400GB optical disc invented by Pioneer! Sweet!

Got a big archiving project you’ve been itching to do? Pioneer’s latest development could help you keep all your data in one nice, little circular package. The Japanese electronics maker has been working on an optical disc, which, like Blu-ray, can store 25GB of data in a single layer. But Pioneer says it’s one-upped the high-definition format to the sixteenth degree. The company announced today that it has a single disc that contains 16 layers of storage, at 25GB each. That adds up to 400GB of data capable of being stored on a single disc.

Blu-ray comes in single layer (25GB) and dual-layer (50GB) flavors. Pioneer does say that because the lens specification for reading the discs is similar to Blu-ray, “it is possible to maintain compatibility” between its disc and Blu-ray discs. That’s not saying it will be compatible, but it would make sense since Pioneer is one of the original Blu-ray Disc Association members. However, plans for that archiving project will have to be put on pause if you want to use this technology. Pioneer is going to demonstrate it at an industry conference next week, but for now the disc is read-only. Eventually, they’ll add write capability as well.

Source: Cnet, Martin

1TB Optical Disc – Tiny but Huge!

It is called the TeraDisk and it is really small, like a ordinary CD/DVD. But it’s really huge in terms of space. 1 TB (1000 GB). How can this be done? The process is easy (or not). All existing optical media record data on semitransparent layers. A regular CD has 1 layer and a Blu-Ray disk has up to 8. The reason nobody can add more layers on a regular CD/DVD/Blu-Ray disk is because when the light passes through these layers it becomes distorted and by the time it reaches the final layers it becomes almost impossible to read/write on the disk.

TeraDisk achieved the 1TB limit by using 200 layers, each storing 5GB of data. So basically the data support stay the same (TeraDisk will be made out of the same plexiglas like material used in other disks) but the write/read laser technology is completely new. They say it’s going to be cheap and it will be available for the public in 2010.

For more info on how this is done visit here or here.

 

Source: The Tech Don, marceli

Indian Spice Movie Phone has a built-in optical disc drive!

 

Indian handset manufacturer Spice is unveiling its innovative Movie Phone later today, but I’ve had a go on it already. It’s the first handset to come with a built-in optical disc drive for playing movies, and goes on sale in India this June. The discs are a proprietary format, but they use blue laser technology, and the compression uses the H.264 standard.

The phone has a 2.8-inch screen, and its headphone jack doubles as a TV-Out port for connecting to a big-screen TV. But it’s that optical drive that makes it stand out – you slot the tiny discs into a tray that pops out from the back of the phone – much like loading UMDs into a PSP.

You can fit a two-and-a-half hour film onto one of the discs – and a bit more if the compression is tweaked. The 40 films that’ll be available at launch are mainly Bollywood movies, and Spice told me they’re readying 1,000 more through deals with studios. The films will be sold in mini DVD-like cases for the equivalent of $5.

Here’s a shot of how the disc drive works:

 

 

And here’s a shot of one of the discs:

 

Nothing’s been announced regarding distribution outside India and South East Asia yet. Could the Spice Movie Phone be a hit in the West? The flop of UMD, even when backed by Sony, indicates a challenging market for distributing films on yet another disc-based format, compared to sideloading films onto a phone digitally.

Source: Tech Digest