‘BLU-RAY’ DISC SPECS TO BE REVEALED JUNE 14
Newly created “Blu-ray Disc Founders” group of 9 companies said it would disclose technical specs for proposed high- definition optical disc recording format beginning June 14 (CED Feb 20 p1). Consortium said purpose of disclosures was to let parties study specs in time for start of licensing, targeted for end of June. Besides revealing new group name and schedule for implementation, Blu-ray Disc Founders said Philips would be contact for specifications process but didn’t outrightly name company as licensing agent for format.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
Founders said recipients of specifications could evaluate them to explore feasibility of future development of manufacturing of Blu-ray products. Spec book for Version 1.0, which will cost $5,000, will describe format’s basic, file system and audiovisual basic specifications. Inquiries on disclosure were referred to Philips at www.licensing.philips.com. Although licensing was expected to start next month, products based on new specs still were expected later rather than sooner.
Blu-ray is backed by Hitachi, LG, Matsushita, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Thomson. Conspicuous absentee is Toshiba, but sources familiar with Blu-ray said it had been invited to participate. Also absent was JVC, which has been promoting its HDTV-quality D-VHS. Blu-ray format owes its name to 405 nanometer blue laser used for recording and playback. Single-sided, 12 cm disc will have storage capability of up to 27 GB of data, sufficient for 2 hours of HDTV-quality video and sound and 13 hours of recording standard TV broadcasts. Blu-ray agreement provides for using double-sided 12 cm discs capable of up to 50 GB capacity, consistent with recent Matsushita proposals. Disc itself is 1.2 mm thick, including 0.1-mm thick “optical transmittance protection layer” common to most of preannouncement proposals. At early stage it was difficult to discern which companies had contributed which technologies to Blu-ray specs. But format uses groove recording method common to DVD-RW and DVD+RW rather than land-and-groove method favored by Matsushita and Toshiba for DVD-RAM.
As for Toshiba’s absence from consortium, DVD Forum founding member has said it was “neutral” on Blu-ray but begged off joining consortium because it believed DVD Forum, not Blu-ray alliance, was “the single official body to create and promote DVD formats.” As such, Toshiba has said it would submit its previously announced 30 GB recordable disc proposal to DVD Forum for possible consideration as “uniform standard.” Company expressed opinion that development of next-generation optical disc recorders for HDTV was “still at the initial stage and we expect multiple technologies to come out in coming months or years.”
In fact, NEC Mon. announced 35 GB optical disc with capacity to record 14 hours in DVD quality. It said system used 405 nanometer blue laser disc doped with zinc sulfide and silicon dioxide, and it would propose system as standard. Meanwhile, before Blu-ray agreement, individual alliance members such as Matsushita, Philips, Pioneer and Sony had been working on systems of their own. At time, Matsushita and Pioneer had said DVD Forum was only official body for creating and promoting uniform standards. But Blu-ray statements include no provision for involving DVD Forum. Chris Buma, Philips program mgr.-AV disc recording and company’s delegate on consortium, has said Blu-ray didn’t fall under DVD Forum’s jurisdiction because it was format “completely separate” from DVD, and hence DVD appeared nowhere as part of Blu-ray logo.