I don't post often, so I'll use my 1st words to thank all the devs that have contributed to the wealth of information available for the PS3. My thanks of the day go to arodd, for his efforts on DRL and HRL
I have a CECH2504A slim console with CFW v3.55 and a NOR flasher installed. BD movies do not play (Playback of BDs is prohibited on this system. Contact tech. support for assistance). Other than BD movie playback, the drive is perfectly functional. I can even backup BD movies using either MultiMan or OtherOS++.
Hoping for a brainless quick-fix, I've tried QA downgrading, service jig downgrading, and this
Remarry BD Drive procedure/tools. I'm unable to use the Remarriage tools as my console won't downgrade below FW v3.40. No joy yet.
HRL/DRL/CRL/re-marriage
Using OtherOS++, ps3dm_utils, and
Hypervisor Reverse Engineering, I have confirmed that:
- the HRL/DRL stored on the PS3 matches the MKB from the known latest-MKB BD movie played on that PS3. HRL/DRL mismatch is ruled out.
- The DRL and CRL SHA1 hashes returned by ps3dm_vtrm match manual hash calculations. DRL SHA1 hash check ruled out. (Need to confirm if CRL data is correct before I can rule out its hash check? But how?)
Note: The 1st time the BD playback error appeared was the 1st time that the "known latest-MKB BD movie" was played. This means that the GameOS did at least attempt to update the BD-drive. Perhaps it failed, after HRL/DRL update but before the end of its sequence, and so the update process did not complete?
The drive does communicate with the PS3 which rules out the need to re-marry the drive?
A step towards the solution?
BD playback is partially working with SS patches. Some BDs play perfectly, others will stop with a black screen (at the same point where the BD playback error would occur without SS patches). When I say SS patches, I mean ONLY SS patches applied to an OFW is sufficient to get partial playback.
Where to from here?
I think I've gone far enough to prove that the problem isn't one of the usual HRL/DRL mismatch or drive re-marriage problems.
All fingers are pointing at authentication (specifically BD movie authentication as everything else works, so AACS?)... BD movies are 100% readable but not playable, SS patches force GameOS to skip checks and attempt BD playback but some titles fail to decrypt. If I am right, then the solution is to find out which auth is failing and fix that. Which means I need to become much better friends with
Hypervisor Reverse Engineering: BD Drive and/or BD security principles?
If someone, hopefully with some appropriate experience, can give me a push in the right direction I'd be really grateful!
Update
So I found a remarry method was released that allowed 3.55 consoles to remarry without downgrading to FW 3.30 or below and gave that a try... BD playback fixed! Then I installed Rogero's 4.21 CFW v1.09 and play-back is once again prohibited

So I downgraded to 3.55 and tried to remarry again. The remarry process passes but still, even in FSM when playing back the 1st BD after the remarry, BD playback is prohibited.
Solved
Multiman's BD playback fix has worked a charm!