Toshiba Touts 51GB HD DVD

srizah writes to mention that Toshiba plans to launch a 51 GB HD DVD, with a 1 GB advantage over Sony's Blu-ray disc. From the article: Toshiba has submitted a triple-layer, 51GB HD DVD-ROM disc to the standard's overseer in the hope the technology will be adopted as a standard by the end of the year. If approved, it allow the format to exceed the 50GB storage capacity of rival medium Blu-ray Disc. The HD DVD standard currently defines single- and dual-layer discs capable of holding 15GB and 30GB of data, respectively."

Comments

Behind the curve

[Straif]

I'm not a big fan of Blu-Ray (lack of standards is going to play havoc on first gen adopters) but if this was a fight about capacity HD-DVD would have been dead before it ever began. Capacity is about the only aspect of the next gen formats where there is a clear winner and it is not HD.

TDK was showcasing 100GB blu-ray discs almost two years ago and has recently shown off 200GB blu-ray discs. The problem is people are slow to adopt the use of next gen optical drives for performing important back ups and at present the excess capacity is next to useless for the movie industry.

This does help HD-DVD in that the increased capacity does help them match Blu-Rays superiority in the important TV DVD market. Previous to this you could fit an entire high def season on one BR disc but would be forced to use 2 or 3 HD discs. Now they can both meet the single disc hurdle.

I just hope someone wins this battle quickly and we'll get one standard for both PCs and movies or if not at least drives/players capable of reading both.