Samsung BD1600 BluRay Player

[frieday]

Have some PAL dvds I'd like to play on it. For Americans with this player (A1 Region) is their any hope or chance to be able to set the player to region 9? Everything Ive read on here is about 3 years old which is understandable given that it is an older machine and was hoping between those old posts and now some folks had some breakthroughs or new methods I could try to employ.... couldn't get the player to even recognize the brazilian firmware that i tried, it is the newest one, though (2.21 I believe) I used hex editor changed country code and no acknowledgement from player after trying disc it simply said can not read with a ! yellow sign, and tried usb and no acknowledgment of the update just said usb connected. If anything I Can't find older firmwares from brazil or mexico and if a member here could direct me were i could find a link that I could use like a 2.07, 2.08, or 2.09 XAZ could work better im thinking. Suggestions would be kindly welcomed my software version info is the following.... s/w 81126.01_050708-1_XAA, region A1

[jman98]

We have had exactly ONE post here from a member who is not a regular and I have no trust/confidence in that he was supposedly able to hack some Samsung BD player sold in North America into being region free for DVD playback. Otherwise, the standard response is if you want region free, do NOT buy ANYTHING sold by Samsung or Sony in North America - period. The odds are quite high you will never unlock your player. And trying to use other country's firmware is a huge risk. Bricking your player is always possible if you do that. Note that even if you did unlock the player by some miracle, it probably can't convert PAL DVD video output to NTSC. Do you even have a TV that can accept PAL video input?

The solutions are what they always are.
1) Rip the DVDs and reburn them as region free PAL discs - BUT - your player and TV have to have ways to deal with the PAL video either by being able to play it as is or the player allowing you to convert to NTSC output.
2) Buy a true region free player. Philips may still make a small number of players that can be made region free out of the box by entering a code (they always deny making such players, yet the players do exist) but you'll have to check reports on current models to see what is out there in the USA. You can also buy an already hardware modified player from a seller like http://www.220-electronics.com/ and use that.