Could someone test VLC with a different region dvd and report whether or not it allows region-free playback?  VLC supposedly lets some Matshita drives play region-free, but doesn’t work on others.  If it works, please post the model of your notebook and which drive it uses (My Computer, right click on drive, Properties, Hardware tab).

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

Edit: Oh yeah, also please note what region your drive is set to, if it has been set.  If you have not set your drive’s region yet, do not set it before running VLC, since it seems that atleast in some instances (on macs), it might make the difference between being able to and not being able to play.