BR, Cinevia, Win7, DRM, and audio

[VirtualLarry]

Is Cinevia THAT GOOD a protection, that it causes you not to hear the audio past the opening scene? Even if you rip to MKV and view with MPC-HC? (I can't imagine that an open-source media player would actually implement DRM?)

 

[Super56K]

It's very effective. . .in devices/software that implement Cinavia. And, as far as I know, you can't remove it because the watermark is embedded into the audio tracks.

Now, the easy way to defeat it is to not use commercial playback software, or try to play them on Blu-ray set tops, or a PS3. MPC-HC, VLC, Plex, XBMC, and so on have no issues because they're not looking for the watermark. Even Plex running on a PS4 isn't looking for it.

 

[nutternatter34]

As of news yesterday. Soon Cinavia is no longer a problem if you're willing to re-encode the few movies that use it. I signed up just to share that. Hi!

 

[poofyhairguy]

Is Cinevia THAT GOOD a protection, that it causes you not to hear the audio past the opening scene? Even if you rip to MKV and view with MPC-HC? (I can't imagine that an open-source media player would actually implement DRM?)

When Cinevia gets triggered nothing works. Something else is going on.

 

[SlitheryDee]

I think you get a black screen with with a "You've been a bad boy" type message on it when cinavia is triggered. I haven't heard anything about audio muting with it.

Cinavia is pretty remarkable though. Possibly the most effective DRM I've seen for movies.

 

[smitbret]

Cinavia is very formidable but only works if both the Disc and the Playback device support it. Generally, that is limited to BD players that are BD licensed. HTPCs and most standalone devices like WDTV Live, Roku, etc. won't even notice it.

When Cinavia triggers, you will get one of these 4 codes:

http://cinavia.com/pages/message1.html

I've never seen anything but a code 3 where I would be watching the movie and then somewhere between 7-20 minutes, the audio mutes and the corresponding message pops up in a gray box over the video that is still playing normally.

Incidentally, SlySoft is claiming to have defeated it, but there are some footnotes. They dropped off some audio samples and you can clearly hear some audio distortion that I would describe as kind of an echo or hollow effect. You may not notice it if you didn't compare it to the original source, though. Additionally, because the audio has to be re encoded, any HD-Audio tracks get downsampled to Dolby Digital. You must also completely reencode the file using both AnyDVD HD and CloneBD. I've never used Clone BD, but I would hope there is something in there that would allow me to pass through the video track without re encoding as it would be horribly inefficient to have to needlessly re encode the video, too.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Cinavia is pretty remarkable though. Possibly the most effective DRM I've seen for movies.

Really? I feel its the opposite: a terribly ineffective DRM. All you have to do is avoid devices with it baked in, and play your files back on the thousands of other devices that can do it without complaining. Heck the only thing that Cinavia has prevented is me giving money to hardware companies that support it. I don't get the point from the perspective of a Sony for example, other than to placate the media branch.

I will go so far to say I like Cinavia. Nothing gets the point across to someone that they need to buy a new box for media playback instead of using the old PS3 for everything than when they run into DRM. Cinavia has been the motivation for a couple of Chromebox/WD Live purchases in my family, which has meant a better overall experience for them and less headaches for me.

 

[SlitheryDee]

Really? I feel its the opposite: a terribly ineffective DRM. All you have to do is avoid devices with it baked in, and play your files bank on the thousands of other devices that can do it without complaining. Heck the only thing that Cinavia has prevented is me giving money to hardware companies that support it. I don't get the point from the perspective of a Sony for example, other than to placate the media branch.

I will go so far to say I like Cinavia. Nothing gets the point across to someone that they need to buy a new box for media playback instead of using the old PS3 for everything than when they run into DRM. Cinavia has been the motivation for a couple of Chromebox/WD Live purchases in my family, which has meant a better overall experience for them and less headaches for me.

Well the assumption in my post is "In devices that support it". What I mean is that it's very difficult (impossible?) to get around when you're trying to play something on a device that incorporates cinavia. Even analog cam recordings trigger it, and it survives pretty much any kind of ripping/encoding, etc. I only have the luxury of admiring it because I'm playing my media on devices that ignore it though.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Ah, good point. It is hard to defeat if you want to defeat it instead of just work around it.

 

[smitbret]

I will go so far to say I like Cinavia. Nothing gets the point across to someone that they need to buy a new box for media playback instead of using the old PS3 for everything than when they run into DRM. Cinavia has been the motivation for a couple of Chromebox/WD Live purchases in my family, which has meant a better overall experience for them and less headaches for me.

That's kind of funny cuz that's how I ended up on XBMC/Kodi. When Sony pushed their software update that installed Cinavia and I got their warning message I dumped everything in my house that was Sony, starting with the PS3 to be replaced by a WDTV Live Hub about 3 days later and eventually a Chromebox running OpenELEC.

I just got tired of supporting the company that was responsible for their Rootkit debacle that literally installed malware/virus on your PC when you inserted your CD and the Arcoos protection scheme in 2005. Cinavia was kind of the last straw.

 

[pcslookout]

It is easy to get around Cinavia. There is a solution online that takes less than 5 mins.