Sony and Panasonic Teaming Up For New Optical Disk Format

by
in storage on (#3FE)
story imageLooks like Sony and Panasonic are teaming up again for the new Archival Disc format. The new disk format will premier at 300 GB with plans to increase to 1 TB using signal processing advancements. Double sided, 3 layers each side, and 405 nm optical wavelength - maybe these new 4K TVs will finally have some 4K source media.
Reply 11 comments

Library of Congress (Score: 5, Funny)

by hex@pipedot.org on 2014-03-10 21:44 (#DR)

Imagine the storage capacity of a Library of Congress filled with these discs!

Year One (Score: 5, Funny)

by bryan@pipedot.org on 2014-03-10 21:49 (#DT)

A long time ago, Before Compact disks, I shall call this period "BC", people made due with analog recording devices. Then came the enlightenment of the optical disk. And there was much rejoicing. Much storage was available for pr0n and pictures of cute animals playing the piano. But the users soon fell unwell, for the disk formats of old could not support the massive needs of dvd::rip and MakeMKV. Now cometh the Archival Disk, I shall call this period "AD", and again there was much rejoicing.

But will they blend? (Score: 4, Funny)

by zafiro17@pipedot.org on 2014-03-10 23:06 (#DY)

I'm being a little facetious, but my point is, I don't see any obvious way these thingies are going to have any better longevity than your standard old CD, which seem to self-destruct if you pick them up and ever handle them. Moisture peels away the reflective layer, they scratch, heat warps them, etc. The press release says "better quality" or whatever but doesn't specify.

Given the current shift away from discs and all the moving, breakable parts their readers require, I'm wondering if Sony hasn't missed the boat. Discs aren't cool anymore in the same way 3.5" floppies stopped being cool the moment disc technology arrived, or the way the 3.5" guys used to sneer at the old fashioned, 5 1/4" floppy guys. "Hey, go get yourself some real hardware, eh?"

Ironically, tape seems to be making a comeback, possibly because it has proven itself in a way this new tech hasn't.

Re: But will they blend? (Score: 2, Interesting)

by qwertyuiop@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 16:29 (#ET)

You could always halve the capacity and double the reliability. Less storage, but more chance of recovering data.

Price per GB and other stuff... (Score: 3, Informative)

by captaindeerface@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 01:20 (#E2)

300GB for double sided, 3 layers a side. 50GB/layer So basically double the density per area of blueray.
If they can make as fast or cheap as the ancient LTO4 (800GB) tape, maybe we can talk. You can get an old drive for $500 and tapes for $20-25.
They'd have to be >$10 per disc for it to make sense.

LTO4 Tapes are about $0.032 / GB
Hardrives are about $0.045 /GB

I just go with harddrives and sell them and buy new ones annually since the price per GB keeps dropping.

Also I've been bitten by bad tapes and "archival media" before.

Sorry if my math is bad,
-sent from my iPhone while driving and eating barley soup. ;)

Re: Price per GB and other stuff... (Score: 1)

by danieldvorkin@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 01:44 (#E4)

I was going to say, is this really much of an advance over Blu-Ray? Which I've long suspected is the last gasp of optical storage. I'm really not sure what the use case for "archival optical disks" is these days.

Re: Price per GB and other stuff... (Score: 1)

by reziac@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 02:47 (#E7)

Well, with the size of all our collections of data these days, we've got to do something that's not just another hard disk, and is more reasonably portable without fear of dropping it on the floor.

Re: Price per GB and other stuff... (Score: 1)

by danieldvorkin@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 13:53 (#EH)

Thumb drives for portability, RAID for reliability. Between the two of these, I don't see any need for this disk.

Sony = Run Away (Score: 4, Insightful)

by scott@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 03:32 (#EA)

Whenever I see a 'standard' coming from Sony, my first instinct is to run. If they didn't have Playstation, even Blu-Ray would be in the long list of dead proprietary formats from Sony.

Re: Sony = Run Away (Score: 3, Informative)

by vanderhoth@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 10:40 (#EC)

BluRay was still better than the alternative, HD DVD from Microsoft. At least BluRay was a collaborative effort by a bunch of groups rather than MS just owning the whole thing.

Re: Sony = Run Away (Score: 3, Insightful)

by ticho@pipedot.org on 2014-03-11 16:20 (#EQ)

Likewise. When I read names of the companies behind this, first thing that popped into my mind was "Where's the DRM?"