Windows 7 Media player will not play back BluRay disc's

I cannot play blue ray on my new sony with windows 7, I just want to play a blue ray disc how come the windows commercials say windows 7 rocks if I cant even watch district 9, I mean come on I should be able to pop the disc in and watch the movie, I am going to consider apple computers ??? What do I do

Blu-ray licenses cost about US$30, a charge that Microsoft doesn't want to add to the overall bill for Windows 7. And, we assume that the OS maker wants to keep the price down as much as possible, so as not to outrage the millions of Vista users who forked out for their short-lived system.

This is the reason why I firmly believe Windows needs to become significantly more modular.  Instead of creating all of the big bundled packages, we buy what we use, which would result in a cheaper OS for many people.  I, frankly, never want to pay for MS Paint ever again.  If I want to use Blu-ray, I should be able to buy how many ever licenses I need directly from Sony and then use those licenses in whatever OS I want with whatever video player I want on whatever hardware I want to use.  The key here is *I*, the end-user, should be able to purchase the license directly at-cost.  I'd shell out $30 so I could play Blu-Ray with VLC Media Player in a heartbeat.

PowerDVD is expensive and ____.  WinDVD is, has always been, and always will be pure ____.  Never heard of ArcSoft TotalMedia until this thread - running some quick Google searches turns up that itmight not be ____ (maybe?) and that they seem to listen to customers (based on a cursory glance at their forums) - but it is expensive and my experience with expensive video player software is that such software is ____.

I'd much rather have a floating Blu-ray license that I can take with me.  Why does the license have to be bundled with the player?  If I want to watch Blu-ray, I should only have to buy the license, plug some data into some Blu-ray enabled software (e.g. a signed SSL certificate/SMIME data/something), and voila!  Software starts playing Blu-ray.  Windows Media Center could then support Blu-ray playback with every version of Windows without Microsoft having to license it.  It would be up to the end-user to obtain a valid license.  Media Center could simplify that process with a purchase wizard but the license could float between Windows installs (e.g. a Windows 7 to Windows 8 upgrade).

The Blu-ray "Standard" is closed, proprietary, and there are only three software developers out there - and they bundle their own media player with the license.  I just want the license and the freedom to use ANY Blu-ray capable video player with that license.  Why is it so hard for the movie industry to comprehend what customers actually want?  It isn't rocket science - all they would have to do is run a few basic Google searches and read forums like these to find out!  But apparently they can't be bothered to do that.

I can completely understand Microsoft's position of not including Blu-ray support in Windows Media Center.  They might be holding out for the industry to introduce floating (or cheaper) licenses.

A true car analogy would be to buy a car in 2010 that comes with a CD player but no default or optional mp3 player/iPod connector. Sure, you can still play music, just not with the media you are actually using. While you can buy a third-party adapter, I'd much prefer one that is integrated by the car manufacturer, for which you can control the volume from the wheel, or which will pause playing music when your mobile phone rings.

That is not really a valid analogy, there are various MP3 players on the market, there is no such thing a single connector standard that would control any iPod/Zune/Sony/whoever's MP3 player and I certainly would not want to pay extra for a music system in the car that connects to an iPod, if I had a Zune or vice versa.

What hang-the-9 meant by the "no OS supports BD, is just that -- the Mac OS doesn't support BD, nor Linux.

The fact is MS make the core OS, it is up to the PC maker to add on the necessary bits (S/W & H/W), don't forget in Europe, they don't think that even a basic Media Player or Browser should be included as part of the OS.

If Dell or Sony or HP is selling you a system with a BD drive, then they should have included BD software, if they didn't, then your complaint should be with them. GPS has been around a long time and widely used, but there is no native GPS built into the OS, when you buy a GPS receiver, you still need to buy software to use it (or get one that includes software)

Do I think it would be nice if full BD support was native to Windows? Yes, if it was a minor expense.

Do I care that it isn't? No, not really, because if I buy a BD drive, it would include the application.

James Wolf MS-MVP [Media Center]

Most H.264 codecs are free, so you paid $5 too much. It's also part of Windows 7 for free, unless you use an emasculated version such as Starter edition.

We are not talking about HD codecs only, but about a feature that allows us to read blu-ray discs, from the Java menus to the extras, audio/subtitle tracks, regions, DRM, etc.

Nor are we asking to include the blu-ray license into all packages whether one uses blu-ray or not, just into the Ultimate package for those who want to use blu-ray.

If Microsoft does not start adding the blu-ray feature to WMP/WMC now for the PC and Windows enthusiasts, they will be totally behind the market with no solution to offer when the license's current mess is simplified, as it necessarily will, you're right to say it's a huge labyrinth. Blu-ray movies have been around for 4 years, HD DVD has been dropped for 2½ years, we are now seeing the first 3D blu-ray discs, it's really not just a trend anymore, it's a reality that Microsoft should not ignore.