Group aims to drastically up disc storage

A few hundred movies on an optical disc? That's the goal of the Holographic Versatile Disc (HVD) Alliance.

Six companies, including Fuji Photo and CMC Magnentics, have formed a consortium to promote HVD technology, which will let consumers conceivably put a terabyte (1TB) of data onto a single optical disc.

A TB-size disc would certainly compress movie collections. The consortium said an HVD disc could hold as much data as 200 standard DVDs and transfer data at over 1 gigabit per second, or 40 times faster than a DVD.

HVD is a possible successor to technologies such as Blu-ray and HD DVD. Single layer Blu-ray discs hold about 25GB of data while dual-layer discs hold 50GB. Ordinary DVD discs, meanwhile, hold about 4.7GB. HVD technology will be pitched at corporations and the entertainment market, the HVD Alliance said.

The technology behind HVD is based on holography technology from Japan's Optware, one of the six founders of the consortium. A technical committee formed last December to flesh out HVD standards.

Sony unveiled a home server with 1TB of storage for the Japanese market last year. Half of the capacity would be enough to record six channels of TV for five and a half days non-stop, Sony said.

The organization, however, is looking at first developing discs with lower capacities. The first assignments of the technical committee involve coming up with standards for a 200GB recordable disc and a 100GB read-only disc.

If history is an indication, consumers will fill the disc up. High-definition broadcasting and gaming are also expected to add a heavy burden to existing home storage systems because of the size of the files. Two hours of HD programming takes up about 15GB to 25GB.

Michiko Nagai of CNET Japan contributed to this story from Tokyo.

[grey_eminence]

100 Terabytes on 3.5 in Disk ?

Only ONE company in the world will have infinite<br />rewritable data storage like hard drives.<br /><br />Their data storage capacity and bandwidth will leave WORM drive Optware in the dust.<br /><br />Colossal Storage Corp. is the company and you can read about their technology at<br /><br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.physorg.com/news785.html" target="_newWindow">http://www.physorg.com/news785.html</a><br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1635265,00.asp" target="_newWindow">http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1635265,00.asp</a><br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.nanonewsnet.com/index.php?module=pagesetter&#38;func=viewpub&#38;tid=4&#38;pid=6" target="_newWindow">http://www.nanonewsnet.com/index.php?module=pagesetter&#38;func=viewpub&#38;tid=4&#38;pid=6</a><br /><br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://colossalstorage.net" target="_newWindow">http://colossalstorage.net</a>

[skeptik]

Who's kidding who

Yeah, this sounds wonderful and I can't wait... Of course nobody will be legally allowed to rip DVDs and make a movie compilation disc, nor will they be allowed to record and burn anything broadcast by then - so what exactly are we supposed to use this wonderful technology for except "pirating"?<br />Somehow the companies pushing hardware technology need to side with the consumer to preserve home recording rights or they will find themselves without a customer base as anyone inclined to record will be imprisoned and those happy to take what the media companies shove down their throats will have no use for recording hardware.

[bobby_brady]

This will never happen

For starters, nobody will be allowed to copy High Def TV, because hollywood will payoff congress to pass laws. Second, the most popular way to copy HD content will be in Divx or VXID format, which doesn't need nearly as much space. Dual layer DVD is here to stay.

[Dirree]

Definately will happen

First, it is illeagal to pirate ANYTHING! So alrdy your breaking the law. And second, with this new wave of tech in just storage objects will also make hard drives bigger and better. HVD is just a cd, and hard drives are just a compilation of cds alrdy, atleast thats how it used to be. Take 4 or 5 of the HVD's and put them together at a HD and there you do, you got yourself a 4 to 5 terabyte hd. Thus high def video will be wanted over all other types, unless you dont have the HD to do it. HVD has the ability to replce CD's DVD's etc etc. I mean look what happened to floppy disks. the floppy drives dont even come standard with comps anymore, nobody wants them, Everyone is useing Zips or CD's because they are cheap and easy to use. Say bye bye to DVD and CD and here comes HVD. Give it a few years.

[Prndll]

So much pointless tech....

The only real reason to have a harddrive larger than about 40gigs is to have movies and music. No individual home user will need or be able to use a terabyte of legit data.<br /><br />To me, this is non-news.

[CyberWoLfman]

Legal uses for large storage capacity hard drives.

The obvious one would be home movie editing.<br /><br /> Others may want to use that storage space to put a great deal of printed material on it (there's a great deal that's considered public domain) so it can be searched as a type of large reference database.<br /><br /> Far easier, I'm certain, than trying to page through stacks of dusty books in your collection to a reference about some type of repressed technology, or whatnot, don't you think?<br /><br /> Me, I'm waiting for that learning machine in the first Matrix movie. You'd NEVER get my butt out of that chair! I'd be trying to see how much of a datafeed sponge I could become. LOL<br /><br /> - CyberWoLfman

[guitarguynboston]

Awsome for Some not a Big Deal for Others

This amount of storage is awsome for any musican or movie maker. I could hold so many of my recording tracks and be able to transport them anywhere and the same goes for home made movies. However marketing this to the masses who are being sued for "illegal" copying of music and movies doesn't really pan out. I mean unless you have a ton of computers to back up in your house. If anything this would be good for businesses doing backups of their systems.

[Fray9]

Well

"If anything this would be good for businesses doing backups of their systems"<br /><br />I think thats kind of the whole point. The only reason information about it is circulating the public sector at the moment is the "coolness factor" of having that much storage on a single disk.<br /><br />As with most all new technologies it will be tailored and marketed to companies first for that very use: large scale backup. If it becomes popular and there is a consumer demand for it in the public sector then it could fan out. But this technology is definately only going to be used in the business sector to begin with and may never reach the average consumer (much like robotic tape libraries, reel-to-reel optical and the like).

[nonono nono]

What?

You sound like those people 20 years ago that said "I can't imagine needing more than 600K". If people had your attitude we would be living in caves. Digital TV is the future and this technology will be essential to go with it.

[grey_eminence]

Fatal flaw in Optware HVD?

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://p2pnet.net/story/3855" target="_newWindow">http://p2pnet.net/story/3855</a>

[jzsaxpc]

Why will there even been the need for a "Hard Copy ROM" anyways?

The idea behind the ROM is a bad idea. New advances in RAM will make it impossible for tech companies to ignore RAM's potential to dominate all tech markets. Look at the iPod Nano, amazingly small, yet it can hold 4 gig, the rate at which memory is increasing is amazing, it is faster then ROM, though ROM does have a massive head start!<br /><br />In the future, these types of disks will have a severe drop in market share. Even bigger will be when the HDD is phased out. Who needs a HDD when you can use RAM, especially RAM that can retain it's info even AFTER power is turned off, making a computer that turns on at the flick of the mouse. Due to the fast trasfer speeds, and no need to warm the HDD up, we are talking about zero load times, improved heat capacity, better power management, less noise, and the ability to achieve computers far beyond those of today, with technoligy that is already here.<br /><br />However, for the sake of the argument, lets not consider RAM, only ROM, the idea behind these massive disks if first, great that these disks can store an amazing amount of memory, first, this more or less says that the HDD is obsolite anyways, at least the HDD in its current form, I mean please, $400 for 500 gig, when you say that these 1-2 tera disks come out. There is no need, obviously the HDD industry has to hop on the bandwagon, something they are I am sure already trying to do, though at a slower pace. <br /><br />A holo HDD would, I have to admit, make the HDD larger then we would ever need by far AT THIS TIME, I'm not saying we can drop all research for HDD, but seriously, the largest program you can install is like 5 gig, you got a terabyte of space, great, what are you going to do with it? What are you going to do with a disk like that? Nothing, unless you plan on buying like 20 HDTV vids on it at once, which is absolutly stupid, or you pirite it. Two options.

[fest3er]

Short sighted people?

There seem to be a number of short sighted <br />people in here. There're several very good <br />reasons to have high capacity removable media <br />available.<br /><br />1. Small businesses need high cap removable <br />media to back up their online systems. So they <br />only have 50MB of incremental data and 40 GB of <br />total data to back up. They don't see the need <br />to spend thousands on tape changers and tapes, <br />nor do they see the need to spend thousands on <br />hiring someone full-time to manage such a <br />system, nor do they trust outside business on <br />the internet to store their business data. <br />Cycling through 2-4 rewritable HVDs for monthly <br />or quarterly full backups would suit most <br />businesses just fine. And cycling through 3-4 <br />DVD RWs for weekly incrementals would also suit <br />them. (Yes, I am prepared for the flamers to <br />attack me because this isn't the ideal, perfect <br />backup and archival scheme; it'll be clear <br />they've never worked for or owned a small <br />business.)<br /><br />2. Home computer users cannot and will not <br />afford tape changers and others, nor will they <br />spend the time to sit in front of their computer <br />waiting to change disks. A large cap HVD would <br />let them start a backup and go off and do other <br />things.<br /><br />3. Semi-professional videographers need a lot <br />more capacity than is immediately obvious. I <br />have a mere 100GB of diesel event videos and <br />images; some of the videos are 10GB-30GB in <br />size. It would be nice to have small, removable <br />media to store and organize them.<br /><br />4. Did you know that the bitmap image for a <br />semi-trailer wrap needs 27 DVDs to store it? <br />Graphics shops would love to have small media to <br />store such things, without having to spend a day <br />or two getting the images off the computer so <br />they can do other work, and putting the images <br />back on so the trailer can be rewrapped after a <br />repair.<br /><br />If y'all knew more about how information <br />technology is used in commerce today, y'all'd <br />realize that there are many more valid reasons <br />to have 100GB-1TB removable media available, <br />just for commerce alone.<br /><br />Should I delve into education, medicine and <br />research? Where scanning electron microscopes <br />take lots of high-res images that need to be <br />stored? Where doctors would like to have the <br />full 3D imagery of an MRI scan, instead of <br />single pictures? Where professors can <br />individually store large research datasets for <br />courses and put them up just-in-time? These <br />fields could certainly make use of high-res <br />removable media.<br /><br />And how about geological research? And space <br />research? More industries that can use lots of <br />removable media.<br /><br />A Hollywood HD movie using 45GB? Big deal. <br />That's a tiny dataset compared to those of other <br />industries.<br /><br />You know, if you overnight 100GB of data using <br />FedEx, that works out to about 5GB/hour, or <br />around 11 Mb/s. So unless you're wealthy, or a <br />big business, or a research institute, FedExNet <br />is faster than Internet, and will be for quite <br />some time.<br /><br />No, contrary to some opinions in here, there is <br />an honest and legitimate need for large, <br />inexpensive removable media. Today. Not in 2050.

[blueceligts180]

That's all fine and danndy that this disc will work and i agree will help in the commercial and educational along with video and image fields.... But for your everyday run of the mill consumer there is no need for a terabyte disc when unless your pirating movies and music or programs and games would you even take up that much space on your hard drive where you would need to have that much storage. I have a 250 gig hard drive which i filled up with no problem but because of the downloading of all of the above.. But since i stopped downloading i have more then half of my drive free after deleting what i no longer use and the fact that i don't have such large files going onto my computer though i do legal program downloads. In actuality the terabyte disc if it does come out soon would not sell as intended for long. The reason being is because you have that much storage so your average consumer would only need 1 so there would be no need to purchase more and buisnesses would need at most 2 depending on the buisness. If they make them rewriteable then your looking at this disc and the companys going out of buisness because the left over storage can be writen to at a later time and whenever IF it ever get's full can be rewriten over if need be and if not then purchase 1 more... To b honest it's a good concept but people are not going to need it. Plus not to mention that with new technology comes new hardware for it so that would mean that those that use the disc would not be able to transport the info to another local unless the hardware to read it is there as well. Unless computer company begin to incorporate the drives into their computers and gaming system make use of this technology it'll fade out lyk HD DVD did. But who in there right mind would want to put that many games or movies onto on disc. And if companys did that then that would raise the price of the movies for that fact that you will have a couple or few hundred movies or at most 100 in HD on one disc... But then who would buy a disc like that when they might only want 5 of the movies on the disc but not the other 95 or 195... Once again great concept but won't go far in the consumer world in my opinon. They need to direct this product to the buisness and educational industries along with research. Just though i'd put my two cents in.. Blu-ray will deffinately stay and will not be brushed to the side by this new technology : )