I am not sure what hardware hacks are available. Even if you can get the Sony DVP-CX985V to play Region 2 discs, it will not play PAL discs. Need to keep that in mind.

The Region 2 discs that I own I play via my HTPC since these Sony changers won't read PAL discs. I can encode my Region 2 DVD's to make them region free, then ripping to DVD+R for use in my changers. No sense in doing so however, as these changers won't read PAL discs. :-(

-Lowpro