Forums > Help! > removing DRM from a music file.

Posted: 17th Oct 2005
Really dont know anything about DRM stuff but perhaps try playing it on Winamp? I play all my WMAs with that.

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Posted: 17th Oct 2005
Since posting this thread I've been on a long journey and learnt many things

Primarily, not to bother wasting my time on cracking DRM'd wma's- there's lots of methods on the net but most of them are either out-of-date (much like makers of malware, microsoft basically updates its players to combat any hacks that disable the protection) or involve a lot of complicated and highly technical messing about.

I did track down a small program designed to strip the DRM code from wma's, only to find that it didn't work with 'version 1' DRM's (and of course my file turns out to be version 1).

Another thing I've learnt is to avoid downloading wma files, and go for mp3s instead, which are happily lacking in DRM 'protection'.

It's interesting because it was only yesterday that I was talking to Tempest, and he was saying that DRM technology was going to become pretty big in all aspects of digital media,including software/operating systems etc.

What a pain!

(incidently, I'll mention that, even though protecting media from pirate copying is an understandable motivation, the fact remains that this kind of approach also negatively effects legitimate users of digital media ie, many people who've bought or downloaded music, and who are legally entitled to copy for personal use, have been prevented by DRM encoded media and found they can't play the music they've paid for on other devices, such as i-pods).

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Posted: 17th Oct 2005

Written by: ICoN

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Really dont know anything about DRM stuff but perhaps try playing it on Winamp? I play all my WMAs with that.

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Winamp was mentioned a fair bit in the sites I visited, but I got the impression that it's been covered now by microsoft updates that prevent it from playing wma's with DRM.

"You can't outrun Death forever.
But you can make the Bastard work for it."

--MAJOR KORGO KORGAR,
"Last of The Lancers"
AFC 32


Educate your self in the Hazards of Fire Breathing STAY SAFE!

Posted: 18th Oct 2005
DRM= Digital Rights Management?

"he was saying that DRM technology was going to become pretty big in all aspects of digital media,including software/operating systems"

Thus making it more popular, meaning that more people will spend time on cracking it.

Posted: 18th Oct 2005
True. But, even when the cracks and hacks are available, it can be pretty tedious tracking them down on the net and getting them to work.

It's always going to be the piraters and those in the know who get to use this stuff- and with DRM, it seems the main people who are going to suffer are the legitimate users.

To put it simplistically, to get a track you have two options, an illegal one, via peer-to-peer filesharing networks, which gives you the fully functioning track for free, or-

the legal option- buy it on a CD for the full price; if that CD has DRM then you are unable to make personal copies or back-up, and unable to play it on different devices (eg your i-pod) (or, more likely, you will be able to copy it a limited number of times).

Certainly I, if I forked out good money for a CD and then found my legitimate use of it was restricted as part pf the industries 'war on piracy'- I'd be very inclined to not bother, and go to peer-to-peer instead.

"You can't outrun Death forever.
But you can make the Bastard work for it."

--MAJOR KORGO KORGAR,
"Last of The Lancers"
AFC 32


Educate your self in the Hazards of Fire Breathing STAY SAFE!

Posted: 18th Oct 2005
you had a dig around on www.astalavista.com for the DRM cracks?

It may have it, or contain links to other sites that may have them.

Posted: 18th Oct 2005
I bought a cd once that wouldn't play on computers at all. Given how many people don't have cd players any more but work through their computer, this seems a bad idea. Anyways, using a really old version of a media player I got it to work - it just didn't seem to recognise the digital don't play me stuff.

(sorry for lack of technical speak!)

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Posted: 18th Oct 2005
yeah, i had that too.

i can't remember which it was, but a few years back there was a cd that had to be re-issued because so many people took it back complaining that they couldn't play it.

ah, the whole thing pisses me off every time....i wish the music indusrty was less greedy - i wish people could tell the difference between downloading a few track they lke and ripping off artists (mind you i wish the labels could tell the difference too!). I wish all CD's were free!

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Posted: 18th Oct 2005
The easiest way of stripping DRM rights from an audio cd, is / would be to make an analogue copy onto blank cd, then you have your very very near quality digital copy minus DRM, if so motivated then you can do more or less what you want with it.



If your after stripping DRM from electronic media, then the same approach works, take an alalogue output from your pc / ipod / mp3 player or whatever and make a digital copy of this. Obviously this only works if you still have play rights to material.



mark

Posted: 18th Oct 2005
yeh marco is right, this method works well actually but takes time. a buddy of mine had a few songs he had with the same problem, drm would expire soon and he wanted to keep em. He had a creative sound blaster card and the software that came with it (an audigy card i believe). they have this nice little media control player with a "record what you hear" option. which basically lets you play whatever you want, apply effects to it, and record it as if you had a seperate microphone in your room (though this is all done IN the computer). so he just loaded up his file and hit play the nrecord. instant no drm song lol. not the best or fastes way, but it worked.

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