Nvidia Macrovision DVD-TV rules forced on consumers

DRIVERS FROM NVIDIA 41.09 and onwards include "stringent checks" to comply with Macrovision requirements, the company has said.

That could mean if you have a TV encoder that does not support Macrovision, you may well get an error message depending on what DVD software player you are using, the company has said.

In a note to the latest drivers, Nvidia says: "The BT868 and Conexant CX25870 TV encoders do not support Macrovision. If your graphics card is equipped with one of these TV encoders, then it will not support DVD playback with our 41.09 drivers and above."

But that has caused some consumers to react in alarm. One INQUIRER reader claimed that meant users of equipment that doesn't conform to these Macrovision standards are stuck with drivers beyond the 40.72 level.

He said: "Their [Nvidia] drivers automatically lock all DVD playback, not just TV out, when a non-Macrovision approved tv encoder chip is detected, meaning those that have video cards that contain BT868 and Conexant CX25870 TV encoders".

He said he had contacted VisionTek, which made his card originally, and got this response. "This is a bug in the drivers that we have addressed with Nvidia. We hope to see them fix this in the near future. You should continue to use drivers prior to the 41.09 series for complete functionality."

But, he claimed, Nvidia has so far not replied to repeated requests for clarification.

But Macrovision did reply to his query. In a support note, the company said: "It turns out that nVidia had to change their drivers because of an error in the Windows Media player revision 8.1. If you use a different DVD player it should be OK. The issue would not exist on your computer if it had Macrovision's technology but apparently your graphics board has a non-Macrovision capable digital video encoder device."

He said Macrovision had told him it had sympathy for Nvidia, because it was forced into this situation. µ