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A Terabyte of Data on a Regular DVD?
Roland Piquepaille writes "This is the promise of the 3-D Optical Data Storage system developed at the University of Central Florida (UCF). This technology allows to record and store at least 1,000 GB of data on multiple layers of a single disc. The system uses lasers to compact large amounts of information onto a DVD and the process involves shooting two different wavelengths of light onto the recording surface. By using several layers, this technique will increase the storage capacity of a standard DVD to more than a terabyte. Read more for additional references and a diagram showing how this two-photon 3D optical system reads data."
Glad I didn't buy blue-ray or HD-DVD, I knew they were both scams!
something big enough to hold my pr0n collection!
By the definition of a DVD (yes, just like the various "color" Book standards that defined CDs, there are standards that define DVDs), this new technology will not result in a standard DVD by any means.
More proper terminology might be "in a standard form factor 12cm optical disc".
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
using it on regular dvds might be like the days of hole-punching 720k floppies.
I am one of many. My idea is not unique, nor do I expect my voice alone to sway you. I speak in a chorus of opinion.
But is that really true? Is there significant degradation? VHS causes degradation during every play cycle not because you use the same device to read and write, but for two reasons: One, your VCR creates EM fields and VHS uses analog magnetic recording. So any time you put a tape in your VCR you're erasing it a little, whether you play it or not, just because there's a transformer in the same metal box as your tape. Two, the head in your VCR does helical scanning. Since the head therefore has to be round, so that 1) it can spin and 2) as it spins the distance from the axis of rotation to the tape has to remain constant, the tape also must describe a round path. The only way it can do this is if it rubs something so it might as well rub on the head. It pretty much has to anyway, because at the time it was outside our technical ability to use a much stronger signal - which probably wouldn't have been a good idea with analog recording anyway. The result is that the head physically wears away some of the coating as the tape passes the head. This is true of any system in which the recording medium contacts the read head, but it's especially true of VHS because you have a rapidly rotating head to deal with.
As an aside, this is why you should never pause VHS unless you're actually trying to see something paused, and then you should unpause it as rapidly as possible, because otherwise you're stopping the tape but not the head, and the head will sit in one place rubbing away the magnetic coating on the plastic tape. This is why you should never rent porn on VHS, all the good parts will be missing :D
Anyway, back to the topic at hand. I know this is not directly comparable for some obvious reasons, but I want to bring up Minidisc. While Minidisc is a MO drive and thus uses a substantially different technology, it might be worth discussing. MO works by using a laser to heat a very small region of the disk to the Curie Point, and then you write it with an electromagnet as it cools. Nothing happens below the curie point. Now, I know far less about CDR or DVDR than I do about this, unfortunately, but AFAIK it's based on the intensity of the laser, right? So here's my question, is there actually any significant degradation when you use the laser to read, or is the power level so much lower that there's really just not enough energy to cause it?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"