Sony region-free hacks

Download this file: www.home.no/trsolhei/avd-ls10.zip

Put the player into Standby mode

Press 1 and Return on remote for region 1, 2 and Return for region 2, and so on. Use 0 and Return to return player to default region settings

Press P-Mode and Return to play DVD's with the selected region, auto-switching is Off

Press Audio and Return for auto-switching On

Press Angle and Return for MacroVision On

Press Subtitle and Return for MacroVision Off

Unfortunately, this hack isn't very straightforward as it requires the use of a PALM based PDA (certain models can be picked up quite cheaply from ebay). If you have one or can borrow one then its pretty simple if you follow the instructions below.

1) Go into the services menu by doing the following:

- Turn your S550 on with no disc inside.

- (ON THE EQUIPMENT NOT ON REMOTE) Press and hold both the Display and Stop keys while turning the volume control to the right. When your TV screen fickle, release the buttons. You should be seeing the Service Menu now.

This should be fairly easy. I got to this step without any troubles.

2) USE the PALM with OmniRemote (http://www.pacificneotek.com/software/OmniRemote.zip) and Sony_DVD_hack.pdb (http://dev0_2000.tripod.com/).

3) I send numbers 1 to 5 with the PALM as suggested and tried it a number of ways such as sending 1 1 2 2 3 3 etc.

I did NOT see any "data reset" or anything else displayed on the screen as reported in the forums elsewhere. That's why I kept on trying for about an hour with various codes and just as I was about to give up, lo and behold, I tried playing a region 1 DVD and it WORKED. The morale of the story is that keep a bunch of DVDs (with various codes) handy and try it out.

While pressing the buttons 1 2 3 4 5 I did not notice anything unusual except button 2 would put the display into some kind of toggle mode but probably it is irrelevent and safe to ignore.

Put player into standby modus by pressing power button on remote control.

Then press Title button.

Press Clear button.

Press Power button.

A blue options menu opens.

Here you can change settings, for instance

macrovision on/off and regional settings.

Switch player to Standby

Using remote press 5 5 5 followed by Menu

Hold down 3 for 3 seconds

If the above fails to work then you may wish to try:

Switch player to Standby

Press Title, Clear, Power

Press the required region number

Open the drive tray

Enter 9 8 1 7 on remote to access the system menu

Select region from 1 to 6 or set it to 9 for Multi-region. Macrovision can be disabled from this screen

Insert required disc and press the Menu button

Select Program button then select a few chapters

Press Play, Stop, Play until the film starts

This may take some time to work and the film may start playing somewhere in the middle, but once it starts playing you can skip back to the beginning of the film

Turn On the unit with the remote controller

Wait until "no disc" appears in the unit's display

Press Pause, 3 1 4 1 5 9

The word "CODE" should appear in the display

Within five seconds, press the key that corresponds to the zone you want i.e. 0 for region free, 1 for region 1, 2 for region 2 and so on

Again, within 5 seconds, press Pause and Power

If the above fails to work then you may wish to try the following:

Put the player into Standby mode

Press 1 and Return on remote for region 1, 2 and Return for region 2, and so on. Use 0 and Return to return player to default region settings

Press P-Mode and Return to play DVD's with the selected region, auto-switching is Off

Press Audio and Return for auto-switching On

Press Angle and Return for MacroVision On

Press Subtitle and Return for MacroVision Off

Press and hold Clear, Menu and 4

A menu will be displayed allowing you to set the region

If this fails to work then you may wish to try one of the codes listed above

This hack requires the use of a ONE FOR ALL remote control.

See link below but note the following differences:

When you set up the ONE FOR ALL remote with the code 0 5 3 3 you need to first press the DVD button then hold down the MAGIC button until it blinks twice fast (it will blink once first then twice fast after that) you then enter the code 0 5 3 3 and then press the MAGIC button again to lock it in. The use of the magic button is note mentioned in these instructions for locking in the code....

ALSO when you use the 1 2 3 4 5 button presses you DO NOT get SUCCESS on the screen you instead have the unit show 0h then the DVD tray starts to open and close partly and continuously. You now enter 1 2 3 4 5 again and it stops and says OFF then turns back on again. (the instructions say it turns it off) you have to turn the unit off with the button on the machine. Pull the plug out for 5 seconds then plug it back in and turn it on and you are good to go!!!

http://www.auspaytv.com/sony/Sony_DVP_NC615.txt

Thanks to the person who typed up these full instructions originally. With this tweak to then you will be good to go.

I have three of the same machine and it worked a treat on all three :)

This hack requires a One For All 7040 remote

Using the One For All 7040 remote

Select DVD device on remote

Hold Magic button until DVD button flashes twice

Press 0 5 3 3

Set Up Device DVD Player

Put a disc in player and put player onto welcome screen

Hold Magic button down until DVD button on remote flashes twice

Press 9 9 4

Press Magic button

Press 1 8 9 1

Repeat steps 2 to 4, then press 2 5 5 2

Repeat steps 2 to 4, then press 0 9 5 3

Repeat steps 2 to 4, then press 2 2 1 4

Repeat steps 2 to 4, then press 0 7 9 5

Remove disc from the player, then put player on stand by

Press 1 2 3 4 5 (success will be displayed and comes out of stand by

Press 1 2 3 4 5 (player goes into stand by and your player is now region free)

Press O x 2 times

Press R1 x 5 times

Press X x 7 times

1. Turn on power with no disc inserted and tray closed.

2. Push on remote: Subtitle - 3 8 7 6 7

3. A message will appear on the display

4. Push on remote: 9 for region-free.