Amen. Same thing happened over here. Carbon copy, just got a movie from my local rent store, and was looking for a quite night in before going to work tommorow. I 've spent a good four hours, updating video card drives, restoring the system to various set points etc. etc. to no avai. This is pathetic, and your rant well earned. If I could get my hands on any of these prissy little f&*%ers trying to "safeguard" THEIR multitrillion dollars from US blood thirsty "pirates" renting out a movie. And this is xp, I can't imagine where they are taking this with vista...Thanks for suggesting the vlc player, will be my last resort I guess, if somehow they've not managed to render the whole dvd viewing inoperable.