Sony Announces 50GB Blu-Ray Video Deck

[Suhit Gupta]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/36576.html

"Sony has committed itself to shipping second-generation consumer-oriented Blu-Ray video recorders by the end of the year, the company said today. The new systems will support single-side, dual-layer Blu-Ray rewriteable discs with a total capacity of 50GB. Current Blu-Ray rewriteable discs provide 23GB of storage on a single layer. The second-generation machines will also support the so-called 'BD-ROM' format - the Blu-Ray equivalent of today's pre-recorded DVDs, Sony said."



The electronics giant touted, last year, their 23GB disks which had data transfer speed of 11MBps - more if data compression is turned on. The 12cm Professional Disc for Data (PDD) discs are fitted inside airtight protective cartridges and are available in rewriteable and write-once versions. The drives connect to the system over an ultrawide 160 SCSI interface. The 50GB drives, part of their blue laser technology push, that have been just announced have a 22MBps transfer rate. Sony plans to futher double capacity and performance in their 3rd generation drives and disks.

[Suhit Gupta]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/36576.html

"Sony has committed itself to shipping second-generation consumer-oriented Blu-Ray video recorders by the end of the year, the company said today. The new systems will support single-side, dual-layer Blu-Ray rewriteable discs with a total capacity of 50GB. Current Blu-Ray rewriteable discs provide 23GB of storage on a single layer. The second-generation machines will also support the so-called 'BD-ROM' format - the Blu-Ray equivalent of today's pre-recorded DVDs, Sony said."



The electronics giant touted, last year, their 23GB disks which had data transfer speed of 11MBps - more if data compression is turned on. The 12cm Professional Disc for Data (PDD) discs are fitted inside airtight protective cartridges and are available in rewriteable and write-once versions. The drives connect to the system over an ultrawide 160 SCSI interface. The 50GB drives, part of their blue laser technology push, that have been just announced have a 22MBps transfer rate. Sony plans to futher double capacity and performance in their 3rd generation drives and disks.

[bryhawks]

AWESOME! I was just wondering the other day where the Blu-Ray/high density optical media was, imagining the bliss of ~25GB on a disc...I didn't know they were already at dual-layer! 50 GB!

Now we just need a drive for the computer.

--> I just re-read the post, and see that this is 2nd gen. technology (and due by end of year :?) Sure didn't hear much about 1st gen products. Anyone seen/used one?

[brianchris]

Originally Posted by Bryhawks

I just re-read the post, and see that this is 2nd gen. technology (and due by end of year :?) Sure didn't hear much about 1st gen products. Anyone seen/used one?

Agreed. I wonder what generation they'll be at when a Blue Ray recorder actually hits the market :roll:

I remeber first learning about Blue Ray at the Sony both during the 2003 CES, and I was excited then....HDTV content on discs!!!

On a somewhat related note, anyone have the scoop on HDTV capable Tivo's?

-Brian

[Jason Dunn]

Blue Ray products were released in Japan last year I believe, but it's not surprising that we didn't see them in North America - Japanese consumers are willing to pay more for gadgets than we are. ;-)

[Zack Mahdavi]

Originally Posted by Jason Dunn

Blue Ray products were released in Japan last year I believe, but it's not surprising that we didn't see them in North America - Japanese consumers are willing to pay more for gadgets than we are. ;-)

Uggh... stupid Americans.. j/k

[klinux]

how reliable/fragile are those airtight PDDS?

[Suhit Gupta]

Originally Posted by klinux

how reliable/fragile are those airtight PDDS?

So apparently they weren't aimed entirely at end users so far, however I think that will change with the 2nd generation disks. But it isn't clear as to how durable they will be making the 50GB platters.

Suhit

[Crocuta]

The extra space is sure attractive, but they're at it again with more standards wars and I'm not jumping until there's a winner. Blue-Ray is nice, but it's not backward compatible with DVD (mostly because the disk in a case). HD DVD is backward compatible and has about the same capacity as Blue-Ray, so it makes more sense to me. But, of course, neither side will stop fighting until the consumers are all totally confused and half of them have bought the wrong thing. What we need is for these nutcases to get together and hammer out a single next generation DVD format and have everyone use it.

[Jason Dunn]

Yeah, you'd think they would have learned from the +R/-R disaster... :roll:

[Suhit Gupta]

Originally Posted by Crocuta

HD DVD is backward compatible and has about the same capacity as Blue-Ray, so it makes more sense to me. But, of course, neither side will stop fighting until the consumers are all totally confused and half of them have bought the wrong thing. What we need is for these nutcases to get together and hammer out a single next generation DVD format and have everyone use it.

You make a competely valid point, although who is to decide which the better technology is?! Plus a bit of competition is sort of good...

Suhit