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General discussion

I want to play DVD`s on my Mac!

Dec 10, 2005 5:06AM PST

This is a PowerMac 8600 running OS 9.1 @ 400mHz at our vacation house, so no point in putting in a newer Mac....we use this for a little email, a little low level digital audio/video/graphics at times but mostly for iTunes playback.

The Mac lives in the bedroom and I`d like to play DVDs at times when the rest of the family is sleeping. I have a Que drive connected which holds my iTunes music on a home-burned DVD, but I can`t play DVD movies, either homemade or purchased. I`ve tried installing a couple of different apps but still no movies.

Help!

Discussion is locked

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Uh...
Dec 10, 2005 5:43AM PST

Does a computer that old have a DVD drive in it ? It probably has only a cd-rom drive.

I could be wrong but I suspect this is your conundrum.

grim

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correction
Dec 10, 2005 5:54AM PST

I should have said all the Que drives I was familiar with are CD-RW drives. A quick google search did not show me any Que drives that played DVDs but again I could be wrong. I often am, except when I'm not. Wink

grim

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As has just been pointed out
Dec 10, 2005 5:59AM PST

Grim beat me to the post.
I cannot find any reference to a Que DVD ROM or a DVD writer. I suspect that you only have a CDRW device which would explain a lont.
I'm not sure that OS 9.1 and the 8600 are capable of running a DVD ROM. There is no Firewire and no USB (unless added) and no IDE, (it's a SCSI device) I'm sure that SCSI DVD players are available, at a price, but they don't exactly spring off the shelf at you.

Back to the book reading: Happy

P

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Re:I want to play DVD`s on my Mac!
Dec 11, 2005 6:03AM PST

I don`t have the details on the Que! drive but let me answer a couple of questions...I have added a PCI card with Firewire/USB 1 and the external Que drive is connected through the Firewire port. It does see the DVDs...I have my iTunes library on a homeburned DVD and when I plug in a commercial/homemade DVD, it sees it and mounts it but when I doubleclick it, I get a message about something or the other is missing...I can`t say the exact message as I`m 2 hours away from it right now. I have burned at least one data DVD using this drive.

I tried installing a software Apple DVD player last week but got the message that it couldn`t be installed on this computer...

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USB 1.x is not worthy.
Dec 11, 2005 6:11AM PST

Oops. I mean it's far too slow for DVD playback. I'd rather not do the math for you but consider you want to move 4.7 gigabytes in an hour. Will USB 1.x do this?

Even without the 1/2 duplex nature of USB, I get about 78 minutes without adding overhead.

Bob

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Story so far,
Dec 11, 2005 6:44AM PST

The Que! drive is a Firewire device that is connected to a PCI Firewire/USB 1.1 card in a Mac running OS 9.1
You need a software DVD ROM player.

http://www.pure-mac.com/appud.html has one that runs in 9.1 but appears to be for a G3 and above. It's worth a try. I think you will also need the Apple CD/DVD extension to make a DVD mountable.

I have looked in a bunch of places and have not found one that runs on anything lower than a G3.

Perhaps you could let us know what the exact message is next time you see it.


P

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only thing I've found so far...
Dec 11, 2005 2:19PM PST

Is a reference to problems running DVDs with OS 9.1 that MIGHT apply to your problem...

try this link...

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:aHQjJZfG8RYJ:www.tempel.org/mac/+macintosh+os+9.1+will+not+play+DVD&hl=en&client=safari

and look for the section about a third of the way down discussing

''Player FS Patch (Freeware)''
it shows a screen snap of a common error message about ''apple DVD player can not play this disc...yada yada''

It does not mention equipment specific problems so the IC Chip or drive issues may not be addressed.

This may help (shrug) it may not. Without model numbers for the drive or any other details I can't be of much help. I did find 2 or 3 references to a firewire equipped Que DVD drive but nothing more.

Get back to us when you can, just to satisfy our curiosity if anything.

grim

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RE: only thing I've found so far...
Dec 31, 2005 5:17AM PST

Okay, now you`ve done it!

I visited the house last week and now the iTunes DVD won`t even mount!!! I`ve used this same DVD over the last 3-4 months w/out any difficulty other than the occasional skip in playback but now the Que drive won`t see or mount ANYTHING, whether homemade or commercial, CD or DVD. I tried restarting the computer and the Que drive, rebuilding the desktop, reinstalling the CD-burning software (the name escapes me, but NOT Toast-I think it`s something called Discribe). I didn`t try zapping the PRAM and I didn`t have my old Norton disk with me-I`ll try that next.

Back to the original problem: the message I got wasn`t that the DVD couldn`t be played, but that some piece of software was missing...I still can`t say because the DVD wouldn`t mount....I`ll try again next visit.

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One off-beat suggestion...
Dec 31, 2005 7:05AM PST

Instead of using your valuable time trying to retro-fit the 'ol Mac to play a movie DVD (which by the way is WAY different than a data DVD and may explain why you could previously use your iTunes DVD), why not simply buy a portable DVD player. Some nice units for around $115. Best Buy had several that were around this price. Wide-screen, nice LCD picture. Headphone jack. Just a thought.