Full Screen DVD Playback Without QE

[Chaos Storm]

For those of us who have setup our Hackintosh just the way we like, it's a dream come true. Except..well, there is a good number of us who don't have officially supported video cards and as a result, we can't play DVD's. Sure you can use a really out of date version of VLC, but it's PPC so it doesn't run at full speed even with Rosetta, and those of us who are using Framebuffer displays get really bad choppy frames.

 

The solution? VLC! Yes, the newer versions of VLC require QE, but that's only if you want VLC to play the DVD directly. What we are going to do is have VLC stream the DVD.

 

1.) Download the latest release of VLC and drag to your Applications folder.

 

2.) Download MPlayer OSX Extended from http://mplayerosx.sttz.ch/ & place in Applications folder.

 

3.) Run VLC and let it do it's first time setup.

 

4.) In VLC, click File --> Open Disc. In the dialogue that shows, the defaults will be fine except, you need to check the box "No DVD Menus".

 

5.) Click on the "Streaming/Saving" checkbox then click "Settings".

 

6.) Select the radio checkmark "Stream". The default settings should be fine. Enter your current IP address in, and click OK, then click "Open". VLC will now start streaming.

 

7.) Switch resolution to 800 x 600 (stretched). It won't look pretty for OSX, but the Movie should play decent in that setting.

 

8.) Launch MPlayer OSX Extended. Click "File" --> "Open Location". enter: "http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:1234" the xxx here being your current IP Address. In a moment Mplayer will start playing your movie. Click Command F and you go fullscreen.

 

It's not a glorious hack that enables high res DVD playback, but those of you who are stuck with non accelerated graphics like me can now enjoy DVD movies. As a side note, the 800 x 600 resolution is just for fullscreen playback. If you want to do other stuff while playing a DVD, you can keep the native res of your monitor and play the movie in a Window using Mplayer Extended.

 

Enjoy!

 

Chaos Storm.