Another Blu-Ray burner announced

Jayster wrote on 5/4/2006, 2:03 PM
IOData has announced a Blu-Ray burner for PCs, priced at $900.
http://www.iodata.com/usa/news/releases.php?ts=20&tsc=21&newsID=39
I don't know about the performance speed of this unit. The website doesn't say, thus I would assume it's nothing to brag about.

A $500 Samsung BD burner goes full bore at 2x speed. Thus, a 50GB disc would take only a mere 43 hours to burn! At SuperMediaStore.com you can buy a 25GB disc for $25.

Hard to imagine the displeasure if after some 20+ hours you find that you have a $25 coaster:-(
And even if it does work reliably, who is ready to do a 22 hour disc burn so they can distribute an HD video?

With hard drives as cheap as they are, I'd say that for storage purposes the BD technology is very much in the "not ready for prime time" category. (Not news to anyone here, I would expect). And for distribution, we're still effectively limited to highly compressed video on normal DVDs (i.e for HTPC users).

Hopefully after several months (a year?) there'll be speed and price breakthroughs that can make this a worthwhile technology for us.

Comments

farss wrote on 5/4/2006, 2:52 PM
Actually the 2x burn takes about 1 hour, same silly rating system as used for CD and DVD burners. The media is said to hold 2 hours of content so a 2x burn takes 1 hour.

Bob.
Jayster wrote on 5/4/2006, 7:25 PM
Actually the 2x burn takes about 1 hour, same silly rating system as used for CD and DVD burners. The media is said to hold 2 hours of content so a 2x burn takes 1 hour.

Um... Oops. I read the report wrong. Where it said 43:40 I misinterpreted it to mean 43 hours and 40 minutes. Doh! And I am an engineer, too...

Interestingly, the data I read says the drives are ready to be sold, but are currently delayed while they squabble about the "Blu-ray Disc format logo license" and also the finalization of the "copyright protection technology license" for Blu-ray.

And to play movies recorded with this on your PC you apparently will need "at least a 3Ghz CPU and a 128MB Graphics-Card that supports that support copy protection interfaces HDMI, DVI or HDCP."
http://www.supermediastore.com/samsung-sh-b022-blu-ray-burner-blueray-drive.html#description

At $1 / GB and minimum $500 for the burner, this is still not a cheap storage solution. Hard drive storage is available at $0.35 / GB. But, if money is not an issue (big IF), the convenience of a disc vs. a big clunky hard drive is something to consider.

Just hope you don't burn any coasters (at $25 each)...
John_Cline wrote on 5/4/2006, 8:58 PM
When I bought my first 1x CD burner some 12 or so years ago, the burner was $2,000 and the blank 74-minute 650MB discs were $25. Heck, I remember when a two-hour blank VHS was $25. Once Blu-Ray gains a little steam, the price of blank media will fall like a rock.

John