Free Blu-ray media player/codec???

[biker9999]

I have been directed here by Lenovo support looking for a free Bluray driver. No idea why. But now I am here do all you people out there realise you are being conned by the sellers of laptops with Bluray players. They sell you the machine with the player but without the driver so you have to buy a driver (£70) to make the lapop work as you expected when they sold it you. There are loads of posts on the web about non working Bluerays with loads of advice why they don't work. The simple truth is they can't because to save money the sellers/manufacturers don't put the software in to save them money and mislead you into paying more for a useless item. In my case it was Ebuyer who went out of their way to be rude and unhelpful when I complained. I have contacted trading standards and BBC's Rip of Britain program please do the same.

 

[hang-the-9]

If the laptop has a bluray player, it will have software to play movies on it.

There is no free bluray playback software, but the laptop should have PowerDVD or something. Check the specs of the laptop you bought it will have a list of what's installed on it.

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

I bought two Retail Lite-on blu-ray drives and they both came with software to view blu-ray movies.My daughter bought a new laptop with a bluray drive and it come with the software also!

 

[biker9999]

No Lenovo and Ebuyer have both admitted to me that the Bluray palyer in my G770 will not play bluray disc because there is no driver with the machine. Ebuyer were extremley agressive and unpleasant and their customer support?? said that they had fulfilled their contract in selling the machine as they did not say in thier adverts it would actually play Blurays. Have a look at this exchange I have had with Lenovo

http/forums.lenovo.com/t5/Lenovo-3000-and-Value-line/Poor-graphics-on-random-basis-on-a-G770/td-p/499451

 

[hang-the-9]

No Lenovo and Ebuyer have both admitted to me that the Bluray palyer in my G770 will not play bluray disc because there is no driver with the machine. Ebuyer were extremley agressive and unpleasant and their customer support?? said that they had fulfilled their contract in selling the machine as they did not say in thier adverts it would actually play Blurays. Have a look at this exchange I have had with Lenovo

http/forums.lenovo.com/t5/Lenovo-3000-and-Value-line/Poor-graphics-on-random-basis-on-a-G770/td-p/499451

According to that exchange AND Lenovo's web site, the G770 does not have a bluray player, it's a DVD R/W drive. They are saying your DVD player won't play Blurays which is understandable. They are not saying there is no "driver" they are saying there is no "DRIVE", that last r makes a big difference.

http/shop.lenovo.com/us/notebooks/essential/g-series/g770 <-- all models list DVD not bluray players, don't even see bluray as an option.

Look in Device Manager, and see what the drive is there.

 

[biker9999]

Sorry but you have got it wrong, you like Lenovo are believing what they read not what they see. Regardless of their model range even Lenovo now seem to be agreeing I have a bluray player and Ebuyer certainly do. The clue is the fact that it says Bluray on the caddie and inside there are two lazers red and blue. You might also like to note that I have a 640gig drive not a 750 as in Lenovos spec. Its quite clear to me my machine was a batch sold possibly just to Ebuyer as a one off spec to deliver a price break. How else would Lenovo have no records. The only alternative is someone in China/Far East is pushing out clones and Ebuyer have been buying them

 

[hang-the-9]

Sorry but you have got it wrong, you like Lenovo are believing what they read not what they see. Regardless of their model range even Lenovo now seem to be agreeing I have a bluray player and Ebuyer certainly do. The clue is the fact that it says Bluray on the caddie and inside there are two lazers red and blue. You might also like to note that I have a 640gig drive not a 750 as in Lenovos spec. Its quite clear to me my machine was a batch sold possibly just to Ebuyer as a one off spec to deliver a price break. How else would Lenovo have no records. The only alternative is someone in China/Far East is pushing out clones and Ebuyer have been buying them

If the drive states BlueRay, then it is, or at least it should be. Now does it see the disk at all when it's in the drive, aside from playing it? In My Computer, does the title of the disk come up when you insert it?

You may be out of luck with them, no clue how you got a configuration from them with a bluray player when Lenovo does not have it as an option for that model, but that is a clue as to why it does not have any play-back software. Wherever you bought it probably customized it outside of Lenovo specs. But Lenovo should have an OEM copy of the movie player software available, see if their support techs can get you a copy of that. Since it does not look to be a standard Lenovo system though, you may be denied.

You may end up having to buy a play-back software for this thing.

 

[biker9999]

the answer to much of what you mention is in the extensive forum notes between my self and Lenovo a link of which appears above

 

[Ijack]

As BluRay disks can be used for data as well as movies, I'm not sure that the argument that any computer with a BluRay player should also have BluRay movie playback software holds water. If it won't even read a BluRay data disk you might have an argument, but I would have thought that was a simple case of obtaining a device driver from the manufacturer of the drive.

Within the first week you could have just returned the computer to eBuyer under the distance selling regulations but, unfortunately, that no longer applies. I guess your only recourse now is to argue the "fit for purpose" aspect. The question is, is the only purpose of a BluRay drive to play movies?

I'm surprised that the computer didn't come with such software but, as you say, it seems to be a rather unusual model. Perhaps it was a pared to the bones deal. I guess there must be a reason why third parties offer BluRay playback software.

 

[biker9999]

Lenovo do not have any drivers available. How many people would buy a Bluray laptop and not expect it to play bluray discs? You don't buy a new car with aircon only to be told after you bought it "it has aircon but no elctrics to make it work". The problem with the bluray only came to light about 7-8 days after buying it.

Whichever way you look at I was conned by Ebuyer, as they knew the situation and carefully avoided mentioning it

 

[Ijack]

I'm not convinced by your analogy. Air conditioning has no function other than to control the environment in a car. You might be better arguing the case that some car radios have the facility to support a CD multi-player in the boot, but do not necessarily come with such a player included. But if you can convince a court that the only reason for a BluRay disk drive is to allow it to play BluRay movies, and the fact that it can play data disks also is irrelevant, then you would win your case.

Does the computer actually recognize the drive. Will it read data CDs and DVDs (and, if you have one to hand, does it read BluRay data disks)? I would say that your problem does not sound like a driver issue, rather a lack of BluRay movie playback software. But if it won't read any optical disks then there certainly is a driver problem. Does the drive show up in Device Manager? If so, does it say that the driver is installed?

 

[biker9999]

Thanks for your help but I now know that the problem is the lack of a suitable driver Ebuyer have admitted as much and Lenovo do not seem to have records of any machine with my spec but are apparently trying to trace the history via the serial and machine numbers I have provided to them. I think Ebuyer had 100 or more of these machines so it would be interesting to know where they got them from. As to recognising Bluray data dics I did not know they existed until I bought this machine all I wanted was something to play bluray discs on