EEPROM and DVD zones

[Nicolas Boullis]

Hi,

I thought it would be possible to identify different models of
Hollywood+/DXR3 boards by reading the contents of the embedded EEPROM.

Right now, I have received 40 model reports, with 20 different EEPROM
contents. That's a lot, and I can hardly think that there reaaly are
that many different models of Hollywood+/DXR3 boards. Moreover, that
only makes a mere 2 reports per EEPROM content on average, so I guess
more are still missing.

Thinking a little more, I thought that the EEPROM may be use to store
some region information for the Windows driver. Googling around confirms
this: the current zone is supposed to be stored on some EEPROM, as well
as a counter that allows only 5 region changes. (Moreover, it is
possible to reset the counter, but only 5 times; I guess there is a
second counter to handle this.)

If we can find where this information is stored on the EEPROM, then it
becomes possible to define a mask that might drastically reduce the
number of different EEPROM contents, and hopefully make it possible to
identify the different models.

Note that the EEPROM contents of Hollywood+ and DXR3 boards seem quite
different. The location of this information may be different as well.

Reverse-engineering the Windows driver would probably work, but it would
certainly be a hard task. I think a much easier solution is to play with
the Windows driver, changing the region several times, and resetting the
counter, and using the Linux driver to dump the EEPROM contents after
each change.

I have no easily-available computer that still runs Windows where I can
try this (the only one I have is a laptop that can't host a PCI board).
So it would be nice if someone with a computer running Windows, and a
Hollywood+ board could do the following:
 1. using Linux: dump the EEPROM contents (see the beginning of
    /sys/class/em8300/em8300-0/device/model )
 2. using Windows: find the current region
 3. using Linux: dump the EEPROM contents (just in cased it changed for
    no good reason)
 4. using Windows: change the current region
 5. using Linux: dump the EEPROM contents
 6. repeat 4 and 5 until no more change is allowed
 7. using Windows: reset the counter with
      http://www.lava.net/~bhiga/HPlus/reseth.exe
 8. using Linux: dump the EEPROM contents
 9. using Windows: change the current region
10. using Linux: dump the EEPROM contents

Send all the information you gathered to this list.
Doing this, it would be nice to try as many different regions as
possible, especially if the coding of the region is not trivial.


It would also be nice if someone would do the same thing with a DXR3
board, except that I'm not sure it is possible to reset the counter...


Cheers,

Nicolas

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft
Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2008.
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/
_______________________________________________
Dxr3-devel mailing list
Dxr3-devel@...
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/dxr3-devel

[Ville Skyttä]

On Monday 03 March 2008, Nicolas Boullis wrote:

> I have no easily-available computer that still runs Windows where I can
> try this (the only one I have is a laptop that can't host a PCI board).
> So it would be nice if someone with a computer running Windows, and a
> Hollywood+ board could do the following:
[...]

I have a couple of H+ cards and my VDR box also has Windows ME in it, I can
play with it sometime.  Just for future reference when I get the chance to do
that: how do I find out the region in Windows, and how do I change it?  Do
the H+ Windows drivers come with an utility how do do this?  You mentioned
reseth.exe but if I understand correctly it is used only for resetting the
region change counter.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft
Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2008.
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/
_______________________________________________
Dxr3-devel mailing list
Dxr3-devel@...
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/dxr3-devel

[Nicolas Boullis]

Hi,

On Sat, Mar 08, 2008 at 03:26:41PM +0200, Ville Skyttä wrote:
>
> I have a couple of H+ cards and my VDR box also has Windows ME in it, I can
> play with it sometime.  Just for future reference when I get the chance to do
> that: how do I find out the region in Windows, and how do I change it?  Do
> the H+ Windows drivers come with an utility how do do this?  You mentioned
> reseth.exe but if I understand correctly it is used only for resetting the
> region change counter.

To be honnest, I have not used the Windows driver for a loooong time. I
guess there should be a utility to find and change the region, but I'm
not sure. The only way to change the region might be to try to play a
DVD with a different region...



Cheers,

Nicolas

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft
Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2008.
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/
_______________________________________________
Dxr3-devel mailing list
Dxr3-devel@...
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/dxr3-devel

[Jan Kandziora]

Am Samstag, 8. März 2008 14:26 schrieb Ville Skyttä:
>
> I have a couple of H+ cards and my VDR box also has Windows ME in it, I can
> play with it sometime.  Just for future reference when I get the chance to
> do that: how do I find out the region in Windows, and how do I change it?
> Do the H+ Windows drivers come with an utility how do do this?  You
> mentioned reseth.exe but if I understand correctly it is used only for
> resetting the region change counter.
>
On MS-Windows try this: http://www.remoteselector.com/

Linux users would rather rip the whole DVD and never think about the stupid
encryption scheme again.

Kind regards

        Jan
--
Dazu paßt auch der Trend weg von der Kommandozeile: Dem Computer
*Kommandos* erteilen - nein, das geht nun wirklich nicht. Nein, *wir*
haben gefälligst *seine* Fragen zu beantworten und *seine* Meldungen
zu bestätigen... (Christopher Eltschka in ger.ct)


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft
Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2008.
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/
_______________________________________________
Dxr3-devel mailing list
Dxr3-devel@...
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/dxr3-devel