PC-Engine said:
one said:
PC-Engine said:
MechanizedDeath said:
onanie said:
PC-Engine said:
http://www.stor-age.com/dongtai/jishu/htm2005/05063022A2MX.asp
Sony VP of Optical disc department and head of optical research department said SL is their main focus now. There are still problems with the DL. Therefore, due to the cost, they have no plan or date on the volume production for the DL.
So you read chinese? The problem the article appears to be referring to is in achieving DL in BD-R/RE discs (the writable/rewritable).
Is that the translation? I figured PC-E was off with that claim. Both BRD and HD-DVD backers have spent all this time hyping capacity and multi-layer potential that it would see really silly for Sony to suddenly back off that and make a claim that they are focusing on SL.
PC-E: Well? What other excuses are there now? PEACE.
Where was I off? It clearly says SONY is basicallly putting the 50GB DL BRDs on the back burner.
You are off because the gist of the Chinese article you quoted is:
+ They are discussing the plan to increase the size of a single layer from 25GB to 30GB (or even 33/35GB)
+ They start from BD-R/RE, unlike in DVD (from DVD-ROM to DVD-R), and a BD-R/RE disc is harder to manufacture than BD-ROM
+ Sony has no date for the mass production of DL BD-R yet, while Matsushita is already beginning the mass production of DL BD-RE.
And after all is said and done DL is put on the back burner because it's too difficult and expensive. Doesn't matter if Panasonic is going forward with it if it cost $50 a disc.
Funny how you keep hearing about future 4L and 8L BRDs when they can't even make DL BRDs cheaply and are forced to 30GB SL BRDs.
No. Why are you throwing FUD at Blue Ray ?
The article clearly mentions that:
(i) 2L BR-RE (50Gb) has been produced by Matsushita today. The article does not mention US$50 a disc. In any case, the price will drop once there is volume.
(ii) In the second paragraph, the 2 interviewees mentioned that BD-RE *can* be manufactured cheaply. They also indicated that outsiders speculated that BR are expensive to manufacture because they are not privy to the outcomes of the BDA internal discussions.
(iii) The 2 interviewees mentioned that their focus is to *optimize* the single layer specs. Producing 30Gb is no problem, but going beyond 30Gb per layer will poise some unspecified challenges.
(iv) Why single layer ? In spirit and essence, they feel that the proper single layer "specs" will preserve the long term investment of the blue ray industry, especially from consumer perspective. e.g., Once a consumer buy a 1st gen BR disks, it'd be "wrong" to force them to upgrade to a 2nd gen BR disk. They believe that once they optimize the 1L BR-RE (in terms of manufacturing investments, and BR performances), making multi-layer disks can come naturally (so Matushita's 50Gb 2L disk may be obsoleted).
(v) it seems that they have time to think through this properly. Their focus is on products that will be launched at next year's FIFA and 2008 Olympics. They cited that the early DVD discs can achieve 5 Gb, and then later dropped to 4.7Gb and it has stayed there ever since.
Note that the 2 interviewees are from the R&D department. The BR marketing team may have different priorities as usual 8^). In fact, the interviewer added that since HD DVD will achieve 30 Gb using 2 layers, he hopes/expects Sony can do a 1 layer > 30 Gb disc to leap frog.
