Cinavia and new firmware

[amoses]

Has anyone had any problems with Cinavia since updating to the new firmware that was just released this month?

[Strider_Nemesis]

I don't think WDC would go as far as striking its customers with a low blow by secretly (i.e. without announcing it) adding Cinavia to a firmware release. If you need to update your firmware to use a new feature, then do so. I usually try not to update too fast because I wait to see the community's reaction; new bugs always appear along with added features.

[RoofingGuy]

Since WD's whole legit business model is allowing folks to play discs they legally own that they've ripped to non-optical storage, it would defeat their purposes to add Cinavia blocking to their devices unless they were legally mandated to.

It's required on commercial Blu-Ray players, which is why presumably why PS3 had to add it.

To my knowledge, with the exception of the PS3, nothing other than stand-alone BluRay players uses it.

[TonyPh12345]

Netgear NeoTV is getting it...  http://www.anandtech.com/show/4110/netgear-ces-2011/2

[TonyPh12345]

Oh, and by the way.  I have the Green Hornet BD, and I ripped it using DVDFab.    Green Hornet is Cinavia protected, and it's still working fine on all WD boxes.

[RoofingGuy]

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TonyPh12345 wrote:

Netgear NeoTV is getting it...   

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Not necessarily, if you read through to the end:

"Netgear clarified their stance on Cinavia, stating that they will not include Cinavia support till Sigma includes it in the SMP 8642 SDK. They also indicated that users would be forewarned about any firmware including support for Cinavia."

[RoofingGuy]

Certainly, from what I can gather, Sigma is adding it to the SDKs of (some of) their chips.

But, I'd have to hazard a guess that that's because the chips are also sold for use in commercial BluRay players, where Cinavia detection is now required under AACS.

As others have pointed out before I ever did, it seems highly counter-productive for digital media player manufacturers to enable the detection, unless they become obligated to.

I guess when the 8910-based devices start showing up later this year, we can see how many of them enabled the Cinavia.  The Dune Pro might have to, for the optical drive module, but other players would be a significant test of whether the capabilities are actually utilized or ignored.

As far as I can still tell, Cinavia has not been added to the 865x SDK (because the line was never designed for BluRay players to utilize), so WD would seem to be unable to add it to the Live/Live Plus/Live Hub at this point in time.  The WDTV SMP is another matter... I can't find any solid confirmation whether the 8670 SDK has Cinavia or not, yet.

ETA:

From what I can see, Sigma lists:

• SMP8910
• SMP8646
• SMP8644
• SMP8642

as the current SMP chips for BluRay players... so those SDKs would need Cinavia -- it seems, according to NetGear, that it isn't in the 8642 SDK yet.

Sigma lists:

• SMP8910
• SMP8670
• SMP8652
• SMP8646
• SMP8642

as the current SMP chips for Media Players... The 8910 and the 864x would need Cinavia, because they're also intended for BR players, but there's no indication the 867x and 865x lines would need Cinavia added to the SDK, since they are not intended for BR use.

[richUK]

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amoses wrote:

Has anyone had any problems with Cinavia since updating to the new firmware that was just released this month?

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Is there any reason why you are asking? Whats your problem?

[amoses]

I don't have a problem.  I just did not want to upgrade if Cinavia was built in to the new firmware.  I purchased the WD TV live just because it was not plagued with Cinavia like my PS3 was.  I had heard that WD might be going to include it in their firmware at a later date, so was just trying to see if it was still free or not.  I appreciate all the conversation on the topic.

[AA-AMA]

I've ripped Battle Los Angeles bluray (which has cinavia) Played fine on my wd hd media player. I bought the live streaming media player (gen 3) and worked fine out of the box I've then upgraded to 1.07 firmware. Now when I play battle la, it stops working after 20 secs. Nothing else will play and I need to restart to be able to play anything. I've ripped some of my other blurays and they work fine. It seems that WD now detects cinavia and just stops working. Yes, I know audio is supposed to stop working and it gives you a message. But I just get spinning arrows on everything. I took my steaming live back and replaced it. Checked battle la and it worked out of the box. Upgraded to 1.07 and it stopped working again. Downgrade the firmware and still wouldn't work. So WD have either stuffed up the firmware or have chucked in some sort of cinavia protection. BTW, I rip everything with DVDFab and handbrake - all settings are the same