Hello,
I have a PowerBook G4 800mhz running 10.3.8 with 1024MB RAM and a combo drive. I also have a Lacie DVD+-RW (NEC ND-2500A Firmware 107). I'm using VLC 0.8.1
Tonight I was copying a DVD using Mac The Ripper. It was a Full Disc Extraction from my Combo Drive. I had wanted to use my External Lacie to watch another disc. I opened VLC, selected disc 3 out of the list (assuming disc1 was my combo drive) and VLC's Fast Forward, Rewind, Play, and Pause buttons began to flash in time with the disc writes from Mac the Ripper. When it began playing it was playing the disc from my combo drive. No matter what I did and how many times I checked, VLC was set to /dev/rdisk3 in the open disk menu.