Ripped this from a newsgroup just now. Thought you'd like to read it. One of those rare gems among the rubbish...
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ACTUALLY it seems you've fallen prey to the misadvertising that
killed Divx players - Divx back then stood for "Digital Video
Express" - kind of a "DVD Plus" system if you will - they did
everything a DVD player did, hell, basically they WER just standard
DVD players with one tiny feature added -you could get them only at
Circuit City, which was the downfall, but the discs were sold
everywhere - for 2 or 3 bucks, you could get any new movie that was
out on DVD, take it home, and when you put in in the machine it could
play for anywhere up to 48 hours from the point you inserted it, on a
timer, then it would cut off for that particular disc. Like the
movie? use the "buy" button and they'll unlock your machine, want to
watch it again, say next year? same thing but just hit "rent again"
and it'd unlock it for another 48 hours... for another 2 bucks of
course. Not a bad system - same price or cheaper than BlockBuster
etc, but when you were done you could keep the disc, give it to a
friend with a Divx player (he'd of course have 48 hours on it), throw
it away, whatever. In fact less than a week after it came out the
players were hacked to NEVER remember what discs had been watched...
i.e. a perpetual 48 hours per disc that would NEVER run out, but that
wasn't what did them in. What DID kill divx was false advertising,
Best Buy, Service Merchandise, CompUSA, Sears, and several other
chains felt sort of slighted that ONLY Circuit City would sell this
great new product, so they released LOTS of false press saying "DVD
Versus Divx, Which is a better format, or things like: Would you want
your movies to run only 48 hours then lock?? or stuff implying they
would ONLY run special divx discs.... no, other way around, ANY Divx
player was a normal DVD player, it just had added features. That'd be
like saying that a DVD player that can run CDRW discs can ONLY play
them and not purchased ones. Sound silly? sure, but only if you know
what CDRWs are. if it were some new feature (like divx was at the
time) you might believe it, when at least 10 major sources tell you
this thing is non-standard and won't run any other disc, whether it's
true or not is irrelevant. It's the media that people believe.
::sigh:: and I almost bought one of those things too... Wish I had
now. Hundreds of movies for 99 cents apiece in pawn shops etc
everywhere. Check Ebay, you'll find bunches. Mainstream stuff too,
not "bargain DVD" type movies like you'll find at wal-mart packaged 2
for 14.88. Just goes to show, sometimes the pen IS mightier than the
sword. (especially if the pen is really sharp and pointy and the
sword is very, very short.)
Well, there's my 2 cents worth (and then some)
-ArtemisKitty
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ACTUALLY it seems you've fallen prey to the misadvertising that
killed Divx players - Divx back then stood for "Digital Video
Express" - kind of a "DVD Plus" system if you will - they did
everything a DVD player did, hell, basically they WER just standard
DVD players with one tiny feature added -you could get them only at
Circuit City, which was the downfall, but the discs were sold
everywhere - for 2 or 3 bucks, you could get any new movie that was
out on DVD, take it home, and when you put in in the machine it could
play for anywhere up to 48 hours from the point you inserted it, on a
timer, then it would cut off for that particular disc. Like the
movie? use the "buy" button and they'll unlock your machine, want to
watch it again, say next year? same thing but just hit "rent again"
and it'd unlock it for another 48 hours... for another 2 bucks of
course. Not a bad system - same price or cheaper than BlockBuster
etc, but when you were done you could keep the disc, give it to a
friend with a Divx player (he'd of course have 48 hours on it), throw
it away, whatever. In fact less than a week after it came out the
players were hacked to NEVER remember what discs had been watched...
i.e. a perpetual 48 hours per disc that would NEVER run out, but that
wasn't what did them in. What DID kill divx was false advertising,
Best Buy, Service Merchandise, CompUSA, Sears, and several other
chains felt sort of slighted that ONLY Circuit City would sell this
great new product, so they released LOTS of false press saying "DVD
Versus Divx, Which is a better format, or things like: Would you want
your movies to run only 48 hours then lock?? or stuff implying they
would ONLY run special divx discs.... no, other way around, ANY Divx
player was a normal DVD player, it just had added features. That'd be
like saying that a DVD player that can run CDRW discs can ONLY play
them and not purchased ones. Sound silly? sure, but only if you know
what CDRWs are. if it were some new feature (like divx was at the
time) you might believe it, when at least 10 major sources tell you
this thing is non-standard and won't run any other disc, whether it's
true or not is irrelevant. It's the media that people believe.
::sigh:: and I almost bought one of those things too... Wish I had
now. Hundreds of movies for 99 cents apiece in pawn shops etc
everywhere. Check Ebay, you'll find bunches. Mainstream stuff too,
not "bargain DVD" type movies like you'll find at wal-mart packaged 2
for 14.88. Just goes to show, sometimes the pen IS mightier than the
sword. (especially if the pen is really sharp and pointy and the
sword is very, very short.)
Well, there's my 2 cents worth (and then some)
-ArtemisKitty
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