Media and Direction

With all this hype about 16X and 12X burn speeds, where are consumers expected to get the newest media? At this time of publication, we still only have two manufacturers who can reliably produce dual layer media, and only a handful that can reliably produce 8X/12X certified media. During the show, we had a chance to talk to some of Taiwan's larger media manufacturers, including Ritek, Prodisc and CMC Magnetics.

Much to our surprise, all three manufacturers had 16X DVD+R media on display. There seems to be enough expectation that 16X DVD-R media will also follow, although we did not see samples of that particular disc on the show floor. As we saw with the AOpen and BenQ drives, chipset companies like MediaTek and Ricoh are confident enough of 16X DVD-R media support to advertise it in their upcoming chipset specifications. Sanyo and Philips are expected to follow suit. However, as common as 16X media was, dual layer media seemed almost untalked about.

Some manufacturers seemed extremely receptive of BluRay (BD). From all manufacturers to whom we spoke, most seemed to agree that we will see top BluRay devices before 2006. 18 months does not seem very far for a future format that has virtually nothing to show for at this time. Quanta hinted at even earlier devices on their roadmap. BD uses 450nm lasers while DVD uses 650nm.




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ProDisc, on the other hand, had a significant amount of material contradicting the advancement of BluRay in favor of HD-DVD. Whether or not some of ProDisc's claims are valid has yet to be decided, but below is a snapshot of how the Taiwanese manufacturer sees the cards fall with regards to future optical formats.




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Although difficult to see, ProDisc had a small display that almost seemed in favor of Near-Field magnification (which is a key component of BD technology). Below, you can see some teasers of 50nm radius pits. The theoretical capacity on such discs is 100GB.




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  • tfranzese - Sunday, June 13, 2004 - link

    How much faster will DL get? Will it be down to 10 min burn times eventually?
  • MIDIman - Sunday, June 13, 2004 - link

    I heard along the rumor mill that a Philips HD-DVD drive was already on the market. Anyone have a link?
  • KristopherKubicki - Sunday, June 13, 2004 - link

    artifex: Verbatim DVDR+9 media costs about $5 a disc right now. I bet 12 months from now it will be around $1 per disc.

    Kristopher
  • artifex - Sunday, June 13, 2004 - link

    Okay, to get back on topic:

    Do we know yet what decent DVD+9 media is going to cost? I'm already seeing slower +9 compatible drives at places like NewEgg for $89; I really don't care about 12x or 16x speed so much as reliability at this point, especially in a part that costs so little.
  • tfranzese - Friday, June 11, 2004 - link

    I don't see how it is and this is definately news to me if so.

    "You used the word oriental not to refer to the words on the screen, you used it to say Kris is oriental... You are an idiot... "

    Not quite, but if you're this critical of language use on the internet you're a sad person.
  • sisq0kidd - Friday, June 11, 2004 - link

    The thing that bothers me about your use of it is, Oriental is derogatory when you call someone Oriental...
  • sisq0kidd - Friday, June 11, 2004 - link

    "#14, are you blind? I don't think Kris is oriental."

    You used the word oriental not to refer to the words on the screen, you used it to say Kris is oriental... You are an idiot...
  • tfranzese - Friday, June 11, 2004 - link

    Ignorant? No, you just seem to think you know it all.

    http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=Oriental

    I use the word perfectly fine, especially in the context here where I was referring to an oriental language depicted in one of the screen captures. Pretty sad that even on a tech site people like you can't just stick to the topic, but rather flame others. I may have asked if someone was blind, but it was a retorical question. The fact you think that you know every use of the word oriental and use that as a basis for you to argue is truly sad and without any merit to me or anyone else reading these comments.
  • sisq0kidd - Friday, June 11, 2004 - link

    tfranzese calm down, you sound like an ignorant ass... For your information, you don't call people Oriental, you call objects related to those people Oriental... Maybe you need to pick up a dictionary...
  • tfranzese - Friday, June 11, 2004 - link

    #18, stfu prick. If you can't discern between a rug and a persons ethnicity then that's not my problem, last I checked oriental people were not known as rugs.

    As for bashing, no one was being bashed - only cited as inobservant. Get a life and pick up a dictionary while you're at it.

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