We all know there are a few valid reasons to use that other OS. One is playing DVDs.
“No, I’m not making this up. Come the day you buy a Windows 8 PC, or if you’re brave enough to install it yourself on an older PC, you’ll find that Windows 8 can’t play DVDs. You can also forget about TV tuner support and DVD Video Object (VOB) file playback. They’re gone too.”
See SJVN – How to watch DVDs on your Windows 8 PC: VideoLAN’s VLC.
Isn’t that cute? M$ is unbundling DVD playback… How soon will they unbundle the OS? “If you want to use this PC you just bought, send $50 USD and your UPC to
TAXATION
One M$ Way
Redmond, WA”
17444
12749
206
3
2
23885 
11847 
11699 
4624 
4257 
1641 
198 
14 
2 
0 
0 
0 
And no one will miss the feature, Bob. Tablets don’t have optical drives and desktop systems with optical drives have third party DVD software installed.
Is Debian’s “out of the box” DVD and mp3 support legal yet?
Ivan, your an idiot. The article mentions DVD’s on the desktop; you didn’t even read the article.
With M$, anti-features are the new innovations!
Ivan your last point is a non-sequitur, besides licensing is not the problem. When large corporations think a single person listening to their own music via the cloud, then jump-to-conclusions and call it a public performance, everyone has a problem.
“Ivan, your an idiot.”
Great intro. Nice you didn’t forget to throw in a typo.
“The article mentions DVD’s on the desktop;”
What part of “and desktop systems with optical drives have third party DVD software installed.” did you fail to understand?
“you didn’t even read the article.”
Nothing in that article contradicts what he wrote. (And SJVN is still an idiot, but that’s beside the point.)
“With M$, anti-features are the new innovations!”
Let me quote an authority on this one, Mr Pogson himself: “Features you don’t use are useless waste.” So if you already have a DVD player (that came bundled with the DVD drive in your machine), why pay for another DVD player?
Surely there is a FOSS app just dying to help out the unfortunates who have Windows 8 and are stuck with watching DVDs on their computer. Mr. O should be able to find one using Google.
I prefer to just slide a Blu-Ray disc into my FR TV and watch it in 1080p and hear the sound from my Bose audio. Without the sound and the big video, these motion pictures are pretty lame anyway.
Ivan, your an idiot
For a moment, I thought this was another post by oiaohm. Hmmm…
The article mentions DVD’s on the desktop; you didn’t even read the article.
Desktop, you say?
Let’s say I just want something around ~$500. Dell seems to be a good place to start for this sort of things, so let’s see what they have to offer, shall we?
Inspiron 660 – Intel Celeron G460; 2GB DDR3 SDRAM; 500GB 7200rpm SATA HDD; DVD+/-RW; no monitor
If you aren’t some abject moron who just wants to pave over everything with some ugly Linux distro the moment the machine arrives, it also comes with Adobe Premiere Elements 9. “Crapware” isn’t really all that crap after all, is it?
Oh, I got carried away there a bit… What did you say about DVD playback on Windows again?
Ivan you are behind the times. All playback MP3 patents have expired. So debian does have mp3 playback support out box. Encoding is another matter. Some forms are legal without paying patents.
DVD and Blueray that are not protected play out box with debian. Depending on country depends if libdvdcss2 is a issue or not. Please note vlc uses libdvdcss2 as well on Windows.
Interesting enough playing back region free discs does not require a license in any country same problem the playback patents are expired.
Its content protection where the problem of a license comes in with Blueray and DVD. In Australia interesting enough dvd css is not legal because it regional coding so not protected by law.
For countries where there is a legal issue cost is 20 euro for dvd region play back question is how much is MS media pack. http://www.fluendo.com/shop/product/fluendo-dvd-player/
Blu-ray is harder. To get legal solution for countries with issues.
Most codec issues are not playback in software but hardware and encoding.
So the Cult of Microsoft defend their beloved OS by pointing out grammatical errors and the fact that as Microsoft drops usability, third parties will add-in non-integrated features. If Microsoft continues dropping usability, what will your beloved OS look like in another three or so versions? And what will you look like defending it?
I wouldn’t worry. I don’t think Microsoft will have the opportunity to produce a Windows 11. If they do it won’t be called Windows (whatever). Most likely it will be called Microsoft Suse and they will market it as the Second Coming.
When the Linux desktop Gnome crippled its usability the community reacted by recreating the old desktop with some new features added. It’s called Cinnamon and it’s been well received.
@Kozmcrae
Have you tried writing in gibberish and littering your comments with barely-relevant web links just like oiaohm does?
It makes this “ignoring your inane diatribes” business a whole lot easier.
Ivan
“And no one will miss the feature, Bob. Tablets don’t have optical drives and desktop systems with optical drives have third party DVD software installed.”
There is a little catch here I missed as well.
Vlc android install that. Connect a usb dvd/cd drive to the android and it will play Dvd discs. Since android will mount disc media drives it can play them.
No usb DVD drive comes with software for Android as yet Ivan.
No built in optical drives also applies to some net-books and laptops Ivan.
Ivan also not every DVD drive comes with software.
“No usb DVD drive comes with software for Android as yet Ivan.”
And I suspect that it never will. There is no need to do so when video can be streamed from the internet.
BTW I have been using an ASUS Transormer TF300 for about 2 weeks now as part of a project. So far I am unimpressed. Performance wise it doesnt work that much better than the original iPad that I have. In fact the iPad has no problem playing back music while I am reading a PDF. IN contrast The ASUS with its dual core goodness, burps on a fairly regular basis. I’ve also noted that as I have added file to it, the tablet is actually getting sluggish! The notion that this tablet is going to go beyond acting as something more than the glorified internet capable book/manual reader it seems best as now seems far fetched.
“Ivan also not every DVD drive comes with software”
Perhaps that is true if I am going for an el-cheapo white box drive or a naked drive that is true, but you know full well that most DVD packages for sale over the internet or from Best buy or walmart come bundled with play and burn software.
oldman
“but you know full well that most DVD packages for sale over the internet or from Best buy or walmart come bundled with play and burn software.”
Words most. Some of the multi region packages are only shipped with burning software of some form no DVD/Blu-ray player software. Some of it is a believe user will have playback software and the fact its a extra cost.
ASUS Transormer TF300 if it running android 4.0 I would expect that you are very unhappy. Even that its duel processor due to way google did it security in android 4.0 is basically only using 1 core most of the time(kernel lock from hell). Yes there is a reason why 4.0 android devices I use to pave over with SELinux Android 4.0(google secuirty replaced by selinux security and application secuirty mapped to Selinux) before 4.1 turned up. To say by by to google errors. Android 4.1 is a lot better at multi tasking.
Oldman these stupid kernel locks and other things is why Android kernel by force of makers is being merged mainline.
If you are running Android 4.0 its sluggish and has been the complete time you have had it. Factory reset it and it still sluggish.
In fact to be complete annoying Android 4.0 runs faster on single core doing multi process than what it does on duel core doing multi process. So yes Android 4.0 speeds up if you do a build with 1 core disabled.
Oldman I am not going to lie to you about android 4.0. If you have an android phone with multi core make sure its either 4.1+ or 2.4+. Reality anything older android and it has multi core cpu in it performs like dog due to the error in goggle security design that it don’t scale. Single core the old versions of android perform very well.
There are tones of side by side benches.
http://www.androidauthority.com/android-4-0-ice-cream-sandwich-vs-android-4-1-jelly-bean-comparison-video-105805
“In fact the iPad has no problem playing back music while I am reading a PDF. IN contrast The ASUS with its dual core goodness, burps on a fairly regular basis.”
This really sounds like Android 4.0.
“This really sounds like Android 4.0.”
Nope its android 4.1.1 kernel 3.1.10-00003-g6293ea6
So much for that theory…
I’m a Linux user. And this article is complete bollocks. Microsoft have laid out their reasons why they’re pulling MPEG-2 support, and I find them to be sound. On Linux, if you want a licensed DVD playback solution, you have to buy it, too. DVD is on its way out, so why should Microsoft include codecs which cost them money but won’t be used by a great majority?
By the way, the Raspberry Pi can only decode H.264 out of the box. But people demanded MPEG-2 decoding. So the guys at Raspberry Pi now offer a purchasable license:
http://www.raspberrypi.com/mpeg-2-license-key/
Astounding, isn’t it?
Thorsten Rahn wrote, “On Linux, if you want a licensed DVD playback solution, you have to buy it, too. “
Exactly my point. Playing DVDs is no longer an advantage of that other OS and GNU/Linux is on a bit more level playing field.
At the place where I worked last year, of the nearly 100 PCs, only one teacher had a stock of DVDs for which she needed that other OS to play DVDs. Still commentators here scolded me for making DVD playback more difficult for users.
oldman that kernel number lines up for a know bug where recover mode lock up dead with the ASUS tablet. Basically bricked and its a different locking issue far more nasty one.
http://support.asus.com/download.aspx?SLanguage=en&p=20&s=16&m=ASUS%20Transformer%20Pad%20TF300T&os=32&hashedid=8BmzkQ4yoz5WzBrW
Check your build number if you have not already to make sure your current oldman. You might be looking at a ASUS driver glitch if so you want firmware updated asp. Bricked device is not fun.
Thorsten Rahn in fact the with PI license covered H.264 encoding as well. The encoding feature will be unlocked latter. http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/tag/h-264 They miss read the H.264 license and locked H.264 encode in hardware off.
When you pay for H.264 playback you also get encoding for private usage only. For business or sharing with other people usage of H.264 you have to pay extra charge again. Mostly people don’t read the fine print on there cannon cameras and the like and break the license posting H.264 hardware encoded on-line.
Thorsten Rahn PI is using hardware decoding MPEG-2 has to paid for. Software decoding is free just not highly optimised problem is PI cpu is too weak todo it for the output result-ion the PI has. So if PI cpu was like 1Ghz not include MPEG-2 would not have been a problem. Also in sort time its not possible to optimise the Mpeg2 decode. Also MPEG-2 decode is more important that you think. DVB-T standard in digital TV uses MPEG-2 encoding in most countries. So MS is saying they will not support free to air TV.
Thorsten Region free ie DVD discs are not encoded there is no license required to play those. Mpeg-2 has patents for software decoding is expired as well.
MS could include DVD playback without paying anything just reject all regionally coded discs.
http://www.robglidden.com/2011/12/half-of-mpeg-2-patents-expire-in-2012/
This is the reality all the patents required for decoding Mpeg2 in software have expired. Thorsten.
When you go through the list other than a few circuit things there is nothing decoding left.
2017 the mpeg2 patent pool will be completely dead same time as mp3 patent pool is also completely dead. Ok mpeg2 in 2017 only has 1 patent left its a encoding patent and you don’t have to use it to encode.
H.264 wait time is a lot longer 2027. Free playback will come before that. Since lot of the latter patents are encoding only. The catch of backwards compatibility and codecs. New codec new patents at the start of it life.
Thorsten Rahn this is the problem patents have a fixed life span. They do die out.
The newer codecs have been done with free patent licenses like Opus and webm.
Playing DVDs is no longer an advantage of that other OS and GNU/Linux is on a bit more level playing field.
If you go back and read your own cites and their references, you will come across Microsoft’s own justification for deleting the function. It appears that they agree with you that next to nobody cares about playing the DVDs and go on to show where there is a substantial cost, ultimately borne by the consumer, in providing a legal right to play them. The logical answer is to eliminate the whole thing, which is what Microsoft finally did.
Less cost to the consumer and more profit for Microsoft. Win-win all around.
Clarence Moon
“MPEG-2 video compression and Dolby Digital (AC-3) audio” That is basically what dvb-t is in a lot of places. Codec MS is removing does not just effect DVD’s.
Clarence Moon
“MPEG-2 decoder costs $2.00 per unit under current MPEG-LA terms.”
Ok other than the fact MPEG-LA no longer holds any valid playback patents if you are doing software decoding. Hardware decoding is paid for by the video card maker. So there is no requirement to pay the $2.00s any more if you only want to decode even to encode the remaining patents are avoidable. Also the other funny one AC-3 patents for playback have also expired.
So the justification of having to pay patents is bull-crap.
Both Mpeg-2 and AC-3 only require license these days to encode or to make a device with a hardware decoder. Or with AC-3 if you want to use the Dolby Technologies logo or source code. Third party codecs exist for AC-3 and Mpeg-2.
Clarence Moon now when you know what has run its patent life you have to ask why MS is doing what they are doing.
Ok other than… (made-up horse crap omitted)
In case you haven’t got the message, here’s the link.
Also, stop handling out bad legal advices.
handling -> handing
Also, stop handling out bad legal advices.
I believe that Mr. O holds the patent on handling out bad legal advice, so your admonition is fruitless.
Clarence Moon and Brillo if you do deal fully with you need to ask mpegla for there mpeg 2 patent list.
Mpegla makes profit from selling patent pool licenses.
The reality is that link you posted was valid before October 16, 2012. Windows 8 release Oct 26, 2012.
http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/M2/Pages/Agreement.aspx
December 31, 2015 is when the complete patent pool mpegla holds on Mpeg2 goes splat completely. Yes there are patents by other parties that come into play then.
Over 50 percent of the patent pool went splat as of October 16, 2012.
There are Mpeg2 patents past 2015 just mpegla does not hold them.
If you look down the bottom of the mpegla page you will notice “© 2009 MPEG LA, LLC”. So if you are dumb enough to keep on paying mpegla because they are displaying out of date site that is your problem. Patent holders don’t have to refund you because you pay them when you should not.
Brillo please in future read the full page you are quote. 2009 information is out of date. Patents if they are still valid changes yearly. If someone does not pay there renewal as well patents expire.
Mpegla will provide you with a list of patent todo things. When you look up all the decoding ones they are currently expired.
Just like Mp3 a few years before the full end the playback patents expired.
Basically Brillo you stop handing out bad advice and learn to check stuff out properly. If this was a white paper I would get the full list of mpegla patents list what ones apply to decoding and what ones apply only to encoding. Then check there patent status.
I am not being paid todo this white paper for you. I can tell you now if you do you will find what I am saying the mpeg2 decoding patents are expired by the time Windows 8 releases. Lot missed paying their extensions a year ago so are now expired as well.
Really mpegla is just like any other patent troll they will take payment when they no longer have a leg legal to stand on.
The reality from Microsoft side is they have not checked if the patents they are paying are still valid by the time of release.
To decode you need –27 original 1996 MPEG-2 IPR Working Group’s patents– That have just happened to expired October 16, 2012. 2011 while those patents were still valid you could not make a free decode for MPEG 2.
Basically you need a copyright 2012/2013 down the bottom of page Brillo because that is when the critical change in the patent pool happened. Of course mpegla is going to hide this fact as long as able.
Windows 8 is being released after the critical change in the patent pool. Windows 7 had to pay the pool.
2013 when another half of the mpeg2 patents go splat include some hardware decoders and encoders by the way. 2013 Is when mpeg2 gets really shaky on mpegla making money from the patent pool. Why pay mpegla when I can use the patent expired encoders and decoders.
October 26 is Windows 8 Release date. 10 days after Mpeg2 decoding patents become null and void.
Due to the fact we are 2 months to expiry. If you breached those patents now it would not matter. Because by the time the patent holder could get you to court the patents will have expired and the case will be thrown out for wasting the courts time. To get threw the USA and most countries courts the infringement has to be larger than a year from expiry to get into the count room while the patent is valid once you have done that then you can enforce the breach. They are required to provide you with notification and other things that eats up 4 months before you can get to the proper hearing of any form and that is if you don’t have to wait for court time. So 4 months to expire other than possible giving you legal department extra paperwork the patents are basically dead and not enforceable.
I should have clearly stated by the time Windows 8 is released mpegla contains no more patents over decoding mpeg 2 in software.
Of course due to how close the expiry is as Microsoft I would have just said DVD playback will be missing from the first release but will be in the first service pack due to avoiding paying mpegla.
This is the reality most of the common formats will be out of patent coverage. h.264 will take some more time. Webm annoys Mpegla. Because as each h.264 patent expires Webm is picking up its features.
The patents that are expired from h.264 you can make quite a decent codec.
Clarence Moon so Microsoft logic is incorrect because they did not take the time frame forward to see if they would have to pay.
Any device I am working on today by the time it hits production mpeg2 patents are mostly dead. Fast track is 3 months. To go from new design to into production.
So for me mpeg2 playback patents are dead for everything bar hardware encoders/decoders.
The PI mpeg2 decoder is not one of the ones coming free in 2013.
While I agree, this feature is still valid and shouldn’t be lost, I will say that if this happened on a Linux desktop, the response would be:
http://tmrepository.com/trademarks/youdontneedthat/
YouDontNeedThat(TM)
On Linux, shedding features is shedding bloat. On Windows, it’s a Pogson article.
I know I’m premature when I say that “nobody cares about DVDS anymore”, but physical media is a dying medium. I still own DVDs but I don’t want to watch them. And considering the rate at which movies and TV shows are being consumed on iTunes and torrents, I doubt we’ll see a successor to blu-ray.
I do believe that shedding DVD compatibility in Windows 8 is premature by one version, but I’m betting this year’s crop of college students, raised on a diet of YouTube and Hulu, they don’t missing it much.
Personally, I’m glad to see the dics go. Remember how we used to switch CDs instead of simply telling our mp3 player to play the next song? Oh wait, Pogson probably doesn’t own an mp3 player because they all run on proprietary software. Ah well, I’m sure carrying an entire PC around to play music is just fine by him.
TM Repository says a lot of things as things FOSS does but when you look closer Microsoft is doing as well.
YouDontNeedThat™ should be updated to include windows 95 you don’t need more than 756 megs of ram.
Windows XP and later on 32 bit even that 32 bit chips using PAE support 64Gb ram we only give you 4GB because you don’t need that.
My best when MS released Outlook the first version. Contacted them that I did not like that it would just run .exe files without asking user response was you don’t need that how are you going to update software effectively without having .exe auto run when emails open. Few years latter virus plague.
Some of Microsoft You Don’t Need that are completely insane. The FOSS world response is not a huge security hole.
Its not the DVD compadiblity that annoys me. Its removing Mpeg2 under the story that is cheaper. When you know the patent pool and that its just about to expire.
Reason for pulling mpeg2 from my eyes could be an attempt to stop w3c group and others using mpeg2 as a standard patent free video codec until h.264 expires.
The next 24 months sees a lot of the patent trouble against Linux die. Fat file-system patents fall over in 2013 most of Mpeg2 include encoders. Of course you don’t need full Mpeg2 to play DVD discs.
Most of MS gui patents possibly apply to android or Linux also fail in 2013.
Read back on the mp3 comment there are many open source and legal mp3 players out there since there are no true playback patents left that you require.
The common mistake is the PCT patent. PCT is not processed in mp3 decode only in encode so believing live of MP3 patents extend to 2015 when it don’t. Same with a lot of the latter MP3 patents compression optimisations patented basically.
Lot of patent pools with expire around 2017. 8 June 1995 when the USA patent system changed forbidding submarine patents. There was a 2 year window to open up the filing and the 20 years starts from then 1997. So a lot of patents had to be declared.
Thing is there are not that many new patent pools that have fees. WebM upset Mpegla idea of having a patent pool over it google licensed the core patents that you cannot do a paid for patent pool over WebM since this forbids using WebM yourself. VC-1 developed by Microsoft was also started out with the idea of being Fee free. Mpegla is a vampire basically. Invent Mpegla very little other than patent pools to be paid.
Every patent pool has a max effective life. Then it has to die.
So if all the new patent pools forming are fee free.(I have not found any new patent pools in a while requiring fees). The result will be death of patent payments. Its just a question of when.
We are basically coming up to a patent pool end game.
The reality is… (irrelevant nonsense omitted)
Again, I’ll simply give you this as my response.
Read. Comprehend. Shut up.
“Windows XP and later on 32 bit even that 32 bit chips using PAE support 64Gb ram we only give you 4GB because you don’t need that.”
WinXP was released 2001 and the next version was planned to come 2004/2005. In that time, a PC with more than 4GB was a very rare bird. When Vista actually came in 2007, a lot of people still complained because it needed a whopping 2GB to run well! Oh, and there was a 64bit version of XP (2005)if you really had that much RAM. (IIRC, you could even use PAE with XP – definitely with the server version – but PAE is a horrible cludge and so I never ever bothered.)