RestrictedFormats/PlayingDVDs - Community Ubuntu Documentation

RestrictedFormats/PlayingDVDs - Community Ubuntu Documentation: "Note : While Totem-gstreamer can play a DVD automatically when it is inserted into the DVD drive, it cannot navigate the DVD nor play it by selecting Movie → Play Disc 'DVD Name' (see [WWW] Bug #41335). If you use vlc media player you can navigate through the menu, forward in the movie and select subtitles. Just select open disc, probe Disc(s) and click ok."

Okay, so I *probably* should have seen this before when I viewed this page, but I think I didn't understand it even when I did read it. Still being a n00b makes life hard.

Anyway, it appears that Totem-gstreamer will not play back DVDs once you install libdvdnav4... I add this because I successfully played back an unencrypted DVD movie before installing libdvdnav4. It simply started the main title with no menu navigation. Seeing that DVD playback was working I decided to see if I could get navigation to work. After installing libdvdnav4 Totem-gstreamer throws an error and also wouldn't auto-launch upon DVD insertion like it did before installing libdvdnav4.

I glad I came back to this page and saw that little note. It was EXTREMELY frustrating me on my previous install. Yes, that's right... I blew away my original install. It wasn't for this, although it WAS something that bothered me. It was for a whole host of reasons and things not working right. I am certain I inflicted the issues on myself by not being careful about what I installed and looking for conflicts carefully. One of the things that plagued me was ALL video playback, be it DVD or mpg, avi, divx, etc, it ALL played back with a limited color palette. I honestly have no idea what caused this to happen because it was not always like that from the start after my original install. I plan on trying to be more careful and selective in my installs from here on out, and at a minimum keep track of what I install so I know how to back out when something goes wrong.

Anyway, this method, using Totem-xine seems to work just fine now, and I can even playback my newest encrypted DVD (Pirates of the Caribbean 3). So I'd say it's all good.