Slashdot Mirror
Pioneer Promises 400GB Optical Discs
schliz writes "Pioneer has developed a 16-layer read-only optical disc which it claims can store 400GB of data. The per-layer capacity is 25GB, the same as that of a Blu-ray Disc, and the multilayer technology will also be applicable to multilayer recordable discs."
There's always something better coming along. In this case it's pretty much just a research paper, not an actual product, so not all that exciting.
And Blu-ray had burnable 4-layer (100GB) discs two years ago.
We had SDTV for nearly a century, and we had VHS for what, decades?
DVD's reign will be about 2 decades.
BluRay will be what, 1 decade?
HDTV will soon be replaced with SHDTV and other such nonsense.
Keep 'em spendin'!
From the article:
"The huge capacity of these discs means that the new technology will be best suited for applications such large volume data archiving, rather than consumer use."
The tech they are using to read so many layers of information is impressive. However as the article states, this format is in no way intended for consumers.
Your BluRay hardware is probably safe for another five years or so.
Roughly half my comments are never submitted. You may be reading the better half...
the cost/GB of HDD's. I can buy 750 GB of SATA storage now for the cost of 125 GB worth of BD-RW blanks, and plug it in to any USB2 port I want. For the same cost, I can get a 250 GB USB laptop drive in a self powered enclosure that fits in a shirt pocket. I can only imagine what these 400 GB disks will cost when they hit the market, and what HDD's will cost by then.
Now you can order a collection of ALL the pornography on the internet on an easy-to-ship 150 disc set. Pioneer drive required.
Artifacts which I would not have noticed on DVD are readily apparent on BluRay disk.
Unless you are talking about film grain, I have no clue what "artifacts" you are talking about as Blu-Ray, outside of the early Mpeg-2 releases, and HD DVD both use more efficient compression codecs than DVD does. If you are talking about film grain, yes it is more apparent now due to the higher resolution which is able to resolve such detail now, but it is supposed to be there.
No, Laserdisks are (were) high capacity coasters. You could put an entire six-pack on them. These will just hold one drink, like all the other AOL disks.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
A 500 GB HDD costs less than a single one of these discs, is reliable, rewritable a million times, lasts decades if properly stored, is already available, is faster, and requires no fancy hardware.
And there's always tape for true archiving.
But you can't go out and buy ST:TNG seasons 1-7 on HDD.
But as soon as a generous person does, no one else needs to ;)
You must have a shitty tv or are blind to make such a stupid statement.
No. The only people who really care whether they are watching an up-converted DVD or a blu-ray are are videophile snobs looking to justify the expense, who pause the movie to point at some intricate pattern in the corner of the screen and gloat.
The average person can tell them apart side by side. The average person, once instructed what to look for, can see the up-conversion artifacts.
But when actually watching a movie, it just doesn't really matter, and most people can't tell the difference in a blind test, where they get to watch a few seconds of a random scene movie in just one format and then decide. I've done this with a number of people with a few movies I have in both formats, on a number of different TVs from plasma to DLP.
Bluray is the better picture (and sound), there is no question, but the difference is incremental, and ultimately pretty minor. Especially when compared with the transition from VHS to DVD. --THAT-- is a transition the average person can tell apart easily, and then you factor in all the extra convenience of the DVD format in terms of form factor and features. DVDs were worth re-buying much of ones collection in, blu-ray? There's maybe a dozen movies I would consider re-purchasing, and even when buying new, I'll take the usually significantly cheaper DVD version 9 times out of 10.
Call me a snob if you like, that does not change the fact I can tell the difference very quicly on my 56" HDTV between HD content and DVD content, especialy when the HD content was recorded with a HD camera, not upconverted from film.
To me the diffence is as drastic as going from VHS to DVD.
Some people just do not care, and that is fine.
My Dad can sit in front of his 15 year old tv and the picture has a red ghosting hue to it, and drives me nuts but when I tell him he should get a HDTV, he just tells me he likes the one he has just fine, this is a guy that watches every sporting event on TV, and that content is mostly shot with HD cameras, so he would really benefit from the upgrade, but would he care? NO
Call me a snob if you like, that does not change the fact I can tell the difference very quicly on my 56" HDTV between HD content and DVD content, especialy when the HD content was recorded with a HD camera, not upconverted from film.
This statement basically says you don't know what you are talking about, as conversion from film to HD formats (1920x1080 or 1280x720) involves a loss of resolution, sometimes massive depending on exactly how the image is stored on the film.
Film easily has a resolution of 4000x4000, so even using a film format where black bars are stored on the film, you end up with about 4000x2200 at the 16:9 HDTV aspect ratio. Film is then telecined to whatever HD resolution is required, which results in a loss in resolution, but you still have at least full HD quality at that point. Now, special effects aren't always rendered at full film resolution, so some movies (or TV shows) will not have the full film resolution in all scenes, but generally the lowest rendering these days is 2K, which is more than enough for 1920x1080.
What's probably confusing you is that HDTV cameras have more depth of field than most lens/film combinations on 35mm film cameras. This gives the scene a much more "in focus" look for more of the image, and gives the illusion that it is sharper. Film can do this, but it is more difficult due to the complex interaction between the type of lens, the film speed, and the lighting for the scene.