A new format of optical disk in China, 2009-02-04 - Your reactions

[crispin]

In order to fight against the arrival of Blu-ray and to avoid paying royalties the Chinese government promoted another format, the CHBD. If one thought that these two formats would be enough to cover this immense population, it is time to think again. The industrialists have launched HD NVD a new format able to store between 12 to 15 GB, and manage this using a red laser that is infinitely less expensive than the blue laser.
To arrive at this capacity with hardware similar to a DVD reader, they used a technology that others had abandoned: they have put to one side the binary format and use in its place a format where the laser is able to decipher several coupled layers on the disk. This system thus makes it possible to store more; information than simply 0 and 1 and adds an equivalent of 2.
This system on which others have failed seems now reliable since marketing has started. It will make it possible to propose with lower costs HD films since the data flow will be limited to 12 Mbits/s



[translation by crispin]