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1.5 TB DVD by 2010

prostoalex writes "The consortium of three universities and four Japanese companies is investing $25M into a project, that is supposed to deliver a 1.5 TB (that's a terabyte and a half) Digital Versatile Disk by 2010. The Inquirer story quotes multiple layers being used for storage." More importantly, they claim that this will be backwards compatible to existing DVD technology.

318 comments

  1. Hmm... by dachang · · Score: 0, Funny

    Think about all the porn you can put on this thing...

    Sweet...

    1. Re:Hmm... by Kurt+Cobain · · Score: 1

      I hear ya man, I like hours of porn outtakes haha.

  2. Nice to see the correct name by Microsift · · Score: 4, Informative

    Seems like everyone thinks the V in DVD stands for video.

    --
    My other sig is extremely clever...
    1. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It stands for Vaginal. DVD-A is the intended use.

    2. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Neon+Spiral+Injector · · Score: 2

      Actually the DVD consortium has said that DVD doesn't stand for anything. You just call the discs DVDs.

    3. Re:Nice to see the correct name by aengblom · · Score: 5, Funny

      Seems like everyone thinks the V in DVD stands for video.

      I think it stands for vapor now

      --


      So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
    4. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Proc6 · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Fact Check:

      http://www.dvdforum.org/tech-dvdprimer.htm

      What does DVD mean?
      The keyword is "versatile." Digital Versatile discs provide superb video, audio and data storage and access -- all on one disc.

      --

      I'm Rick James with mod points biatch!

    5. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Carbonite · · Score: 3, Informative

      From another "official" FAQ:

      http://www.thedigitalbits.com/officialfaq.html#1 .1

      [1.1.1] What do the letters DVD stand for?
      All of the following have been proposed as the words behind the letters DVD.

      Delayed, very delayed (referring to the many late releases of DVD formats)
      Diversified, very diversified (referring to the proliferation of recordable formats and other spinoffs)
      Digital venereal disease (referring to piracy and copying of DVDs)
      Dead, very dead (from naysayers who predicted DVD would never take off)
      Digital video disc (the original meaning suggested by some of DVD's creators)
      Digital versatile disc (the meaning later suggested by some of DVD's creators)
      Nothing

      And the official answer is? "Nothing." The original acronym came from "digital video disc." Some members of the DVD Forum (see 6.1) tried to express that DVD goes far beyond video by retrofitting the painfully contorted phrase "digital versatile disc," but this has never been officially accepted by the DVD Forum as a whole. The consensus is now that DVD, as an international standard, is simply three letters. After all, who cares what VHS stands for? (Guess what, no one agrees on that one either.


      --
      ich muß mehr Kuhglocke haben
    6. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Neon+Spiral+Injector · · Score: 2
      How about from this page? http://www.flemingmultimedia.com/FAQDVD.html


      What does DVD stand for?

      Originally, DVD stood for Digital Video Disk. As the standard evolved to include additional capabilities, its meaning was changed to Digital Versatile Disc. This didn't translate well into every language, so now DVD doesn't stand for anything -- it's just DVD.


      I've found lots of other pages stating the same thing.
    7. Re:Nice to see the correct name by glwtta · · Score: 2

      Oh come on, everyone knows it stands for 'Valenti'.

      --
      sic transit gloria mundi
    8. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      Oh, come on. Somebody throw this AC a few mod points. The post cracked me up!

      --

      I write in my journal
    9. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Main Entry: DVD
      Pronunciation: "dE-(")vE-'dE
      Function: noun
      Etymology: digital video disc
      Date: 1993
      : a high-capacity optical disk format; also : an optical disk using such a format and containing especially a video recording (as a movie) or computer data

    10. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Oh come on, everyone knows it stands for 'Valenti'.

      Correct, the full name of course being Die, Valenti, Die.

    11. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Snarfy · · Score: 0

      What is your source?

    12. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Zathras11 · · Score: 0

      It was originally video, but quickly
      changed to versatile, yet most people
      still think it stands for video...
      Why? Probably because the biggest
      use is movies.

    13. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually I had heard that the first 'D' stood for Dynamic
      thus:
      Dynamic Versatile Disc

    14. Re:Nice to see the correct name by terrymr · · Score: 2

      I seem to remeber the original trademark registration being for Digital Video Disc - the Versatile came later after they started thinking of more uses for them.

    15. Re:Nice to see the correct name by salientpoints · · Score: 1

      About four years ago I saw an article in Time about DVDs. Except that the incompetent journalist stated that DVDs stood for Digital Audio Discs. I wonder where he came up with that one.

      I also hate it when people write 'compact disk' when 'compact disc' looks much better.

    16. Re:Nice to see the correct name by falser · · Score: 2

      I think this new type of DVD should be called DXXXD, cause you fit a lot of porn on one of those.

    17. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Woops, a picogram spec of dust just obliterated 500MB of data on my 1.5TB DVD.... Mental note, dont store so much data in one place....

    18. Re:Nice to see the correct name by falzer · · Score: 1

      Correct, the full name of course being Die, Valenti, Die.

      So, it's german?

    19. Re:Nice to see the correct name by Tony-A · · Score: 2

      I think the comment originated with Churchill, probably after he got razzed for dangling his preposition.

  3. While this is great by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm sure our facist leadership won't allow us to use this. Thanks to the megacorporation/government/industrial/military complex, we're lucky we can even still warez photoshop.

  4. With anoucements like this...... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wirdws.com will always material for its Vaporware issue.

  5. TB by echidna75 · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    deliver a 1.5 TB (that's a terabyte and a half)

    Oh! Thanks for the conversion. At first I thought I was reading something about tuberculosis.

    1. Re:TB by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      your world sucks.

  6. Unfortunately by efedora · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No one needs the space because by 2010 all digital material is covered by copyrights - which have been extended for 250 years.

    1. Re:Unfortunately by robbyjo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      So you assume that all that big space are for DVD rips and MP3s? How about storing gene info? Backups? Anyone?

      --

      --
      Error 500: Internal sig error
    2. Re:Unfortunately by corsec67 · · Score: 1

      Yeah, and all of that information will have to be on their servers, hosted only on one dsl. As for the length of copyrights, unless congress stops exdending it 20 years every 20 years, they are unlimited in length.

      --
      If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
    3. Re:Unfortunately by robbyjo · · Score: 2

      hosted only on one dsl

      You know what? It's easy to take a revenge. Just post where it is to Slashdot and we'll handle the rest...

      --

      --
      Error 500: Internal sig error
    4. Re:Unfortunately by Ed+Avis · · Score: 2

      Genetic information? I thought that gene sequences and stuff were fairly small, as in a couple of CDs for a typical organism.

      A complete record of everything in your life so far - as will happen once phones all have full-motion video cameras, and are left on all the time - could easily fill a terabyte however.

      --
      -- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
    5. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      A complete record of everything in your life so far . . .snip

      ...can be easily accessed at your friendly local TIA office.

    6. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A complete record of everything in your life so far - as will happen once phones all have full-motion video cameras, and are left on all the time - could easily fill a terabyte however.

      Sounds like such a device has a market of 1 at least, don't count on the rest of us wanting it though. The thought of a phone that's with you and always on is worse than anything out of 1984, never mind the recording your life.

    7. Re:Unfortunately by SETIGuy · · Score: 2
      How about storing gene info?

      I patented your genetic code, retrieved from a hair sample, last week. You can't afford to store your genetic code.

      Backups?

      Backups are illegal under the Ernest P. Worhl Copyright Act (EPWCA) of 2005.

      Anyone?

      People may not be duplicated under the Arnold Ziffle Anti-Cloning Act (AZACA) of 2007. Disney holds the copyright to most people anyway.

    8. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There will be no commercial software market in 2010. The open-source 'free'dom fighters will have virally consumed every possible permutation of code possible with GPL. Software developers will flock to new jobs and remaining software industry will consist entirely of 'comic book store guy' virgins living off their mommy. RMS will have won, and that is how those damn dirty apes take over our planet.

    9. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But you will be able to watch every trailer ever made before you can watch your movie.

    10. Re:Unfortunately by sql*kitten · · Score: 2

      No one needs the space because by 2010 all digital material is covered by copyrights - which have been extended for 250 years.

      That's why they're using multiple lawyers for storage!

    11. Re:Unfortunately by glwtta · · Score: 2
      How about storing gene info?

      Space requirements for "gene info" are either modest or laughable (depending on your definition of "gene info"), by todays "enterprise" standards

      As an example: GenBank contains basically all published sequences, and the whole thing is only about 80GB (if memory serves), but the pure sequence in it would only take up slightly more than 5GB (assuming a binary format, ie two bits per base).

      Here's their stats page.

      --
      sic transit gloria mundi
    12. Re:Unfortunately by buswolley · · Score: 2

      I don't know. Sounds wonderful too me. Unemployment in not the disease. It is the cure.

      --

      A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.

    13. Re:Unfortunately by Jugalator · · Score: 2

      The material many use to store on discs are already copyright protected, still it's burned. :-)

      From a piracy point of view, the interesting part isn't if it's copyrighted or not, but if it can be circumvented. ;-)

      --
      Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
    14. Re:Unfortunately by Your+Anus · · Score: 1

      Don't forget the Copyright Access Control Act (CACA) of 2006.

      --

      In the USA, we like stuff watered down, like beer, television, and freedom.
    15. Re:Unfortunately by danoatvulaw · · Score: 1

      ummm, no. that's trademarks - they are renewable ad infinitum. Copyrights only last from the life of the author plus 70 years.

      danoatvulaw

    16. Re:Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'd just like to point out the hostile take over of disney by AOL-time-warner in 2008 means most people belong to AOL-T-W-D. I would have thought everyone remembered that.

  7. And in other news... by inteller · · Score: 3, Funny

    The same Japanese universities plan to store the entire Intarnet(tm) on one DoCoMo 6G 10Ghz cell phone using an old bubble gum wrapper and a used condom by the year 2020.

    1. Re:And in other news... by Jugalator · · Score: 2

      The same Japanese universities plan to store the entire Intarnet(tm) on one DoCoMo 6G 10Ghz cell phone using an old bubble gum wrapper and a used condom by the year 2020.

      Meanwhile, the US government is passing the planning stages of monitoring Internet, and slowly moving towards a practical implementation.

      --
      Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
    2. Re:And in other news... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Would it still work if the condom had been used by someone that is "shooting blanks"?

  8. WOW by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    thats a lot of pornooooooh never mind

  9. well thats all well and good but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Does anyone else think thats too much to be carrying around in the palm of your hands? and how long would that take to create? it seems like by the timeit was finished the data on the disk would already be outdated...

    1. Re:well thats all well and good but... by docbrown42 · · Score: 3, Funny

      Porn never gets outdated.

      --
      Ed Wedig
      Graphic design services
      docbrown.net
    2. Re:well thats all well and good but... by Corporate+Troll · · Score: 1

      Hmmmm... The CGA and EGA porn pics I have somewhere around really are outdated by my standards now.
      I remember my first MCGA (VGA 320x200x8bit) porn pics and was amazed!

    3. Re:well thats all well and good but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It will arrive just in time for MS latest OS, which will be carried on two discs.

  10. Of course... by JanneM · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What's the chance of that hardware ever being available without DRM? Not all that useful if we cannot actually use it for backing up any data, moving the discs to any other device and so on.

    --
    Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
    1. Re:Of course... by CrazyDuke · · Score: 1

      Why? Its not like one has to reinstall Windows from scratch on a freshly fdisk'd and formated hard drive every six months.

      Oh, wait...

      *looks down*

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced influence is indistinguishable from control.
    2. Re:Of course... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't have to do that.

      Maybe you're not trained well? Incompetent? An idiot?

      Weird...

  11. Bad for RIAA by syntap · · Score: 1

    Now we'll be able to fit entire genres of music, rather than entire band catalogs of MP3's on one disc.

    1. Re:Bad for RIAA by NorthDude · · Score: 2

      With 1.5 Tb of available space, I swear i won't compress my music to MP3! it would be like compressing a 10 K file today which is stored on 40GB hd...

      --


      I'd rather be sailing...
    2. Re:Bad for RIAA by sketerpot · · Score: 1

      Perhaps you should try to cram all the quality you can in 1024 kbps OGG files. Then you could hold massive amounts of music (imagine all the popular music from a few decades...) and still have great quality.

    3. Re:Bad for RIAA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      compressing to a lossy format at a higher bitrate than lossless would be (for cd audio at least).. doesnt make much sense to me

    4. Re:Bad for RIAA by kesuki · · Score: 3, Interesting

      You might want to concider using the Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC).
      Especially since your oggs already support FLAC
      "libOggFLAC and libOggFLAC++, which wrap the encoders and decoders of libFLAC and libFLAC++, respectively, to allow access to FLAC streams in an Ogg container"
      At just slightly over 2:1 compression it's enough to turn that uncompressed best-quality 2304 kbps (48khz stereo 24-bit) .wav into a ~1220 kbps .ogg. Keep in mind that DVD-quality 1536 kbps (48khz stereo 16-bit) would reduce to ~814 Kbps, in a FLACed OGG. BTW where did you come up with 1024? CD quality is 1411 Kbps (~605kbps FLACed).
      just for fun, that's ~5916 hours of FLACed CD audio per 1.5 TB DVD. Just under 247 days worth of audio. Mathematically lossless Audio+video compression possibly in HD format could finally be realistically possible. At 63.1 Mbps (Hufyuv+FLACed 720x480 30 fps) you can fit ~50-55 hours of DVD resolution, lossless quality audio+video on the 1.5 TB dvd (depending on audio quality). 1920x1080 HDTV is 380Mbps so expect 8-9 hours of lossless full-resolution HDTV.

  12. Peace On Earth: +1, Patriotic by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Get Your War On

    Cheers,

    W00t

  13. In other news.... by Em+Emalb · · Score: 3, Funny

    snip snip

    "It will also be backwards compatible with standard DVDs, the reports said, with its storage ability equivalent to around 300 DVDs using the current format"

    This new technology will drive you to work, make love to your frigid wife, baby-sit the kids, wash the dog and the car. Yes, folks, the year 2010 will be a great one. All thanks to this DVD and $25mil.

    --
    Sent from your iPad.
    1. Re:In other news.... by Helter · · Score: 2

      Ever hear "Step Right Up" by Tom Waits?

  14. Data Density? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Will there be an increased data density in these disks? sounds to me like they wont if they are compatible with previous standards, but if they have an increased density will this mean that a scratch could wipe out a movie rather than a few frames or so?

  15. More interestingly, the article states: by jhampson · · Score: 5, Funny

    "* BY 2010, according to senior Intel architects, a CPU will have processing power equivalent to the brain of a bumble bee."
    Wow. Woweewow.
    Imagine a beowulf cluster of those.
    Oh. Wait. I have one of those in my back yard.

    1. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by jhampson · · Score: 1

      Requisite BSOD definition: "Blue Sting of Death"

    2. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by AndroidCat · · Score: 1

      "Where do you want to buzz off to today?"

      --
      One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
    3. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by AlistairGroves · · Score: 1

      Would that be a Hive Mind?

    4. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, but a bumble bee only uses a few milliwatts of power.

    5. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by orangesquid · · Score: 5, Funny

      Top ten modal dialogs in Windows DS/2010:

      (10) WINVIEW: Error reading "cum lolitas.jpg". This problem has been automatically reported to Microsoft with a full profile of your computer.

      (9) Due to overwhelming user request, "Clippy and his Crew" are now an integral part of the operating system and can not be disabled.

      (8) Corruption in ADVERTIS.DLL. Windows halted.

      (7) You have been idle or unproductive for the last thirty seconds. Activating HIVE parallel processing...

      (6) HIVE .NET connection failed. Please unisntall any non-Microsoft software and try again.

      (5) Application terminated unexpectedly. Please do not blame this on Microsoft again.

      (4) Give me more honey!

      (3) Give me more, honey!

      (2) Wrong BigDVD key. Stinger engaged.

      (1) DRM violation detected. Replacing your yellow-and-black stripes with black-and-white ones, please wait...

      Top Linux 3.4 kernel boot message:

      iBee processor (986) detected.
      DRM extension detected, workaround enabled.

      --
      --TheOrangeSquid Is it any wonder things seem so awry? We swim in a sea of confusion and don't have to think to survive
    6. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by terrymr · · Score: 2

      Wouldn't it be easier to just hook up a bee to a computer :-)

      Imagine a Beowulf Cluster of these - or would that be a swarm ?

    7. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How are they going to do this the pentium 4 is slower than the pentium 3!

    8. Re:More interestingly, the article states: by Tony-A · · Score: 2

      Does this mean that MSN will have the brain of a butterfly?

  16. Backwards compatible? by IGnatius+T+Foobar · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Backwards compatible is no big deal -- your typical DVD player can read CD, VCD, etc. formats. The real question is whether consumers will be ready for yet another format change by 2010. Somehow I doubt it. If you go by the previous cycle, it took about 15 years before consumers were ready to buy DVD players.

    Also, we don't want to give Hollywood and the DVDCCA another shot at locking us out. The CSS cat is permanently out of the bag for the lifetime of the DVD format, but a new format would provide them an opportunity to come up with some sort of freedom-restricting technology.

    --
    Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
    1. Re:Backwards compatible? by aengblom · · Score: 4, Insightful

      will be ready for yet another format change by 2010. Somehow I doubt it

      If HDTV is really coming, they may be

      --


      So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
    2. Re:Backwards compatible? by vasqzr · · Score: 2, Informative


      15 years to buy DVD players?

      In 1983 the first CD players were released in the USA.

      CD's have only been out ~ 20 years, DVD's half of that.

    3. Re:Backwards compatible? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      CD's have only been out ~ 20 years, DVD's half of that.

      Pluralization of a word does not give it an apostrophe.

    4. Re:Backwards compatible? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      So as your consumer electronics adviser, I am advising you to donate your current VCR to a grate resident, who will laugh sardonically and hurl it into a dumpster. Then I want you to go out and purchase a vast array of 8-millimeter video equipment.

      ... OK! Got everything? Well, too bad, sucker, because while you were gone the electronics industry came up with an even newer format that makes your 8-millimeter VCR look as technologically advanced as toenail dirt. This format is called "3.5 hectare" and it will not be made available until it is outmoded, sometime early next week, by a format called "Elroy", so order yours now.

      -- Dave Barry, "No Surrender in the Electronics Revolution"

    5. Re:Backwards compatible? by mark_lybarger · · Score: 1

      CDs - "ALL YOUR HAVES ARE BELONG TO US!"

      i don't know, perhaps the cd 0wnz the have?

    6. Re:Backwards compatible? by ryanvm · · Score: 2

      it took about 15 years before consumers were ready to buy DVD players.

      Actually, it took about 15 years for the industry to produce a replacement. I'm pretty sure that if there were $150 DVD players and all new releases were on DVD in 1990, consumers would have bought in just as quickly then.

      Also, we don't want to give Hollywood and the DVDCCA another shot at locking us out.

      That's a pretty silly policy - avoiding progress because of potential risks. Besides, who's to say that Congress won't have finally hammered out some decent fair-use legislation by then?

    7. Re:Backwards compatible? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It is viewed as an acronym, so yes, it may have an apostrophe.

      here

      I'm sure there are many other sites out there dealing with this. News flash: Comics aren't usually the definitive "foot being put down".

    8. Re:Backwards compatible? by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      If HDTV is really coming, they may be

      Just for the record, not only is HDTV really coming, it's already here. I've owned an HDTV-- an absurdly expensive top-of-the-line Sony model I bought on a whim after coming into some extra cash; the burden of being a videophile-- since this summer. There's something on in HD 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. HBO and Showtime are running movies in HD via DirecTV, and all three major nets are broadcasting most of their prime-time schedule in HD. PBS is showing a lot of HD content, and the Discovery Channel set up a whole new channel just for HD programming. Even the WB is running shows like Smallville in HD; can't say I care for it, but it's fun to watch with the sound off. Hell, CBS is even running some of their soaps in HD. The playoffs are in HD, the Superbowl will be in HD next month, the Oscars will be in HD next spring.

      There's still a heck of a lot more SD than HD out there, but HD has definitely arrived.

      --

      I write in my journal
    9. Re:Backwards compatible? by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      Pluralizing an abbreviation, on the other hand, does. At least, according to most style guides.

      It's "CD's" and "DVD's," not "CDs" and "DVDs."

      --

      I write in my journal
    10. Re:Backwards compatible? by IGnatius+T+Foobar · · Score: 2
      Besides, who's to say that Congress won't have finally hammered out some decent fair-use legislation by then?
      Jack Valenti, Hillary Rosen, Bill Gates, George W. Bush, and John Ashcroft. That's who.
      --
      Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
    11. Re:Backwards compatible? by mcmonkey · · Score: 2

      Wow, wrong on both counts.

      First, if you followed the thread on V=video vs. V=versatile, you'd know DVD stands for DVD, is short for DVD, and is an abbreviation of DVD. In other words, the word is 'DVD'. DVD is not an abbreviation.

      Second, only lower case and single letter abbreviations get 's. Others just get an s.

      DVDs, CDs, cgi's, A's.

      ( http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/pubstyle/ch6_1.htm and http://www.wooster.edu/psychology/apa-crib.html#ab brev )

    12. Re:Backwards compatible? by ryanvm · · Score: 1

      [...] George W. Bush, and John Ashcroft.

      You do realize that both the DMCA and SSSCA were introduced by Democratic congressmen.

    13. Re:Backwards compatible? by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2
      From the Chicago Manual of Style:
      6.10 Abbreviations with or without periods, lowercase letters used as nouns, and capital letters that would be confusing if s alone were added for the plural with an apostrophe and an s:
      M.A.'s and Ph.D.'s
      x's and y's
      S's, A's, I's
      SOS's
      Note that "SOS" doesn't stand for anything-- it's simply the three-letter combination that is easiest to send and recognize in Morse code-- and it forms the plural with an apostrophe. The correct plural of "DVD," whether or no it has an acronymic expansion, is "DVD's."

      I dare say that the well-respected and venerable Chicago Manual takes precedence in general use over the very specific EIA and APA style guides, particularly given the fact that the EIA guide, at least, explicitly notes that the recommendation for acronymic pluralization contained therein differs from that given in a more general style guide.
      --

      I write in my journal
    14. Re:Backwards compatible? by rmohr02 · · Score: 2

      Well, DVD Audio isn't really that big (I mean, using a DVD to store wav files?), so comparing the DVD to VHS is probably a more accurate comparison. But then, VHSs haven't been out too much longer than CDs.

    15. Re:Backwards compatible? by Catbeller · · Score: 2

      True, but with a Democrat you have some chance of denying a moneyboy what he wants. With the lineup in the 3 branches today, all Republican, there is NO chance of opposition. None. It's utterly against the robber-baron no-regulation mentality. The business of America is business, and all that. Death to unions, tax rebates to corps that don't pay taxes, offshore tax havens. It's a far-right neo-con agenda, and we are ficked as consumers.

      It would have happened eventually with the Dems, but that is frankly because they are turning into '80's Republicans -- while the main Repubs are now a coalition of neo-con tax cutters, end-of-worlders, guvmint haters -- the farthest of the right wing.

      What was far left no longer exists. Left is now considered radical, moderates are now lefties, conservatives are now moderates, far-right wings are considered moderate-to-conservative, and the looniest fringe nutjobs are now amiable "right-wing" with their own TV networks (Fox, MS-NBC, CNN).

      The Dems would have at least slowed down the corporatization of the world. The Repubs love it, live it, they by and large ARE the corporations that are taking over the four branches of our democratic guvmint.

      I remember vivdly Kornbluth and Pohl's "Space Merchants" novella of 1950. They showed a U.S. Senate comprised of Senators from U.S.Steel, G.M, etc. There were no people's reps, only corporate ones.

      It's happening de facto.

    16. Re:Backwards compatible? by xigxag · · Score: 2

      Did you read your own quote, Twirly?

      It says to add an apostrophe s to capital letters that would be confusing if s alone were added for the plural.

      SOSs could be considered confusing because of the two Ss's, ergo an apostrophe is indicated.

      There's no confusion with DVDs, hence no apostrophe is mandated. Unless you happen to be one of those wacky "DVD is an acronym" people, then go ahead and add it.

      Okay, I'll come clean and admit the whole purpose of this post was to write "Ss's". ;-)

      --
      There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
    17. Re:Backwards compatible? by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      Did you read your own quote, Twirly?

      Did you? It said, "Abbreviations with or without periods... for[m] the plural with an apostrophe and an s." Yeah, I let a typo slip in there, but it should have been clear from context.

      Whether "DVD" now has an agreed-upon expansion or not, it is not a word. At best, it's a neologism coined from an abbreviation. As such, it has to follow the rules for an abbreviation.

      Okay, I'll come clean and admit the whole purpose of this post was to write "Ss's". ;-)

      That's okay. The whole purpose of my post was just to pick a grammar nit, which is something that I happen to get a kick out of. Does it really matter? No. But I find it more entertaining than arguing about religion or politics, and almost as fun as talking about sports. ;-)

      --

      I write in my journal
    18. Re:Backwards compatible? by xigxag · · Score: 2

      Since the subject is of passing interest to you, I'll briefly mention the following three factoids:

      1) I'm a New Yorker, and as such I defer to the NY Times Style Guide over the Chicago Manual. And I notice that the NY Times' website uses DVDs, which is enough to convince me.

      2) If you google the phrase "DVD's", you'll get a message that says, "Did you mean: Dvds" The latter phrase also vastly outnumbers the former.

      3) Here's the Chicago Manual Of Style's own FAQ page. I can't imagine you didn't at least peruse their online resource first, only to find that DVDs weren't mentioned. So I'm guessing you missed the subtle yet quite conclusive rebuttal to your argumentum ad verecundiam which is prominently displayed on the "New FAQs" page. Well, in fact, there it is.

      --
      There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
    19. Re:Backwards compatible? by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      I'm a New Yorker, and as such I defer to the NY Times Style Guide over the Chicago Manual.

      Style guides for newspapers and magazines, including the AP's style guide, describe an extremely simplified mode of writing, appropriate for mass communication media. I prefer the more conservative mode described by The University of Chicago Press. It's a preference thing.

      If you google the phrase "DVD's", you'll get a message that says, "Did you mean: Dvds"

      Oh, well, that's an appeal to authority that I can agree with. ;-)

      So I'm guessing you missed the subtle yet quite conclusive rebuttal to your argumentum ad verecundiam which is prominently displayed on the "New FAQs" page.

      My deskside copy of the Manual is a 13th ed.; I had to go consult a more recent edition to get to the bottom of this. In editions more recent than my own, the Manual distinguishes between types of abbreviation: acronyms, initializations, and contractions. An acronym is meant to be spoken as a single word, like NASA or BART. Acronyms form their plurals with a single s, as in FAQs (pronounced "facks"). Initializations are pronounced as separate letters, like CD, ATM, or VCR. Initializations form their plurals with an apostrophe: CD's (pronounced "see dees").

      When you start pronouncing "DVD" as a word, rather than as letters, you can drop the apostrophe. ;-)

      Now, would you like to split this hair still further, or shall we just agree to disagree?

      --

      I write in my journal
    20. Re:Backwards compatible? by xigxag · · Score: 2

      The latter, I suppose. But I boldly and fearlessly predict that within 10 years the CMS will bow to good sense and popular usage and come around to my position. Honestly, who'd write, "I went to various ATM's in the area?" That doesn't look right a'tall, no indeed. Not that I'd expect you to agree.

      --
      There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
    21. Re:Backwards compatible? by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2
      Honestly, who'd write, "I went to various ATM's in the area?" That doesn't look right a'tall, no indeed. Not that I'd expect you to agree.

      Actually, I do agree. The apostrophe rule comes from the Olden Dayes when abbreviations were actually written out with periods. Which is better, "A.T.M.s" or "A.T.M.'s?"

      As to changing the Manual, I'll agree that the rule should be changed when the name of the candy is changed from "M&M's" to "M&Ms."

      ;-)

      --

      I write in my journal
    22. Re:Backwards compatible? by 75th+Trombone · · Score: 1

      2) If you google the phrase "DVD's", you'll get a message that says, "Did you mean: Dvds" The latter phrase also vastly outnumbers the former.

      Oh, cool. "Judgement" gets two million hits on Google and no correction prompt, it MUST be a correct spelling!

      (Really I think "judgment" is pretty stupid, but hey, it gets the point across. ;-) )

      --
      The United States of America: We do what we must because we can.
    23. Re:Backwards compatible? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      News flash: Comics aren't usually the definitive "foot being put down".

      Well, I'm glad someone said it. I'll add this: if you (not you specifically) ever link to that fucking cartoon again, EAT MY SHIT!

  17. What kind of laser will it use? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    With the blue laser DVDs being able to hold a mere 27GB of information, other than the layering, I wonder if they will use the blue laser technology to read/write them. I'm thinking this might be one way to get the entire run of B5 on one DVD.

  18. 2010 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    * BY 2010, according to senior Intel architects, a CPU will have processing power equivalent to the brain of a bumble bee.

    So how long until we see Beowulf clusters of Linux bee-computers swarming at Bill Gates?

  19. TB GB MB Is Obsolete by robbyjo · · Score: 4, Funny

    The trend unit is "how many equivalents of library of congress" does it hold?

    --

    --
    Error 500: Internal sig error
    1. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by inteller · · Score: 1

      huh? I thought we still spoke in terms of: "this thing will hold X^N 1.44 floppies!"

    2. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by zakharin · · Score: 1

      So when are we going to see gigaquads?

    3. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by glwtta · · Score: 2

      LoC's, in their turn, were obsoleted by the "Human Genomes"

      --
      sic transit gloria mundi
    4. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by AndroidCat · · Score: 2

      It might hold a lot of data, but how fast will it be on read/write? I want to know what its MPAA speed rating will be! (It's what, 32x = 1 MPAA?)

      --
      One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
    5. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by cosmosis · · Score: 2

      I'll take a serioud crack at your question.

      If are considering text only, then the Library of Congress is aproximately 100 Terabytes. We can call this unit measurement 1 LCT (Library of Congress Text)

      If we add images that are in these books, as well as their map collection, then we are up past a Petabyte (1000 Terabytes). We can call this unit 1 LC (Library of Congress - ALL).

      Question: The trend unit is "how many equivalents of library of congress" does it hold?

      Answer: Each of these new discs has a storage capactiy of 0.015 LCT, or 0.0015 LC.

      Planet P Blog - Liberty with Technology.

    6. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Glonoinha · · Score: 2, Informative

      Jesus man, you said that with enough authority to almost sound like you knew what you were talking about.

      The LoC is approximately 100 Terabytes. I would love to the see the goatse that approximation came from ... perhaps share a little of your scratch paper with the rest of the world?

      Here is a little math of my own :
      1 page 8x11 is roughly 50 typed lines, 80 characters per line. That is a little large for most books, but gives us something to work with. That is 4,000 characters per page on the high end, and assumes that a page is mostly typed and not white space.

      Two hundred pages is about the average, pulled right from goatse.cx but close enough for government work. 200x4,000 = 800,000 characters in a full book. Lets stretch it just a little and say there are lots of fat books, make the average 1 million characters (bytes) per book.

      A million books, at a million characters (text only) per book is 10^12 bytes, or a full Terabyte. In ASCII form, one terabyte could hold the text of one million books, assuming 200 pages of single spaced (no white space) pages. For reference, Neuromancer by William Gibson as text (including the copyright notice at the bottom) is stored in an ASCII file 472,253 bytes in size. So might we say that half a million bytes is closer in size to average we are up to 2 million books stored in text only form on a 1TB disk.

      How many books are in the Library of Congress? Dunno. Are there two million? Probably. Extrapolate that to your 100TB estimate and we are presuming two hundred million books in the LoC, each about the size of Neuromancer. Every man in America would have had to write two full 200 page novels, get them published to some degree, and then into the LoC to have that many. I am guessing that the LoC has closer to 3 million books in their archives.

      3 million books at 500,000 characters apiece and Voila! this new disk could hold all of them (ASCII format.) Thus the new unit of measurement is born : the LoC = one of these disks = 1.5TB

      It still wouldn't hold all of my porn, though.

      --
      Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
    7. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by sql*kitten · · Score: 2

      The trend unit is "how many equivalents of library of congress" does it hold?

      Didn't Neal Stephenson use "Boeing 747 full of encyclopaedias"?

    8. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Jesus, man, you sound like an arrogant asshole. Also, your estimate is little better than the first guy's.

      From their website:
      The Library of Congress is the largest library in the world, with more than 120 million items on approximately 530 miles of bookshelves. The collections include more than 18 million books, 2.5 million recordings, 12 million photographs, 4.5 million maps, and 54 million manuscripts.

      The 54 million manuscripts is the wildcard; from dictionary.com, a manuscript is A typewritten or handwritten version of a book, an article, a document, or other work, especially the author's own copy, prepared and submitted for publication in print. So there may many more than 18 million books in the LOC (if you include the handwritten or nonpublished ones.)

    9. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Glonoinha · · Score: 1

      >Jesus, man, you sound like an arrogant asshole. Also, your estimate is little better than the first guy's.

      Naw, just haven't had enough caffeine today. I could substitute alcohol for caffeine and smooth out but I have to drive later on tonight.

      Actually, his estimate (the final number) is pretty much right on the mark, given the data you have provided us with.

      Based on the 1Megabyte per book I assumed, and a meg per map or photograph, and (being generous) just shy of a meg per manuscript) 120 million items at 800kbytes per (figuring the manuscripts are a little smaller) is within 4% of his 100TB estimate. Pretty accurate and I give props to cosmosis for being so accurate.

      I was wrong, I generally admit being wrong as soon as possible, beating others to the punch.

      --
      Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
    10. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Glonoinha · · Score: 1

      >Didn't Neal Stephenson use "Boeing 747 full of encyclopaedias"?

      I think this is a reference to Snow Crash, an excellent novel for reference.

      --
      Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
    11. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It holds...

      4574 Libraries of Congress
      13 Pyramids at Giza
      27 Hindenburgs
      19 Titanics
      11 Aswan High Dams
      8 Hiroshimas
      6 Amazon Basins
      2 ComboyNeils
      0.01 Slashdot Effects
      and a partridge in a pear tree!

    12. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Cripes man just go over here and see what they themselves say.

      http://www.loc.gov/about/

      Lots of books (over 17 million), many maps, loads of reports, the photo and electronic collections etc.

      pm

    13. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      One thing that every one is forgetting is that most text gets at least a 10 to one compression with any modern lossless general purpose compression program... So, you could put 10 times the contents of the libary of congress onto one of these babies... Maybe they will come up with a middle generation of 150MB DVD's in the next couple of years with a compressed disk format and be able to store the entire library of congress on one of those babies.

    14. Re:TB GB MB Is Obsolete by Snover · · Score: 1

      Really? I thought it was now "the equivilant of X hard drives."

      --

      [insert witty comment here]
  20. +5 funny by Slashdotess · · Score: 1, Redundant

    Wow! That might hold a fourth of my collection

  21. Slashdot can teach us many things by addps4cat · · Score: 5, Funny

    1.5 TB (that's a terabyte and a half)


    Thanks captain obvious!
    --
    Don't eat shrimp candy, just a heads up.
    1. Re:Slashdot can teach us many things by misterhaan · · Score: 1
      i remember when everybody thought they were cool because they knew that giga- was the one that came after mega- . . . and hard drives were about to get as big as a gigabyte!

      then of course i impressed/confused them all by saying that someday we'd laugh as we brought home our terabyte drives . . .

      --

      track7.org has all kinds of interesting stuff!

    2. Re:Slashdot can teach us many things by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Taco's got a Mac, he's become userfriendly now.

    3. Re:Slashdot can teach us many things by ottffssent · · Score: 4, Funny

      At least you don't see "that's equivalent to a stack of paper stretching from the earth to the sun 12 times" in magazines anymore.

  22. So much data -- a little OT by sisukapalli1 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The amount of data on a single disk made me think what the uses could be, and the primary thing I could come up with is hi-res multimedia. There was an article in one of the popular magazines about the next 10 years advancements, and one of them was about digital projections that fool the eye -- one would not be able to distinguish between real images and digital images.

    But, this also makes me wonder... Our ability to process information has stayed the same (e.g., it still takes me awful lot of time to read a small book -- let alone the LOTR), but the amount of data is just exploding.

    May be there would be some new technology that leads us into faster/better processing of the tonnes of information?

    S

    1. Re:So much data -- a little OT by etyam · · Score: 1

      The company I work for could most definately use this kind of storage. We sell stockphotography and store everything digitally of course. Diskspace is a perennial problem. We're at 4 TB now, but our collection of images grows rapidly. I would cut our costs significantly if we can just use a bunsh disks like this.

    2. Re:So much data -- a little OT by freeweed · · Score: 2

      May be there would be some new technology that leads us into faster/better processing of the tonnes of information?

      Yes, it's called a 'computer'. Seriously, not trying to be a troll or anything, but that's precisely what the field of computer science has been working on for decades now. The machine I'm typing this from really is nothing more than a glorified calculator, multiplied by several orders of magnitude.

      The basic idea behind a computing device is to speed up data processing - and to handle amounts so vast the human mind can't deal with it all. Remember, before electronics, a 'computer' was actually a reference to a human being.

      --
      Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
    3. Re:So much data -- a little OT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Our ability to process information has stayed the same" but there is no database containing all
      the information for all 4 (or it is now 5) billion
      of us. Notice how companies are merging...
      Coopers and Lybrand merged with Price Waterhouse
      which was bought by IBM. Informix was bought by
      IBM for $1 billion cash. IBM also bought Sequent.

      AOL and Time-Warner merged. Fujistu bought Siemens
      and ICL.

      Employees 170,000 - Fujitsu group worldwide

      More frequently we are seeing companies with hundreds of thousand of employees. These will have
      much larger central database!

    4. Re:So much data -- a little OT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      One of the things that I am working on is "just in time" learning.

      This is based on the methods of the "just in time" manufacturing. Old style manufacturing required huge warehouses and lots of lead time for suppliers to ship things and lots of capital investment in that large inventory and lots of dollars inventorying and managing the huge mountain of supplies. The new style of manufacturing is that you don't order the product until just before you are going to need it. The trucks will pull up and unload the supplies directly to the production floor, minutes ahead of when those parts will be placed on the product. Just in time.

      I believe that we can do the same thing with learning and human beings. Imagine that you have all knowledge of all human beings immediately available to you from any computer terminal, or most of it available through compressed files on a 1.5TB DVD.

      What school will do for you instead of cramming your head full of mostly useless facts and dates will be to instead teach you how to read, write, do arithmatic and how to access and cross correlate data from different information services.

      Teaching people how to learn, and providing a complete reference library that is fully cross indexed, like the internet, only better, is more important than teaching people any specific single fact.

      I think that the public education system should be completed by the time a person turns 14. People really are adults at that age and should be treated as such, with all the rights and responsiblities thereof. One of the major reasons we have so much crime and malcontent among teen agers is because they have nothing to do. Idle hands are the devils playground.

      So, when someone mentions a book or a play or a new advance in science or a band that I don't know I look that reference up instantly on the web. When they wonder how much something costs, I can find pricing right away. When I read something political I can immediately read the opposing view point on any subject.

      I use google mostly for that, but it would be nice if I could have an intelligent agent that runs on my own machine and that worked for me that acted like a tireless personal librarian and tracked what I am interested in and found articles and did executive summaries of that information. Kind of like slashdot, but without the trolls. Or allow me to comment on a topic and publish my comments in a blog like format that is open to anyone else to read. The indexing service could then add my comments to the index.

      I think that in 50 years the internet will be the way we talk, debate, share information, share interests and view art. The world will be a different place in the information age.

  23. Nice quote from the article... by MonTemplar · · Score: 3, Funny
    • * BY 2010, according to senior Intel architects, a CPU will have processing power equivalent to the brain of a bumble bee.


    Hmm... so what that make my Pentium III equivalent to? A cockroach? :)

    --
    -MT.
    1. Re:Nice quote from the article... by alchemist68 · · Score: 1

      No, cock roaches are just as "evolved" as the bumble bee. Your Pentium III will be equivalent to a prion, perhaps an amoeba, or a damaged/diseased sperm cell forever searching to impregnate the first cell it "sees".

    2. Re:Nice quote from the article... by Stonent1 · · Score: 2, Funny

      Your Pentium III will be equivalent to a prion, perhaps an amoeba, or a damaged/diseased sperm cell forever searching to impregnate the first cell it "sees".

      Thats the funniest thing I've read in a long time. I can't wait to use it against someone. (Where they think that it is a complement) "You're as smart as my 1.2Ghz Pentium III!"

    3. Re:Nice quote from the article... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Slashdot editors??? :P

    4. Re:Nice quote from the article... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just imagine the Intel ads...

      Mike

  24. Sweet by BoomerSooner · · Score: 2

    So DeCSS will still work?

  25. Porn Vs Internet by Gaggme · · Score: 1

    Ahh the timeless question
    Does capacity expand revelvant to the expansion of porn?
    Or is it that more porn must be made to fill the space?

    --
    My ignorance is a perfect shield against your logic.
    1. Re:Porn Vs Internet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm just wondering how many dongs and twats fucking each other can be stored on disk before someone finally gets tired of it. I mean come one, you can only fuck a person so many ways.

    2. Re:Porn Vs Internet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I found that when the person you fuck, fucks someone else it results in the most grevious personal fucking. So in fact the fucking can go on and on!

    3. Re:Porn Vs Internet by AndroidCat · · Score: 2

      If it's R/W, then it could be used to buffer all the incomming spam. (Might need a RAID cluster by 2010.)

      --
      One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
  26. not that amazing by xingix · · Score: 1

    2010--- that's 7 years from now. 7 years ago I was dumbfounded by Pentium 166's with 200MB hard drives. In 2010 1.5Terabytes will be no more impressive than the 4.7GB I can currently burn on my DVD-R/W drive.

    --

    Confucious says: Man who runs behind car gets exhausted.

    // jeku.com

    1. Re:not that amazing by benzapp · · Score: 2

      2010--- that's 7 years from now. 7 years ago I was dumbfounded by Pentium 166's with 200MB hard drives.

      I don't know what it is with youngins today not knowing the history of hard drives. Needless to say, 200 meg hard drives were common with 486's were the dominant process. This was around 1992-1993. When I got a 486 DX/2 66 Dell in 1994, it came with a 360 meg hard drive.

      gigabyte were common by the time Pentium 166's came out in 1996. That same year I got a 1.6 GB western digital that still works to this day. Hell, even my Compaq laptop from that era, 486 DX/2 50, 16 megs of ram, 640x480 256 color screen, and a 340 meg hard drive! This laptop was super high end, nearly $5000 in 1994.

      Technology moves fast, but not that fast. besides, you are making me feel old and I am only 25

      --
      I don't read or respond to AC posts
    2. Re:not that amazing by xingix · · Score: 1

      OK you're right, after I submitted and did more remembering, I remember my friends having 1GB hard drives in '95. But in '92 when we purchased a 486DX/33 it had a 120MB hard drive that was big for its time. Still, 7 years ago we had 1.6GB hard drives. Do you think 1.5TB will be such a big deal in 7 years? I don't think so. We'll have 1TB hard drives in 4-5 years from now.

      --

      Confucious says: Man who runs behind car gets exhausted.

      // jeku.com

    3. Re:not that amazing by xingix · · Score: 1

      By the way, I am young (22)--- that isn't much younger than you, old man ;-)

      --

      Confucious says: Man who runs behind car gets exhausted.

      // jeku.com

    4. Re:not that amazing by Helter · · Score: 2

      I've been noticing that too...

      7 years ago a friend of mine had an 11 Gig hard drive (I remember his exact quote "I can copy *ENTIRE CD's* to my drive"). Now 11 Gigs was impressive as all hell, but it's a far cry from the 200 meg drive the parent poster was claiming.

    5. Re:not that amazing by benzapp · · Score: 2

      Do you think 1.5TB will be such a big deal in 7 years? I don't think so. We'll have 1TB hard drives in 4-5 years from now.

      no, I agree. I think 1000 gigabyte hard disks will be around in five years guaranteed.

      --
      I don't read or respond to AC posts
    6. Re:not that amazing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hard drives seem to double about every year .. so in only 2-3 years (not 4-5) there should be 1TB drives.. you know, if there is enough demand to push them out on the market .. Of course, in 4-5 years, 1TB drives should be common place..

    7. Re:not that amazing by schmink182 · · Score: 1
      In 2010 1.5Terabytes will be no more impressive than the 4.7GB I can currently burn on my DVD-R/W drive.

      Actually, I'm still plenty impressed by a 4.7 GB DVD, considering its bigger than my last hard drive (4 GB).

    8. Re:not that amazing by NineNine · · Score: 2

      I know that I'm not the oldest one here, but I'm probably relatively old... I'm still gateful for hard drives. I probably had 4-5 PC's before I got one with a "hard drive". It was pretty amazing to have a 10 meg hard drive (that's almost 30 5 1/4 disks!!! wow!!)

    9. Re:not that amazing by Blkdeath · · Score: 2
      Ok you're right, after I submitted and did more remembering, I remember my friends having 1GB hard drives in '95. But in '92 when we purchased a 486DX/33 it had a 120MB hard drive that was big for its time. Still, 7 years ago we had 1.6GB hard drives. Do you think 1.5TB will be such a big deal in 7 years? I don't think so. We'll have 1TB hard drives in 4-5 years from now.

      Based on the proportionality the computer industry seems to maintain, hard drive capacity will, in all likelyhood, outstripe removeable media capacity by atleast ten-fold.

      Right now I can burn 4.7 (or, I believe, 9.4) GB onto a single disc. I can also purchase a single hard disk drive that will hold 200GB. That's more than twenty times the storage capacity.

      Following that (grossly over-simplified) logic, by the time I can store 1.5TB on a single disc, my hard drive will hold a modest 30-60TB.

      While the notion of RAID'ing a group of 5 30TB hard disk drives sounds way more than phoenominal today, it'll most likely be fairly common-place in a decade.

      I'm not sure if the content and magnitude of growth of knowledge/information we have will grow at the rate of technology, so it's difficult to say whether we'd need "Data Centres" in the not-so-distant future, or if the network server will be a standard ATX (or equivalent at the time) case sitting under somebody's desk.

      Then again, if full-motion 3D imaging comes to pass as a commonplace technology (hard to envision, what with regular video conferencing being so niche (ie; not mainstream), we could see requirements for fields upon fields of 100PB storage arrays.

      --
      BD Phone Home!

      Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.

    10. Re:not that amazing by Blkdeath · · Score: 2
      7 years ago a friend of mine had an 11 Gig hard drive (I remember his exact quote "I can copy *ENTIRE CD's* to my drive"). Now 11 Gigs was impressive as all hell, but it's a far cry from the 200 meg drive the parent poster was claiming.

      7 years ago? As in 1995-1996? Your friend must have had a pretty decent source of income to purchase such an astronomically large drive.

      --
      BD Phone Home!

      Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.

    11. Re:not that amazing by Glonoinha · · Score: 1

      Based on the proportionality the computer industry seems to maintain, hard drive capacity will, in all likelyhood, outstripe removeable media capacity by atleast ten-fold.

      Translation : regardless of how large removable media backup devices become, you home users will never, ever be able to back up your home systems to removable media.

      Floppy disks hold 1.44M? Your hard drive is going to be 60M
      CD-ROMs hold 650M? Your home drive array is going to be 180G.
      UberDisk holds 1.5T? Your home server farm is going to consist of 60TB.

      The computers of tomorrow do not particularly excite me, they merely make me hungry for tomorrow's computers of tomorrow. Now THOSE excite me.

      --
      Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
    12. Re:not that amazing by Helter · · Score: 2

      It was early '96 if I recall correctly, and his father had gotten it through some amazingly fortuitous circumstances for a good price. I think I had an 800 Meg HD at the time.
      Considering that I was still running Windows 3.11 (I was morally opposed to Windows '95) still, it was more than enough.

    13. Re:not that amazing by spike+hay · · Score: 2


      CD-ROMs hold 650M? Your home drive array is going to be 180G.


      Not necessarily. When CD drives first became commonplace, they were much larger than HDs. However, this is still going to be much smaller than hard disks in ten years. HDs should be around 50 terabytes by then.

      --
      If you don't understand any of my sayings, come to me in private and I shall take you in my German mouth.
  27. Nice to see the correct name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That is precisely the sort of errant pedantry up with which I will not put

  28. Unified Paranoid Theory by CatWrangler · · Score: 2
    This is just what Big Brother needs. Cheap mass storage to collect info from you will be a breeze now. Electronic sniffing noses, spy cams, facial recognition software, the Total Information Awareness project will all join together to track every thing about you, and store it on disc.

    1000 hours of film footage of you, plus every transaction you have made with credit card, through paper work, and what have you, will all be put on one of these bad boys, and tin foil is not going to help.

    --

    ---
    When you come to a fork in the road, take it! --Yogi Berra--

    1. Re:Unified Paranoid Theory by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wired Mag had an interesting take on this. If a camera is in the public space it should be publicly avalible to all. If we can watch the watchers...

    2. Re:Unified Paranoid Theory by Captain+Nitpick · · Score: 1
      This is just what Big Brother needs. Cheap mass storage to collect info from you will be a breeze now. Electronic sniffing noses, spy cams, facial recognition software, the Total Information Awareness project will all join together to track every thing about you, and store it on disc.

      Yeah, and the hard part of this won't be installing a smart tracking system capable of autonomously watching everyone 24/7, but finding portable media big enough to store the data.

      Here's $0.50, buy a clue.

      --
      But then again, I could be wrong.
  29. I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by Junior+J.+Junior+III · · Score: 2

    I wonder how much one of these things will cost? Considering I could probably buy one and not fill it up for like 10 years, I'm curious as to how this technology will be viable, at least in the home user market. It'll be great for big IT department backups, though.

    --
    You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
    1. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by Noehre · · Score: 1

      7 years ago you were trying to fill your 1GB hard drive drive.

      Something tells me in another 7 years you won't have problems filling 1.5TB.

    2. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by glwtta · · Score: 2
      mirc
      kernel.org
      kazaa lite
      sourceforge
      edonkey
      video capture

      have fun filling up that hard drive...

      oh, and you'll probably need on of these soon

      --
      sic transit gloria mundi
    3. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by El+Puerco+Loco · · Score: 2

      i never even filled my 20gb drive. and i had 3 operating systems and an impressive collection of pr0n and mp3s on it. unless you do digital video editing, you probably won't ever need anything larger than 40gb. at least until the next version of windows and office comes out.

    4. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by DrEldarion · · Score: 2

      I remember when I was a kid and saw an ad for a 540MB hard drive and thought to myself, "How on earth would it be possible to fill that up?".

      Now I have single files that are larger than that.

      Imagine a nice 3200x2400 lossless-compression movie. Or being able to store all your MP3s in lossless-compression audio.

      By 2010, 1.5TB isn't going to seem nearly as large as it does now.

      -- Dr. Eldarion --

    5. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by eggstasy · · Score: 2

      Let's put it this way.
      When recordable CDs came out, I backed up my entire floppy-based game collection to one.
      Games have been using multiple CDs for a while now, I expect them to use multiple DVDs a few years from now. And you know it won't really be 1.5TB... They said DVDs could hold 34 gigs, then they said 17, then they said 9, and sadly what most people have are 4 gig DVDs...

    6. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by Helter · · Score: 2

      Then why is my 200 GB of storage almost full?

    7. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by timmyf2371 · · Score: 1
      you probably won't ever need anything larger than 40gb

      I beg to differ. Lets say you have a music collection of 100 CDs, and a DVD collection of maybe 30 DVDs. 30 DVDs would run to over 100GB, and the CDs would come to 5GB encoded at 160kbps. Coupled with an ever-growing collection of media, there is no maximum amount of hard drive that we would need.

      This is, of course, assuming that we are able to exercise our fair use rights and make backups of DVDs and CDs to our computers.

      Tim

      --

      Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
    8. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by mark_lybarger · · Score: 1

      impressive collection of pr0n and mp3's

      sorry, but lt 20GB is not an impressive collection. and to boot, you're bragging about having 40GB of free space? there's a reason best buy has the spindles of cdr's for 4.99$ all the time. out with the old and in with the new. go ahead, get on gnutella/morpheous/etc, etc and grab more music/video of your favorite genre, everyone else is doing it! it's the kewl thing to do.

    9. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by AndroidCat · · Score: 1

      Just install Windows 2010.

      --
      One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
    10. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by El+Puerco+Loco · · Score: 2

      your pr0n-fu is obviously better than mine.

    11. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by discovercomics · · Score: 1

      Yeah I know Every body and his brother have different needs but I have 106 gigs of music of which 40 gigs is of Bob Dylan, I am typical? No, (most of that dylan was aquired on a dialup connection) 24 7 365 dial up connection and they never complained. Add in Video archived from my ReplayTV and I am fast running out of room even with 160 Gig + 80 gig 1.5TB Back up device would be very welcome Right now I'm archiving on 4.7 Gig DVD R Previously I was Archiving MP3's on CDR

    12. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I wouldn't even call a 20GB collection of porn impressive. Now, 200GB, you're starting to talk some serious numbers.

    13. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Isn't it 5.4GB per layer, with two layers per side, and two sides per disc?

    14. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by xingix · · Score: 1

      This is because the 4.7GB DVD-RW drives out there use one layer on one side. Some DVD movies use 2 layers on 2 sides, making the 4.7GB = 4.7 * 4 = 18.8GB which is around what was originally predicted from what I remember.

      --

      Confucious says: Man who runs behind car gets exhausted.

      // jeku.com

    15. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by Blkdeath · · Score: 2
      i never even filled my 20gb drive. and i had 3 operating systems and an impressive collection of pr0n and mp3s on it. unless you do digital video editing, you probably won't ever need anything larger than 40gb. at least until the next version of windows and office comes out.

      I've come pretty close to filling my 80GB Western Digital that resides in my server, and the 20GB and 40GB that make up my workstation are getting pretty close to filled based on;

      • Medal Of Honor: Allied Assault
      • MechWarrior 4: Vengeance
      • Max Payne
      • Need For Speed III
      • Oni
      • Soldier Of Fortune Platinum
      • Soldier Of Fortune II: Double Helix
      • Return To Castle Wolfenstein
      • WarCraft III
      • WarCraft II
      • Star Trek: Armada 2

      With more coming (Comanche 4, Silent Hill 2, Hitman 2: Silent Assault, etc) as soon as I upgrade my video card. That's not to mention the fact that I've got;

      • Windows XP
        • Microsoft Office 2000
        • Corel Office 2002
      • Windows 2000
      • Gentoo 1.2
        • KDE 3.0.5a
        • OpenOffice 1.0.1
        • VMWare
        • Windows 98SE
        • Windows 2000
        • SuSE 8.0

      Gentoo 1.4

      FreeBSD 4.7

      installed presently. Video editing does eat up a lot of space, but there are probably dozens of reasons why a person would require large amounts of storage capacity. A friend of mine with 30GB worth of MP3s, another friend with several game CD images stored on his drive (he hates hunting for the CDs), a colleague who runs a recording studio and deals with raw, uncompressed digital audio, etc. etc.

      The 15GB drive in my laptop is getting a bit brimming right now, since I have to have three operating systems and a lot of data (network maps/plans, company information, images, price lists, development tools, etc.).

      --
      BD Phone Home!

      Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.

    16. Re:I still haven't filled my 60GB HDD... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i had 3 operating systems and an impressive collection of pr0n and mp3s on it.

      If it's on that little space, I doubt it would be impressive. I've got a 15 gig collection, and, according to my friends, it=teh sukc. :-p

  30. dvds? by v(*_*)vvvv · · Score: 1

    So we will STILL be stuck with DVDs in 2010?

    I can imagine getting a 500 in 1 hollywood DVD collection off the streets of HK :D

  31. DVD technology? by tandr · · Score: 2, Interesting

    More importantly, they claim that this will be backwards compatible to existing DVD technology

    But wait a sec... with which DVD it will be compatible? DVD-R ? DVD-RAM? DVD-RW? DVD+RW? There are more then enough DVD-xxx technologies already, and if rate of creating new ones will be the same, I think in 7 years they will have at least 3-5 new more to choose from!

    1. Re:DVD technology? by wirelessbuzzers · · Score: 1

      There are more then enough DVD-xxx technologies already...

      ... and from some of the above posts, it's precisely XXX that people will be putting on these DVDs...

      --
      I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
    2. Re:DVD technology? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      But wait a sec... with which DVD it will be compatible? DVD-R ? DVD-RAM? DVD-RW? DVD+RW?

      No, dumbass. It will be compatible with DVD, like it says. You know, the silver or gold shiny discs that look like CDs, but have movies on them?

  32. put it in perspective by Slashdotess · · Score: 1

    put it in perspective:
    before cd-rom's came out there were no mp3s, no video, no 3d games.. if someone told you you could hold 600 megs in your hand you'd have probably said the same thing here.

    i don't know what's to come, but i'm sure someone will find a good use for it

    1. Re:put it in perspective by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i don't know what's to come, but i'm sure someone will find a good use for it.

      Say it with me now!!!

      <Homer>Sooooooo... much... porn! [drooling]<Homer>

  33. Great... by Queelix · · Score: 1

    When can I get the 'Back to the Future Trilogy' on one of these? Sincerely, /. Nerd

    1. Re:Great... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      February, 2010

  34. What happened to Constellation 3D? by agallagh42 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    There was a company called Constellation 3D that was supposed to have something called a Fluorescent Multilayer Disc (FMD) with capacity in the Terabyte range.

    You'll notice that their website no longer exists. It did stink of vapourware from the beginning, but I had a glimmer of hope that it would become something. Here is the most recent press release I could find on the subject, but it's from early 2001.

    They said they'd have their terabyte discs out "within a year or two". Oh well, I guess I'll have to wait until 2010 now...

    --
    Carpe Cerevisi - Seize the Beer
    1. Re:What happened to Constellation 3D? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That or it was silently bought and shelved by some big media conglomerate.

    2. Re:What happened to Constellation 3D? by WaxParadigm · · Score: 1

      Yah, I once owned stock in that company and later (after losing my ass) I tried to keep up with what was going on there. They had working prototypes and were supposed to have already released the first driver (read and write, what a concept to release both at the same time). Their prototypes were verified to be able to read 24MB/s or something like that (over the rate for HDTV 1080i regardless).

      They had deals with WAMO (warner advanced media operations) who helped make DVD happen, deals with high-volume makers of CD/DVD media (to make the FMD media in bulk).

      It was truly looking promising a while ago. I would LOVE to know what happened to them...they just stopped putting out press releases, etc. They were having some cash problems...but it appeared to me they were getting the additional backing they needed.

      What a shame.

  35. 2010? by Rew190 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Not until 2010? 7 years is a long time. Shouldn't that amount of space be pretty much commonplace by that point anyhow? Sure, it sounds like a lot now, but somehow I don't think that number will be at all impressive in 7 years.

    I imagine that if one of these gets scratched you're gonna lose a whole lotta data unless it has some sweet error correction going for it.

    1. Re:2010? by NegativeK · · Score: 1

      I imagine that if one of these gets scratched you're gonna lose a whole lotta data unless it has some sweet error correction going for it.

      See, that's where you're wrong. The actual disks are about the size of your bed, so if you scratch it, not much is lost at all. >=)

      --
      This statement is false.
  36. Divx;) and 1.5Tb by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That what about 253846.15 minutes of video using Divx:)

    110 253846.15
    ___ _________
    650 1500000

    WOW THATS A LOT OF PORN!

  37. LOTR 3 in 1 by Scrameustache · · Score: 3, Funny
    So the LOTR extended footage 3-in-1 complete story on one DVD is due out in 2010 then? Damn...7 more years to wait!

    --

    You can't take the sky from me...

    1. Re:LOTR 3 in 1 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's okay, they still have to design the combination seat/intravenous feeding unit/human waste receptacle that all the LOTR users will have to use so they can watch the entire thing nonstop from start to finish without dying.

    2. Re:LOTR 3 in 1 by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      Never flown trans-Pacific, huh? Sitting in one chair for 12 hours is no picnic, but it's not that big a deal. Fifteen to Sydney is a hike, and 16 from Hong Kong to New York is no fun. But it's doable.

      --

      I write in my journal
  38. LOTR Full Set by Aggrazel · · Score: 3, Funny

    WOW! 1.5 TB!

    That ought to be just enough to hold the LotR collectors edition with all 3 special editions, all 3 regular editions, and 56.2 hours of special footage detailing every aspect of every actors life, and every thought that went through Peter Jackson's head in the last 12 years (not to mention, Sean Astin's 6 hours of bitching about how his hobbit sized underwear kept riding up while filming) all on ONE DVD! In both Widescreen and Fullscreen formats!

    Awesome!

    1. Re:LOTR Full Set by AndroidCat · · Score: 2

      Due to the success of LOTR, by 2010 they'll probably have shot the second trilogy. :^)

      --
      One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
    2. Re:LOTR Full Set by MarkLR · · Score: 1

      Actually, if they used Tolkien's writings on the First or Second Ages of Middle-Earth as it's basis, a prequel trilogy wouldn't suck.

    3. Re:LOTR Full Set by AndroidCat · · Score: 2

      I was kidding. Using the Silmarillion for movies would take some .. adaptive writing. LOTR was hard enough to bring to the screen without butchering the story.

      --
      One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
    4. Re:LOTR Full Set by mcmonkey · · Score: 3, Funny

      But The Silmarillion deals with the history of Middle Earth before the events in the LOTR. So would the current movies actually be 4, 5, and 6 in the series?

      Just don't tell me it turns out Sauron is Frodo's father.

      I said, DON'T TELL ME!!

    5. Re:LOTR Full Set by Zeinfeld · · Score: 2
      Actually, if they used Tolkien's writings on the First or Second Ages of Middle-Earth as it's basis, a prequel trilogy wouldn't suck.

      Or if they were to look at the nothern mythologies on which they were based. Tolkein madee no secret of the fact that he took ideas from those sources. One of the motivations for the books in the first place was to get people interested in them.

      Tolkein was disgusted with 'that bloody ignoramous' Hitler for hijacking the Norther heritage for his own political ends, he correctly realised that Hitler would pollute many of the symbols he appropriated.

      There is no reason that the Silmarilion etc could not be made into workable movies. After all The Bond movies have done perfectly well using short stories, not that they are based on Flemming's books any longer.

      --
      Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
      Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
    6. Re:LOTR Full Set by AndroidCat · · Score: 2
      Imagine a Beowulf cluster of .. Beowulf! :^)

      over Xmas I reread the Simillarion. I can't see tieing together the various tales in that book into a coherent set of movies. There's some good stuff that could be expanded, but that would take "creative writing", and I'm not sure that I'd like to see that done, even if it had the blessing of Christopher Tolkien. (Almost a week without computers or Internet, not even any spam, yaaargh! Today I start on the telephone/voice interface to email, never again! Injury a buttocks culture of voice recognition software!)

      --
      One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
  39. Other predictions for 2010 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    AGP 64x
    16gb 8xRAM
    50 GHz IA-128 Processors
    802.11 X
    Affordable QGA Graphics
    Paddlium for linu

    1. Re:Other predictions for 2010 by Glonoinha · · Score: 1

      And Doom IV running on this at about 7 fps. =)

      --
      Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
  40. Backwards compatible? by debilo · · Score: 1

    More importantly, they claim that this will be backwards compatible to existing DVD technology.

    Who's to say what we will be using in 10 years? When it comes to storage, I wish they'd focus on reliability, performance and something to replace hard drives with, rather than on compatibility. Honestly. If they managed to come up with something fast, reliable and highly performant to get away from hard drives, I'd pay little attention to compatibility to existing devices.

  41. but... but... but... by Jafafa+Hots · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I don't WANT more on DVDs. I want bigger HARD DRIVES.

    Thing is, I don't want to have hundreds of stupid little plastic discs in their stupid little plastic boxes lining shelves in my place.

    Thats why I ripped all my CDs to my hard drive and hooked my comp. to my stereo. I listen to stuff I never bothered to before because it was a pain going through all my 1000+ CDs.

    I want to store all my DVDs on my HD for the same reason. But I cant as it is!

    Give us 50,000 TB hard drives FIRST (what comes after tera??)

    --
    This space available.
    1. Re:but... but... but... by WetCat · · Score: 2, Informative

      PB - Peta Bytes.

      (no relation to PETA which is animal rights group).

    2. Re:but... but... but... by saintan · · Score: 0

      I completely agree... but that's just not how this industry works... they want us to keep switching formats to keep this capitalist machine going... it would be less profitable for "them" to release such a higher capacity drive so that all we have to do is plug it into our raid array and let it rebuild rather than entice us to copy all our data to hard drive ->cd ->bigger hard drive -> dvd -> even bigger hd -> even bigger dvd -> and so on... its all about the $$$$

      --
      ****--- A fortune cookie once told me the meaning of life...so I ate it. ---****
    3. Re:but... but... but... by glwtta · · Score: 2

      tera -> peta -> exa -> zetta -> yotta

      --
      sic transit gloria mundi
    4. Re:but... but... but... by Helter · · Score: 2

      As removable media becomes larger and larger the need for a hard drive becomes less and less.

      So you have your entire CD collection on your HD, why not have it all on one DVD? As long as the thing is rewritable what's the difference? Realistically, unless HDs improve at a drastic rate (which they probably will) I really don't see much of a reason to keep them. I'd much rather have a computer the runs off of removable drives (remember back when you had the OS on a 5.25 inch disk?) rather than a hard drive anyway. Want to dual boot? Just image another DVD with a different operating system. Want to store your entire CD collection in a lossless format? Just put it on a disk and keep on adding as you get more music.
      Not to mention it would make migrating to a new PC so much easier.

      Really, I've got 200 GB of HD space in my house (mostly full), but I'd trade it all for some GOOD, RELIABLE rewritable disks like I just described.

    5. Re:but... but... but... by EReidJ · · Score: 1

      Ooooooooh. PETA Bites... no end of fun we could have with this one...

    6. Re:but... but... but... by ryanvm · · Score: 2

      I don't WANT more on DVDs. I want bigger HARD DRIVES.

      Where are you going to back up all this data? That's what these big ass DVDs are for.

      Thing is, I don't want to have hundreds of stupid little plastic discs in their stupid little plastic boxes lining shelves in my place.

      Again, if you have 1.5 TB DVD's you aren't going to have hundreds of little plastic discs laying everywhere. That's what you have now.

    7. Re:but... but... but... by v(*_*)vvvv · · Score: 1

      I'd definitely recommend MO drives for someone like you... they are main stream in Japan.

      At one point I had all my stuff on MOs until they started getting too small for my needs (640MB per disk). Now they have GigaMO's but a bit pricy.

      It is aweful having lots of disks floating around. That is when I shifted towards using an external HD (120G). But if everything fits on one disk or a couple, then removable is extremely convenient :)

    8. Re:but... but... but... by Helter · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yeah, I need the best of both worlds. Huge amounts of space, easily rewritable, AND removable/reliable.

      Until that arrives I'll stick to the combination of HD and removable media, but I'm waiting...

      Incidentally, if/when this happens it'll also require a dramatic shift if OS design. To have the installed OS act generic you would probably have to have the hardware abstraction layer stored in the hardware, instead of in the OS system data. That way I could just pop my disks into any computer I wanted and use it just like it was mine.

    9. Re:but... but... but... by InfoVore · · Score: 2
      I don't WANT more on DVDs. I want bigger HARD DRIVES.

      Don't worry too much about it. Hard Drive capacity seems to be doubling approximately every 12 months, while the price seems to be holding constant.

      If that holds true, then when the new 1.5TB MegaDVDs are released, you should be able to pick up a 10TB hard drive for around $100 retail. (Calculation: 2^7=128, 128*80GB=10TB. $80GB HD today costs about $100).

      A bit below the 50,000TB you want, but you will only need to wait another 12 years for that. Perhaps sooner, since all these doubling trends seem to be accelerating.

      Of course, some of us don't want TB class DVDs or HDs... we want terabytes of solid-state memory. Holographic storage crystals would fit the bill nicely.

      I.V.

      --
      "These laws they're passing won't even compile anymore, let alone execute." - anon
    10. Re:but... but... but... by Salamander · · Score: 2
      Where are you going to back up all this data? That's what these big ass DVDs are for.

      No, that's what tapes are for. Writable optical random-access media happen to do well for short-term backups (they don't have the shelf-life for long-term) but it's not really what they're *for*.

      --
      Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
    11. Re:but... but... but... by /dev/trash · · Score: 2

      I'd rather have one DVD to hold all my data ( actually two, redundancy ya know) than one HDD with movable parts.

    12. Re:but... but... but... by JayJay.br · · Score: 1

      Just FYI, what comes after tera is petabyte (PB), or 10^15 bytes.

      I just can't wait until the googlebyte HD comes out!

    13. Re:but... but... but... by ryanvm · · Score: 2

      No, that's what tapes are for. Writable optical random-access media happen to do well for short-term backups (they don't have the shelf-life for long-term)

      1) Big tape drives are slow and very expensive. Most home users don't do tape backups.

      2) Tapes are absolutely not good long-term storage. They use magnetic recording and the signals will fade. Granted, in it's current incarnation CD-RW won't hold up in the long term either, but at least the technology has some potential. Magnetic media will never be an acceptable long term solution.

    14. Re:but... but... but... by Jafafa+Hots · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Migrating to a new PC is no problem. I have 2 HDs, one 180 gig for media, and the other for the system.
      I just pop out the media drive and put it in my new system.

      And that way I don't have to dig around in a stack trying to find the right piece of removable media. Everything is on line all the time. So as I lie in bed I can use my remote to cue up any one of over 10k tracks of music.

      I like neatness. Everything self-contained in a little machine. Everything instantly accessible online. I HATE swapping discs, I HATE having CD shelves.

      I HATE having media which has no need of being wedded to a physical format being FORCED to be. I want the MUSIC, I don't want a chunk of plastic.

      --
      This space available.
    15. Re:but... but... but... by Jafafa+Hots · · Score: 2

      I have it all backed up on another HD, stuck away in a safe place. True, I could use the writable DVD to back it up, but it would probably be slower, and my bet is the new flavor DVD, if writable, will come with some form of copy management system.

      --
      This space available.
    16. Re:but... but... but... by Salamander · · Score: 2
      Big tape drives are slow and very expensive.

      It's not too hard to find a modern tape drive for about three hundred bucks that will sustain 2 MB/s (equivalent to 12x) and store 20GB per cartridge (equivalent to 30 CD-Rs). That hardly seems to fit your image of "slow and very expensive".

      Most home users don't do tape backups.

      Utterly irrelevant. The reason has more to do with the convenience of random access (which, I admit, is a compelling feature) than anything we're talking about.

      Tapes are absolutely not good long-term storage.

      Please, study the work done by professional archivists and such. Manufacturer's claims are worthless. When we're talking about home users, "ideal conditions" studies are almost as bad. From what I've seen, the life expectancy of a CD-R under typical conditions is about two years; for tape it's two to five. CD-RW and all flavors of writable DVD are even less durable.

      All that said, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with using optical media for backup. I do so myself. What I said is that it's not what they're *for* - i.e. not *designed* for. CD and DVD formats were designed for distribution, and recordable versions originally for copying, but backup is neither of those. MO is actually the most durable type of storage that's anywhere near affordable (ion-beam-etched nickel plates don't count) and could be said to've been designed for backup, but media are expensive and I don't think that's what you were talking about.

      Hmmm. I wonder why there's no MO tape. Seems like it'd be extremely durable with a reasonable media cost. Maybe nobody's come up with a flexible MO material/coating.

      --
      Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
    17. Re:but... but... but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I can't waiting until 64-bit is too small and
      we need to look at 128bit! What after that
      256-bit? Has anyone even thought about 256-bit?

    18. Re:but... but... but... by dildatron · · Score: 2

      Damn you are lazy! do you HATE typing?

      --


      If you had nuts on your chin, would they be chin nuts?
    19. Re:but... but... but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      yotta? ::dances back and forth:: oh, sorry, I though you said YATTA!

    20. Re:but... but... but... by Jafafa+Hots · · Score: 2

      not lazy. I just hate STUFF. Clutter. Possessions. Hate them.
      I hate our consumer culture where owning physical things is considered success. I see the need to own as a sickness.

      I want only my clothes and my PC. Maybe a blanket.

      --
      This space available.
    21. Re:but... but... but... by spike+hay · · Score: 2

      I would much rather have a better hard drive than a better optical drive. I HATE hard drives. They are slow, unreliable, and get corrupted all of the time. We need a better solution than this. Perhaps mram (very fast and non volatile, but somehow I doubt it will have the storage capacities to be used for anything more than ram) or holographic storage. (Very fast, large capacity)

      As for chips, I hope that by '10 or '15 we'll have multi-core spintronic processors to speed up Quake 5.

      --
      If you don't understand any of my sayings, come to me in private and I shall take you in my German mouth.
    22. Re:but... but... but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't worry about 256 bit addressing being necessary. 2^256 bits of memory would require more atoms than there are in the galaxy, even at one atom per bit.

  42. HDTV compatible DVD players? by El+Puerco+Loco · · Score: 2

    this could be cool, it would allow uncompressed 1080p video and uncompressed sound too. hopefully there will be players and TV sets capable of taking advantage of this by that time.

    1. Re:HDTV compatible DVD players? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually, the plans I have seen call for HDVD's at 1000 lines resolution, followed by VeryHDVD's at 2000 lines, and probably ending with UltraHDVD's at 4000 lines. The human eye can theoretically resolve 5000 lines, but it might be 20 more years before you can buy a UHDVD at nearly that quality for $20. So I guess that IMAX or better quality on 1 DVD will take up about 160 GB.

      Front projectors can already handle HDTV, with screen sizes of 4 to 30 feet diagonal or more, up to 1600 x 1200 currently, and resolutions will increase to handle higher format sources as they become available. HDVD will probably kill off any remaining movie theaters. VHDVD will be the end for sure, unless they offer 3D or some other gimmick. You can already get better surround sound in your home than most theaters will ever offer.

  43. Yes, but will it be recordable? by jridley · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm sure a lot of people see this and say "Finally, I'll be able to back up in a reasonable way!" but it needs to be recordable.

    Even current DVDs are only recordable in one layer. You can't record directly to multiple layers, you have to master two layers separately and then wafer them together in the manufacturing process.

    While a > 1TB disc is a cool idea, if it's only usable on commercially duplicated, mass-distributed data, it's of very, very limited use.

    1. Re:Yes, but will it be recordable? by terrymr · · Score: 2

      Pre-recorded dvd's aren't recorded at all they're pressed like vinyl records and cd's. Then the layers are sandwiched together.

    2. Re:Yes, but will it be recordable? by Lord+Jester · · Score: 1

      But, chew on this...

      Can you imagine how long a burn would take. Fastest DVD-R is currently about 2.4x.

      1.5 TB is equivelent to 2307692.31 650 MB CDs. With at ~2x (30min per 650 MB) is about 69230769.3 minutes or about 131.627 years.

      I think we'll reach the MTBF long before we finish.

    3. Re:Yes, but will it be recordable? by SectoidRandom · · Score: 2

      Err, even if we assume as you did that the pace of technology will stand still over the next 7 years, you seem to have missed the fact that when it comes to the "[something]x" speed measurements on DVD's, a 1x DVD-R drive is equivalent to I think 20xCD-R. So your figures are a little off..

      Considering also the standard CD-R now is 52x with DVD's not far behind, well enough said..

    4. Re:Yes, but will it be recordable? by Lord+Jester · · Score: 1

      Doh!!!

      Guess there is too much rum in the eggnog.

      Left off a few zeros in my computation.

      It isn't as bad as I had first posted. Only 48 days will be needed. (131 years is if it took 30 min to write 650 bytes.)

      *hangs head in shame*

  44. I beg to differ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If that were true, there would be no need to buy more than one magazine, or download a couple of photos. Porn gets old faster than milk goes bad.

    Porn is the lie - the promise of intimacy with no substance behind it. We always want more/new porn because the old never satisfies. Sadly, the new porn doesn't satisfy either and we just get deeper and deeper into the vortex.

    You can break free from the tyranny and find hope. http://www.provenmen.org

    1. Re:I beg to differ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Truth: 5
      Presentation: 0 :P~

  45. oh, thanks a lot by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 5, Funny

    supposed to deliver a 1.5 TB (that's a terabyte and a half)

    This reminds me of a quote from an old Sports Night episode. They were talking about Mt. Everest, I think.

    Guy #1: "Twenty-nine thousand feet. Can you imagine how high that is?"

    Guy #2: "It's 29,000 feet."

    Guy #1: "Yeah, but you've got to put it in perspective. Compare it to something you can visualize."

    Guy #2: (beat) "It's 29,000 rulers."

    Thanks for the clarification, guys.

    --

    I write in my journal
  46. How sensitive... by Anonymous+CowWord · · Score: 0

    ... will these disks be? the current dvds already cram so much that even a small scratch (which wouldn't damage a CD) could render the dvd useless.

    With 1.5TB on it, every square mm. will hold lots of info. A small scratch could render GB's useless.. thats a lot of data...

    --


    Disclaimer: My opinions are my own and do not, in any way, reflect the opinions of my employer or university.
    1. Re:How sensitive... by saintan · · Score: 0

      this must be a terrorist plot to give us geeks heart attacks! i get a grey hair every time i see a cd/dvd lying around face down on someones coffee table or car seat... if i ever saw a 1.5 TB disk out of case...i might just die...

      --
      ****--- A fortune cookie once told me the meaning of life...so I ate it. ---****
    2. Re:How sensitive... by F34nor · · Score: 1

      Um... geeks. Guess what? You could devote some of that space to error correction and redundancy.

  47. so what by Zed2K · · Score: 1

    If the dvd group doesn't approve it for use noone will be able to use it anyways...can you say vapor ware???

  48. what? by BarrettAnderson · · Score: 2, Insightful

    BY 2010, according to senior Intel architects, a CPU will have processing power equivalent to the brain of a bumble bee

    now that was random...

    1. Re:what? by freestyle-fiend · · Score: 0

      The word 'random' means occuring at haphazard, or without aim. It was misused here.

      An example of something that is random is this post.

    2. Re:what? by BarrettAnderson · · Score: 1

      i am sorry, but you're an idiot. It most certainly was random. It had nothing to do with the rest of the article, hence "without aim" - they weren't aiming towards the article, so there was no aim.

  49. Re:Okay.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I remember when everyone thought they were cool because hard drives were about to get as big as a terabyte!

    then i turned on my PC from the future and stunned them all with my yottabyte drive.

  50. compatible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Will these 1.5TB dvds be able to burn in my shinny new DVD+R burner from phillips?

  51. Bah! by Strange+Ranger · · Score: 3, Funny


    Can't fool me. If they were serious they'd have said 1.44 TB.

    --

    Operator, give me the number for 911!
  52. Re:Okay.... by Helter · · Score: 2

    I remember when geeks weren't cool, no matter WHAT size their hard drive was.

  53. Bumble bees do not sting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They are like the cows of the bee community. They're furry, docile, and are content to spend all day pollinating, which is an important role in the natural order of things. You can pet bumble bees as they're pollinating flowers. All they normally do is sort of kick at your finger with their hind legs. :) In my experience you have to really, really piss a bumble bee off before it will even consider stinging you. Basically the only time you ever have to be worried about bumble bees is if you threaten their nest.

    Now, wasps and hornets on the other hand .. *shudder*

    1. Re:Bumble bees do not sting by Buck2 · · Score: 1

      Where did this post come from?

      You can pet bumble bees as they're pollinating flowers. All they normally do is sort of kick at your finger with their hind legs. :)

      You sound like an incredibly nice person. Petting bumble bees and thinking of them as little cows helping nature along.

      Are you like a saint or something?

      --

      As my father lik@(munch munch)... ....
    2. Re:Bumble bees do not sting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, at least bumble bees are cute. So fat and fuzzy.

  54. IS? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    The consortium of three universities and four Japanese companies is investing $25M into a project,
    ARE investing! I find increasingly frustrating that more and more people are unable to conjugate verbs correctly. No that's not what's so irritating. It's irritating because those who do it here are slightly smarter than your average moron.

    Cat
    1. Re:IS? by tgrimley · · Score: 1

      The subject of that sentence was consortium, which as you will notice, is singular.

    2. Re:IS? by Anonymous+CowWord · · Score: 0

      Main Entry: consortium Pronunciation: k&n-'sor-sh(E-)&m, -'sor-tE-&m Function: noun Inflected Form(s): plural consortia /-'sor-sh(E-)&, -'sor-tE-&/; also -sortiums

      "consortium" is singular and it should be "is" not "are".

      --


      Disclaimer: My opinions are my own and do not, in any way, reflect the opinions of my employer or university.
    3. Re:IS? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yep, I'm an idiot. I noticed my error about 5 seconds after I posted.

  55. Does that mean... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    we can go back to laser-disc quality video instead of shitty mpeg?!?!?!

    1. Re:Does that mean... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i could be wrong here, but laser-disks wasnt that mpeg-1?

      i realy cant imagine it was uncompressed
      how fast would that disk have to spin????

  56. The won't be running Linux... by wirelessbuzzers · · Score: 1

    ... they'll be running BeeOS.

    *ducks*

    --
    I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
    1. Re:The won't be running Linux... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There's always an Esso Bee in every crowd!

  57. 90 minutes of uncompressed HD video by jeffgreenberg · · Score: 1

    That's right. That's how big it is.

    When you work in Uncompressed 10bit HD, it requires a TB or so for 90 minutes. So, figure you'll get a 2 hour film or so, uncompressed in HD.

    Still not as good as viewing film.

    1. Re:90 minutes of uncompressed HD video by JKR · · Score: 2
      Yes, he's right; HD is ~ 1400 x 1200 (1050 in the US) pixels, and 10 bit resolution means 30 bits for the three channels, YUV (we're in video land here, your RGB don't buy nothing). Therefore, you're looking at

      1400 x 1200 x 30 / 8 = 6 MB

      for a SINGLE FRAME OF HD. Multiply up by 25 or 30 FPS and that's about 0.93 TB for 90 minutes.

      Not so hard, really, now is it? Of course, that is uncompressed...

      Jon

  58. In 10 Years..... by jwilcox154 · · Score: 2, Funny

    It would take that whole disk just to hold the M$ Window$ Installation files.

    1. Re:In 10 Years..... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, but as a bonus, they could list every single bug they knew about in their current OS.

    2. Re:In 10 Years..... by lunaman · · Score: 1

      Yeah but they'd need another 3 discs to list all the bugs they don't know about.

  59. mod parent up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    its tired and the horse is starting to spatter as itss beat, but please mod the parent up somebody

  60. Scratch that by bkruiser · · Score: 1

    I am sure they will have some great anti-scratch technology keeping all of your hdtv home movies safe and secure. Diamond Coated disks rock.

  61. I/O Issue? by vudufixit · · Score: 1

    OK, so how long will it take to spool that data from a hard drive onto that 1 TB disc? And how long will it take to write it? My understanding is that a full DVD takes over an hour to burn, and this is a disc with over 300 times the capacity. That's a loooong burn...

  62. Soundthing sounds wrong? Resolution? by phorm · · Score: 2

    Ummm... something sounds wrong here. A terabyte for 90 minutes of video? Ummm, I'd have to ask - what resolution is that at, and what's the BPS rate for the encoded video? At 10MBps it would imagine it looks pretty damn good, and 10x60x90=54,000MB (36GB). At 100Mbps it's 540Gb. It is roughly a rate of (a little less than) 200MBps, because that's what it would take to be able to use use 1 TB on 90 minutes of movie. That being considered... I know of nothing that plays movies at 200MBps. DVD-ROM's could not spin fast enough... and I think the processor/memory load would be astronomical.

    Also, why would it be better in film when a lot of these movies are starting to be being RECORDED in digital? I'm guessing even the movie studios aren't using hundred-thousands of Terabytes of digital video. Going from a digital medium to an uncompressed digital medium... loss should be low if not null.

    My calculations may be off... but something still sounds fishy about this

    1. Re:Soundthing sounds wrong? Resolution? by Wonko+the+Sane · · Score: 1

      (720*480)pixels*24bits/pixel=8100kilobits/frame

      8100kilobits/frame*30frames/second=30375kilobyte s/ second

      30375kilobytes/second=29.66megabytes/second

      29.66megabytes/second=104.3gigabytes/hour

      These calculations are for raw video data with no overhead. Still, you should be able to get more than 90 minutes of uncompressed video on a terabyte, unless you are using huge resolutions.

    2. Re:Soundthing sounds wrong? Resolution? by phorm · · Score: 2

      Ahh yes. I believe that they do record at rather huge resolutions though, before they dump it down to something TV-friendly. I was calculating as if the were using a (for example) big one like 10240x7680@32bit... but I forgot to multiply for the 30fps (rea..ly sl..ow ex..plo...sions that would be).

      So, you could still get several (almost 15) hours of DVD (at 104.3gb/hour) on the actual presentation DVD. Less at a higher res - or for a large screen - but you should still be able to get more than 90.

      I'm still wondering at what rate those cameras record though... at high res it would still have to get in the >=100MBps area. And for such resolution to be displayed at 100+MBps would be beyond the capabilities of modern players max speed. You'd have a virtual helicopter in your DVD-ROM otherwise... lots of power use too.

    3. Re:Soundthing sounds wrong? Resolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      7 years though...think about what we had 7 years ago. If they can make a 1.5 TB disk in the next 7 years, I would think a drive to read it fast enough wouldn't be too much of a long shot.

  63. New Name? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    7 years down the road and 300x the capacity, surely it won't just be called a DVD. Maybe DVD2, SDVD, or DVD+? Or maybe even an entirely new acronym with no official meaning.

  64. Backward compatibility by Salamander · · Score: 2

    I don't think backward compatibility to current DVD technology is going to count for a lot in 2010 because nobody will be using current DVD technology (for data) by then. Backwards compatibility with Blu-ray, or its successor, or whatever comes along and supplants both five years from now, is what will really matter. Compatibility with a by-then obsolete standard will actually turn out to be a handicap in 2010, and they probably know that, but here in 2002 maybe it helps them get funding.

    --
    Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
    1. Re:Backward compatibility by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes and CD technology was invented in June 1982 and they're no longer in use are they!

      Penicillin was invented in the 1940's and that's not used is it.

      Think before you open your mouth buddy

    2. Re:Backward compatibility by Salamander · · Score: 2

      Here's a clue, "buddy": not all technologies have the same life cycle, and in general tech life cycles have been decreasing. Your apples-and-oranges comparison is utterly worthless, like you.

      --
      Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
  65. Help by limekiller4 · · Score: 2

    prostoalex writes:
    "...that is supposed to deliver a 1.5 TB (that's a terabyte and a half)..."

    Is this for all the people who think that 1.5 means "one and a third"?

    --
    My .02,
    Limekiller
  66. Think of the scratch damage! by dnoyeb · · Score: 4, Insightful

    1 scratch and you can wipe a whole movie! whoopee!

    Essentially less fault tolerant, and less ability to make backup copies.

    Who wants that?

  67. oh come on by servo303 · · Score: 1

    this is absurd. Posting some vapor news about media in 2010. Well, in 2010 the democrats will resume control of the house and senate. Pah.

    --
    "Cats and Dogs living together, Mass Hysteria" - Ghostbusters.
  68. What happened to the 1" cube? by Phoenixhunter · · Score: 1

    Anyone recall the concept of storing about a terabyte in a cube, storing the data in 3 dimensions? Discs are so passe.

  69. Condense the collections... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Cool, when that comes out, I can fit the porn collection on one...er...maybe two discs!

  70. Just in time... by The-Perl-CD-Bookshel · · Score: 1

    For the VaporWare of the year awards!

    --
    I don't keep a lid on my coffee so when I walk around I look busy -me
  71. Great, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    by that time we'll all have 10TB hard drives, and complaining that our backups can't fit on one disk. ;)

  72. Solid state instead? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think we may move to more solid state, non-movable, non-scratchable media by then. Those 128MB usb memory sticks may just turn into 1.5TB sticks by then.

  73. Backwards Compatibility by miketang16 · · Score: 1

    Bah! That's nothing... now forwards compatibility is another story. I'd thoroughly enjoy watching my 1997 DVD-ROM drive say, 1500 GB of used space.

    --
    -------
    "In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
    -- George Orwell
  74. Gigaquad by Esion+Modnar · · Score: 1

    Star Trek sometimes used the term "gigaquad" whatever that is. Sounds big...

    --

    They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
  75. Whatever happened to the Water Drive by Glonoinha · · Score: 1

    I remember something I read about 3-4 years ago about a water polymer that was going to create a 3D cube with 3 lasers, all coming to a point in space within the polymer to either polarize or depolarize that specific point in space ... pretty much a multi-layered physical storage media that used water as a primary component.

    A 1" cube was supposed to hold like 1TB or something insane like that, and it was going to be as fast as the RAM at that time but not need refreshing (so it could also be used as permanent storage.) In my mind it blurred the line between operating memory and storage.

    Did I just imagine it, or has anybody got any insight into the Water Drive?

    --
    Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
    1. Re:Whatever happened to the Water Drive by dachang · · Score: 1

      3D pr0n! Yay!

  76. perhaps less impressive than it sounds by g4dget · · Score: 2

    At current growth rates, I suspect that harddisks will be surpassing that capacity quickly at around that time. So, we'll probably still have disks that are much bigger than DVDs. And that means that 1.5TB DVDs will probably not bee too different from the way DVDs are today: a slighty too small and fairly slow medium for storing data for a few years (since they are not guaranteed to last much longer).

  77. Eight words... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    General failure reading drive C:
    Abort? Retry? Fail?

    Now do you see the problem with a 1.5 TB HDD?

  78. Why wait till 2010? by Eric_Cartman_South_P · · Score: 2
    make love to your frigid wife, baby-sit the kids, wash the dog and the car.

    I'll do all that right now for free! Just pay for the plane ticket and tell the Mrs to slip into something more comfortable. And for the car, one coat or two?

  79. FROM THE ARTICLE (Sc0re:5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    FROM THE ARTICLE - "BY 2010, according to senior Intel architects, a CPU will have processing power equivalent to the brain of a bumble bee. "
    Here - More info on bumble bee

    1. Re:FROM THE ARTICLE (Sc0re:5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      oh, gee, thanks, that was both on-topic and informative, now with your link I know more than I ever wanted about DVDs.

  80. in other news: by theonetruekeebler · · Score: 1
    In other news, 1.5W is a watt and a half. 1.5kJ is a kilojoule and a half and 98.6F is ninety-eight and six tenths degrees Fahrenheit.

    .5C is still half a clue and 2 is equivalent to the number two.

    --
    This is not my sandwich.
  81. FROM THE ARTICLE (Sc0re:5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    FROM THE ARTICLE - "BY 2010, according to senior Intel architects, a CPU will have processing power equivalent to the brain of a bumble bee. "
    Here - More information on bumble bee

  82. I don't want to be the one... by delcielo · · Score: 2

    Oooooh, I don't wanna be the guy that leaves that database backup on the dash of his car.

    --
    Hot Damn! It's the Soggy Bottom Boys!
  83. The Inquirer? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    i'm gonna have to say this article is bullshit. lets not forget who 'The Inquirer' is.. now if some other fine periodical website would like to write up a story on the same thing, then i might be more willing to believe it.

  84. ...1.5TB by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    a 1.5 TB (that's a terabyte and a half)

    o, thats what 1.5 meant....

    I was lost for a short while

  85. The crack will be out before the release in 2005. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    haxor dude.

  86. backwards compatibility by tekunokurato · · Score: 1

    is really, really valuable. Obviously, this means I don't have to buy another LOTR set, I can still use my old DVD one. But will the player cost significantly more due to its ability to play DVDs? With those crazy DVD guys jacking up prices already, do you think they'd lower them to make this device feasible? Probably not.

  87. Here's some info... by WaxParadigm · · Score: 1

    http://www.abiworld.org/headlines/02Dec17.html

    Seems they filed for Chapter 11 this past week.

    C3d should play powerball...it's their last chance. :) $300M would probably help them out, even the lump sum after tax would be good enough to get them out of debt. Guess you could say they already spent the jackpot.

    It will be sad to see them go.

  88. Yes but this is SneakerNet by redcliffe · · Score: 2

    You need a higher capacity sneakernet to fill the 50,000 TB hard drive.

  89. err.. by SectoidRandom · · Score: 2

    That's kinda the idea.. You see at the rate we're going by 2010 hard drives 1TB in size will likely be tiny, that presents many of us here a serious problem, serious as opposed to; "wow, see how much hdtv porn i can store now". That is of course:

    Backups.

    Offline storage has to keep up HD storage for this reason most of all, and with the current exponential price increase with each incremental tape storage size increase, optical technologies like multilayered DVD's look like one of the best possibilities.

  90. Re:Okay.... by Catbeller · · Score: 2

    Geeks are cool? I don't think that is a situation that will long obtain. When the salaries start dropping, the coolness of being PC-bound will abate, sadly.

  91. Maybe, maybe not by Goonie · · Score: 2
    HDTV may have arrived, but whether it's moved in or is just a temporary guest isn't clear.

    At current prices, it'll be quite a while before Joe Sixpack will choose it over a standard TV.

    --

    Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
    --Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
    1. Re:Maybe, maybe not by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      At current prices, it'll be quite a while before Joe Sixpack will choose it over a standard TV.

      Look more closely. Most of the TV's at the local Best Buy have HDTV tuners built in already, and are capable of displaying an HDTV picture. The picture may not be as good as you'd expect, depending on the quality of the tube or projector in the set, but it works.

      I did a little last-minute Christmas shopping yesterday, and I out of my own curiosity I did a quick count. I didn't add up a total, but on each aisle there were more HD-compatible TVs than otherwise, except when I got down to the sub-20-inch models.

      --

      I write in my journal
    2. Re:Maybe, maybe not by ShadowDrake · · Score: 1

      You seem to believe that availability guarantees acceptance. Two flaws in that theory.

      1. People aren't necessarily buying the HDTV-ready sets. It's hard for Joe Sixpack to resist the $99 25-inch set sold in his local low-end electronics warehouse or supermarket, even if it's made in Bourkina Faso and only takes SECAM signals, and the brand name means "Cow Spleen" in some language.

      2. The churn rate on TVs is too low to guarantee widespread adoption in time. For someone with a 1-, 5- or 10-year old set, he's not going to see any impact until they start actually shutting down analogue transmitters. Why should he spend $x00 a second earlier than he has to?

      Bonus reason: Seems to be a bit of uncertainty regarding HDTV around. I was under the impression that they weren't yet certain that today's HDTV tuners would be able to handle tomorrow's HDTV broadcasts. That sort of thinking is going to make people hesitant.

      --
      It's just like a fascist dictatorship, without the punctual rail service!
    3. Re:Maybe, maybe not by Twirlip+of+the+Mists · · Score: 2

      I was under the impression that they weren't yet certain that today's HDTV tuners would be able to handle tomorrow's HDTV broadcasts.

      That's not actually true at all. All the stuff related to HDTV signaling, from picture formats to audio encoding to the 8VSB transmission system, is defined by SMPTE standards. These are the same standards that govern old-fashioned TV. You can have the same degree of confidence in a new HDTV that you had in your old-fashioned TV.

      Does it suck that we're forcing old-fashioned TV's into obsolescence? Yeah, kinda, but it's better than the alternative. And remember that you don't have to buy a new TV. You can get an HD set-top box for $90 today-- prices, of course, will drop over the next couple of years as demand increases-- that lets you watch digital broadcasts on your old-fashioned set. You won't get improved picture or sound, but you will at least get better reception than you get via analog TV today.

      But the digital transition is set in stone; old-style television will cease to exist in the US in 2007. I wouldn't be surprised at all if we started to see PSA's from the FCC starting in the next year or so telling people that old-style TV is going away, and explaining the options.

      --

      I write in my journal
  92. Uses for 1.5 terabyte optical discs by MtViewGuy · · Score: 2

    Right now, there are obvious uses for such a high capacity optical drive, especially if they can produce at the same time a one terabyte re-writeable drive too.

    For a re-writeable drive, one obvious application is personal video recorders (PVR's). Imagine by 2010 instead of recording shows on a TiVo or Replay TV unit on larger and larger hard drives the PVR will only sport a 20-30 gigabyte hard drive to store the program code for the PVR and program indexing information; the actual program itself will be recorded onto re-writeable and removeable 1 TB optical drives that will store nearly 1,000 hours of standard-format digital video or circa 300 hours of 1080i 16:9 uncompressed HDTV video. It is this technology that will finally end the reign of VHS VCR's for good.

    For non-writeable 1.5 TB media, there is one application that needs it now: theatrical quality digital projection of movies. By 2010 digital projectors will have picture quality equivalent to 2000 lines non-interlaced, and that will mean massive storage requirements. Imagine storing the entire movie in uncompressed 2000-line digital projection format on just ONE DVD-sized disc, including multichannel audio in 6-7 languages and 7-8 languages of subtitles! Such a change will make it possible to have true simultaneous worldwide release of theatrical features, and just the savings in shipping costs between a movie on these new digital discs weighing well under half a pound (including the shipping package!) and a 35 mm print that weighs 105 pounds per hour of film is tremendous, to say the least.

    1. Re:Uses for 1.5 terabyte optical discs by alannon · · Score: 2

      A back of dc calculation shows that 2000 * 4000 video at 24fps and 32 bit color depth would work out to about 2.6 TB per hour.

      Throw in some decent compression and a 2 hour movie would squeeze quite comfortably onto a 1.5 TB disc.

  93. Liar by V.P. · · Score: 1

    We won't get those until the year 2525.

  94. Imagine by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    a beowulf cluster of those!

  95. I know your all thinking it.... by Bush_man10 · · Score: 1

    That's a lot of porn one could back up :)

    --
    "I believe in everything in moderation. Including moderation." -Dean DeLeo, Stone Temple Pilots
  96. Will it be consumer technology? by Eric+Green · · Score: 2
    I am aware of two different new optical technologies that are scheduled to hit in the 2nd quarter of next year. The first is a new DVD-RAM technology that is supposed to double the current density, allowing close to 20gb per platter. This one is aimed at the consumer market.

    The second is in a traditional MO form factor, aimed at the archival storage market. The manufacturer claims that this one will hold 20gb per platter too, but has laid out a schedule that will get it to 100gb per platter by 2006, and they feel they can get to 1tb per platter by 2010 by using the multi-layer optical technology. It is altogether feasible to think that they could make a read-only version that would fit 1.5tb on a platter, though obviously they don't intend to do so (since they are a vendor of traditional MO drives).

    In short, while I'm dubious about the 1.5TB claims, they are credible, and the guys in the archival storage industry are going to be *VERY* interested in these guys. Optical media has the ability to be randomly accessed, unlike tapes, but right now is a bit too expensive (at about $63 per 100gb, vs. under $30 per 100gb for LTO tape). But tape technology is approaching its limits, and the new media for the drives coming out in 2003 is supposed to be the same price as the current media, which would halve the price of optical storage. I have not seen tape drives making these kinds of advances recently... the leap to 120gb LTO was more of an extension of the DLT concept to its logical extremes, and there is not much of anywhere to go there. Given the general scuzziness of tape (and as the architect and head designer of a tape backup product I think I'm qualified to talk about tape being scuzzy :-), I applaud the thought that optical media may *FINALLY* be coming down in price to the point where it can be cost-competitive to tape...

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  97. The funny thing... by Eric+Green · · Score: 2
    is that these robber baron "no intervention" types are all so eager to have government intervene -- but only on their own behalf!

    A patent is a government grant of limited monopoly for a particular point in time. Ask these people how they'd feel about there being no government patent enforcement, and then ask them if, having been granted a monopoly by the government, surely government has some interest in making sure said monopoly is not abused?

    Whatever you do, do not get sucked into arguments about "intellectual property". There is no such thing. Ideas cannot be owned. The government can grant a monopoly ("patent") on use of an idea for a limited time, but it is the monopoly, not the idea, that is owned. The whole reason for the Orwellian phrase "intellectual property" is to trick people into believing that ideas can be owned, when there is nothing in the Constitution, U.S. law, or in the history of humanity that supports such an assertation. A patent or copyright (government-granted monopoly rights) can be owned, but the ideas themselves are no more ownable than the notion that "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness." (an idea stated by some crazy commie terrorist sympathizer by the name of "Thomas Jefferson", but no more owned by him than any other idea).

    -E

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  98. The company died, the technology did not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    Plasmon has picked up the multi-layer technology, and is using it to build optical disks in the traditional MO form factor (that will fit into traditional MO jukeboxes, such as those made by Plasmon). They seem confident that they can release a 40gb drive by the 2nd or 3rd quarter of next year, and have rumored a 100gb drive by the end of 2004, and are projecting a 1 terabyte drive by 2010. Plasmon is not a fly-by-night company, and my boss has seen working prototypes of the drives in actual form factor (i.e., not as a bare mechanism hooked up to a boxful of electronics). Most of the engineers from Constellation 3D have moved over to Plasmon and are continuing development, according to my sources.

    Constellation 3D didn't have a chance in hell of producing a 1TB disk in 2001 -- the technology is theoretically capable of it, but they did not have the ability to manufacture such a disk -- but the technology itself is not vaporware, and is in fact workable and on its way to market in the 2nd or 3rd quarter of next year.

  99. Nonsense by Eric+Green · · Score: 2
    Multi-layer disks are no more succeptible to scratch damage than single-layer disks, and the same error-correction codes and protocols work fine. You sound like the guy who said of 1gb hard drives, "Can't be done, why, one head crash would wipe out hundreds of files!". It HAS been done, in case you didn't notice!

    I will also point out that there are companies like Plasmon that have a game plan to create writable optical disks of up to 1TB by 2010 using the same technology. So your notion of it being "hard to back up" is less than apt. So there (pffft!).

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    1. Re:Nonsense by oliverthered · · Score: 1

      .....And when they go, boy do they go.

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    2. Re:Nonsense by dnoyeb · · Score: 2

      " I will also point out that there are companies like Plasmon that have a game plan to create writable optical disks of up to 1TB by 2010 using the same technology. So your notion of it being "hard to back up" is less than apt. So there (pffft!)."

      And their technology will disable DRM?

  100. Great! I'm looking forward to using it... by mtec · · Score: 1

    ...in my flying car.

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  101. 20gb tape drives for $300? No panacea. by Eric+Green · · Score: 2
    If you're talking about the ones I'm thinking of: The average speed of those in actual backups is more like 1mb/sec, not 2mb/sec like you claim, and the average cost per tape is $30. They're not cost-effective, in other words.

    I use a 6-tape DDS-4 DAT changer to back up my network, but that cost considerably more than $300.

    Regarding long-term storage, LTO and DLT are expensive but should be considerably more durable than DAT technology was. LTO is currently the cheapest per-gigabyte archival storage mechanism, storing 120gb of data onto a $35 tape. DVD-RAM disks, wholesale, hold 9.4gb for $5 apiece, meaning that they're nowhere near being cost-competitive. HOWEVER: Tape technology is reaching its limits. Densities have gone up, but the biggest issue is that they're reaching the limits of the physical tape mechanisms -- you can't make the actual tape skinnier to cram more tape into the tape because you're reaching the limits of plastics technology. At the moment they are increasing density by making the tracks skinnier, but they are reaching the physical limits of tape registration (i.e., the tape moves up and down slightly as it passes the head, and the issue is that they are reaching the limits of their ability to control and compensate for this limit). Thus even though linear bit densities can increase somewhat, the primary method used by DLT and LTO to get their amazing capacities (putting more tracks onto the tape and stuffing more tape into the same form-factor cartridges) is reaching the end of physical capability, unless you actually imbed a head in the cartridges -- and at that point you are talking about very expensive cartridges.

    Optical media, on the other hand, has not yet begun reaching its limits, and has the advantage of random access -- useful when you have to actually retrieve data or are writing data incrementally and do not want to have to wait for the tape to whiz to the end to start writing. I suspect that when we have the 1TB read-write optical media, we will see tape go the same way as floppy disks (i.e., as a rarely-used media mostly used for backward compatibility purposes rather than actual storage).

    -E

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  102. There is a recordable version by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    My understanding is that the initial prototype used different-color lasers for the two layers, where there was a filter layer between the layers to keep the first layer's laser from touching the second layer and where the first layer was designed to transmit the bandwidth of the second laser untouched, but that they've come up with a method to use one laser to write two (or more) layers via using a method similar to holograms to steer the beam to the layer they want to affect. I'm a software guy, not a hardware guy, so I don't quite understand how they are doing this, but the engineer I talked to said that they planned to get 1tb READ-WRITABLE optical media by 2010 using this technique. The multi-laser method worked but was too expensive for media that had four layers. If they can make the single-laser method work, the drive mechanism will be more expensive than for current DVD-RAM but should still be cheap enough to be affordable.

  103. Current DVD-RAM speeds by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    Current DVD-RAM drives write at about 1mb/sec, though overhead through our jukebox drivers drops that to about 800kb/sec. By the end of the second quarter next year, we will have DVD-RAM drives in our jukeboxes that write at about 1.5mb/sec. DVD-R writes considerably faster -- right now we can write DVD-R at approximately 1.5mb/sec, by the second quarter next year we'll be at 2mb/sec.

    Write speeds will indeed be an issue with 1tb media, since the phase change time is the main limitation on speed. There's two possible solutions there -- stacking drive mechanisms and doing multiple backups in parallel, or using multiple lasers to write in parallel. Either way, it's a solvable problem.

  104. Get a life! by n3k5 · · Score: 1
    Seems like everyone thinks the V in DVD stands for video.
    Sure, because it actually does (as well as versatile). No one who has a say in naming these discs (Toshiba, Phillips, the DVD whitepaper, ...) ever says video was wrong. Only smart-asses who desperately want to show off their cleverness do. Today it is widely accepted that DVD is just a name for a DVD and the letters don't have any special meaning. That doesn't mean, however, that digital videodisc or digital versatile disc were wrong. You may use both.
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    1. Re:Get a life! by Microsift · · Score: 1

      Damn Straight!

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  105. Last Post! by alpg · · Score: 1

    Brahma said: Well, after hearing ten thousand explanations, a fool is no
    wiser. But an intelligent man needs only two thousand five hundred.
    -- The Mahabharata

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