon Coolscan

External DVD Drive to Read Blu-ray / HD DVD

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