[Cbe-oss-dev] Playstation 3 BD-ROM access and LV1_DENIED_BY_POLICY

[Nicholas A. Bellinger]

Greetings all,

I have been successfully watching both commerical BD-ROM and HD-DVD
content from a Playstation 3 Linux-iSCSI Target running 2.6.16 over to
multiple win32 initiators for a number of months now.  I have been very
happy with the fact that the Playstation 3 + Linux allows me to watch
the many HD discs that I own (of both formats) via Linux-iSCSI, as I
have been unable to get either of my DVI montiors to work directly via
the PS3's HDMI out. I have posted some screen captures and photos of
Linux-iSCSI/HD in action at: http://www.linux-iscsi.org/~nab/

Having the ability to issue ATAPI commands, in particular ATAPI commands
related to the AACS state machine, under PS3-Linux for my legitimate
purposes is something that I have been enjoying very much, and has lead
me to purchase many, many more commerical BD-ROMs that I would have if I
had never had the chance to watching BD-ROMs via iSCSI in the first
place.

Which leads me to the topic of this email..  Recently, as I have been
preparing the Linux-iSCSI.org foundation for IPv6 + iSCSI + HD support,
I had been forced to upgrade to the latest ps3-linux git (2.6.23-rc1)
from the original and unmodified 2.6.16 kernel that I have been using
since launch in Nov 2006.

Once I upgraded to 2.6.23-rc1, I have been *NO LONGER* been able to
watch the commerical BD-ROMs that I own from the PS3.  After enabling
debugging in drivers/scsi/ps3rom.c, I am getting the exception from the
first AACS related CDB: REPORT_KEY / 0xa4 that is being sent to the
hypervisor:

sr 0:0:0:0: CDB: cdb[0]=0xa4, sa=0x0: a4 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08 08
00
ps3rom sb_03: ps3rom_atapi_request:175: send ATAPI command 0xa4
ps3rom sb_03: ps3rom_atapi_request:218: ATAPI command 0xa4 denied by
policy
sr 0:0:0:0: CDB: cdb[0]=0xa4, sa=0x0: a4 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08 08
00
ps3rom sb_03: ps3rom_atapi_request:175: send ATAPI command 0xa4
ps3rom sb_03: ps3rom_atapi_request:218: ATAPI command 0xa4 denied by
policy

So from there, I decided that watching my BD media via iSCSI over ole'
IPv4 was more important than IPv6 with 2.6.23-rc1, I decided to boot
back in 2.6.16.  But to my great dissapointment, I am now *COMPLETELY
UNABLE* watch the BD media that I own under *EITHER* kernel revision.
Alas, only HD-DVD over IPv6 and IPv4 is now possible from the
Playstation 3 under Linux.

Quite an irony indeed..

Which brings me before you fine folks this morning.  My question(s) are:

1) Why has this changed after working for me for months, and through 30+
different commerical BD-ROMs under 2.6.16, only to now be denied with
*BOTH* kernels with LV1_DENIED_BY_POLICY after a single boot into
2.6.23-rc1..?

2) What has to happen in order for me to continue to watch commerical
BD-ROM content from PS3-Linux console over iSCSI..?  At this point, the
ability to issue these ATAPI commands from a remote machine is very
important to me personally, that I have been debating getting another
console and sticking with 2.6.16 permanently.  Or at least until this
newly added restriction can be removed.

3) What can I do the prove that they are legitimate purposes (other than
my screen captures) for re-allowing the ability to issue these commands
under Linux..?

I hope that we can find some middle ground with re-allowing these ATAPI
CDB(s) to continue to be issued under PS3-Linux to the PS3 BD-ROM,
thereby allowing legal HD capable software decoders (I purchased a
license for PowerDVD) to issue commands, over the network, via iSCSI to
the Playstation 3's BD-ROM.  I had been looking forward to sharing this
benefical ability with the PS3-Linux community, and have had big plans
with iSCSI on the Cell; but now it appears that for my current PS3
hardware, I will have to wait until this change within the hypervisor
can be reverted.

For any of the nice folks @ Sony, please let me know if there is
anything that I can do to help make this change a reality.

Many thanks for your most valuable of time,

Nicholas A. Bellinger
Linux-iSCSI.org Founder, Kernel.org member