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Lens That Writes on Both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray
morpheus83 writes "Ricoh claims they have developed an optical component that reads and writes all disk formats -- Blu-ray Disc and HD-DVD, as well as DVD and CD -- with one pickup and one objective lens. The component is a 3.5-mm diameter, 1-mm thick round diffraction plate with minute concentric groves on both sides which function as a diffraction grating. Based on disc information the drive can identify which format disk is loaded, Ricoh's optical diffraction component adjusts the laser beam with its diffraction grating for each format and passes it to the objective lens."
Phew! I thought there'd be no solution to the format wars.
Oh wait, there's still:
But, at least now we've gotten that pesky dual-compatible use-a-single-object-lens issue out of the way. Now I can tell all my friends and family the hurdle has been cleared and to let the floodgates of new consumers open.
Not.
I'm going out for a bicycle ride.
It's a good start. Legal issues may end up being the biggest hurdle.
It's a nice trick. Diffraction to take advantage of the fact different wavelengths bend different amounts through the same material. As usual, when someone says something can never be done, they've probably missed a good half of the equation.
I wouldn't consider the mad hatter mad. Just reality impaired. He sure can make a mean cup of tea.
Won't buy anythying associated with Sony after their rootkit fiasco and support for DRM and the RIAA, MPAA etc etc.
And all those who don't give 2 hoots about the PC3 or any other gaming toy (especially XBOX) for that matter.(This is actually the majority of computer users if you care to research the stats)
IMHO, the capacity of BLURay of HD-DVD is still an order of magnitude less that what I really need for a backup device. IN the past few years, HDD capacitied have increased dramatically and there are more increases on the horizon. But, backup media affordable by the masses has not increased buy anywhere the same amount. So, I think it is useless!
Why do I think so, Well as a professional software developer and systems integrator for the past 25+ years, I don't:-
Play DVD on my PC's
Listen to MP3's on my PC's (my Ipod is good enough)
Play shoot'em up games of any sort
So, why do I need HD-DVD or BluRay?
What I want is an optical device tat can backup my 100Gb laptop HDD on ONE volume in less than 1 hour.
Give me that, and I will eat my hat
I'd rather be riding my '63 Triumph T120.
...so the rest of us kids from the poorhouse can get it cheaper tomorrow ;)
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
Seems to me that this makes it more likely that the survivor will be the one with the lowest disc manufacturing costs. So this development may make it take longer for a clear winner to emerge, I don't think we'll see both formats go on forever. And once one format gets the upper hand in mindshare and shelf space, cheaper players will appear that only play that format (cheaper because they will only pay licensing fees for BD or HD, not both [as the combo players will have to do]).
Me, combo players seem like a good step towards standardization.
-b
If I wanted a sig I would have filled in that stupid box.
What sales?
Even the system for doing this is not new. CDs and DVDs have different wavelengths and DVD players have been able to play both using a single lens for years. This just extends that technology - in otherwords a non-news item on the Slashdot frontpage.
Why not? Let's review. Because:
Eventually, they will be broken anyway.
Likewise, people shouldn't be allowed to own cars. Eventually, they stop running anyways.
Microsoft should not be allowed to monopolize the market by locking in users to their Office formats
Locking in users to their formats? Sorry, the consumers have done that themselves.
the media industries should not be allowed to screw over their own customers by creating formats that are designed to be combative against those customers.
Consumers shouldn't buy from those companies in the first place. Anyways, historically screwing over your consumers has been a pretty unsustainable business plan.
Just imagine how many decades we'd be ahead in technology if things worked this way.
Business does not exist to further technology. It exists to generate revenue.
Paul Grosfield - the quicker picker upper.
Just like how one of the two recordable DVD formats (DVD+R/RW & DVD-R/W) was supposed to "win" and become the dominant format? AFAIK neither one has won definitively and it only makes sense to buy a drive capable of writing both simply out of convenience. Why lock yourself into one format when you can spend a couple more bucks for compatibility across the board?
PCs took off because Windows provided an equal format for everyone.
Err.. PCs took off because the IBM PC was reverse engineered and clones proliferated the market, and because of the business software that was available. And was well before Windows became commonplace. As far as media formats, there were tons of competing technologies.. WORM drives, magneto-optical, hard drives, ZIP drives, and all sorts of proprietary storage tech. PC makers eventually adopted standard interfaces for RAM, the expansion bus, and eventually the CPU itself, but that's not really the same thing. About the only standard interface back then was RS-232, and even that was plagued with 9-pin vs. 25-pin and male vs. female.. you were lucky if you could connect any device without at least 1 adaptor. Once hard drives became common, pretty much everyone was using SCSI except the PC market, which mainly stuck to IDE because it was cheaper. And then there's EGA vs CGA vs VGA and early 3D graphics cards.
The PC took off either because of, or in spite of, format wars.. not format compliance.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Clue for you: Ford didn't invent the assembly line. The Wright brothers didn't invent the airplane. Wanamaker didn't invent the department store. Edison didn't invent the light bulb.
All these people derived inspiration from their contemporaries. All they did was "steal" ideas from others and make them better.
Steve Jobs' saying, that "real artists ship," is right on the money. Production, after all, has a more lasting impact than theory and prototype. Now let's hear from you an example of Linux community innovation even by the diminished standards set by the aforementioned inventors, or fail.
you also need to generate lasers of the proper wavelengths.
Why do you need to use the correct wavelengths?
Blueray discs use blue lasers because the pits are smaller than the wavelength of the infrared laser used for CDs. But why would that stop you reading a CD with the blue laser? The wavelength is still smaller than the pits so all you'd be doing is seeing the pits in a higher resolution, right? (or am I missing something?)
http://blog.nexusuk.org