before you buy a clarifier, read this

[jimdagys]

You might get lucky and and not need a clarifier. Some DVD players when hacked do not display any form of copy protection (Macrovision or cgms/a). My DVD player (Classic DVD50s $39.00 from Meijer) never displays cgms/a. I found this out by hooking up to and old TV and turning the vertical hold and looking between the picture where the cgms/a signal can be seen (5 bright horizontal lines just above the picture). However, the lines are not there on this player. From someone who makes clarifiers, "You are correct that the CGMS/A will appear at the top of the screen in the
lines that are usually off the screen, namely line 21. Some DVD recorders
will react to this signal and some will not. You might get lucky. Usually
the newer the DVDR the more kinds of copy protection that they will detect."

[Saminai]

Yea but in the future stuff like PPV and movies on HBO will all have broadcast flags turned on via CGMA-A so you won't be able to record those to your DVD recorder.