wordproc@ucf-cs.UCF.EDU (wordproc) (12/28/89)
/* ---------- "Tandy's new WMRM optical disc devic" ---------- */ > A cousin of mine who works as a programmer in Los Angeles is visiting here > for Xmas. He told me yesterday about seeing a device developed by Tandy > at some kind of electronics market show. It's fully operational. > > It's a WMRM (write many/read many) optical disk with a capacity of about > 4 gigabytes. It can interface with your VCR, computer, or CD player, to the > extent that you can store/retrieve all three kinds of data on a single > optical disk. It threatens to *devastate* the market for hard disks, > CD players, and VCR's, since its enormous capacity permits you to use a > single disk for *everything*. > > The device is supposed to retail for under $600. Extra disks (should you > ever need one!) will run about $160. Tandy is currently contracting with > 4 companies (such as Dell computer) to manufacture the disks. > > And now, the obvious, obvious question: is this for real? > > Ron Morgan _Signal_Research_Report_ had an article on this about a year or more ago. Tandy was announcing the product's development and that it would be available in a year to eighteen months. It absolutely should do wonders for storage. Better yet, it finally provides the much-needed link between seemingly unrelated devices such as the VCR, stereo systems and PC's and will allow easy interfacing between them, something that opens up a whole range of possible new applications. ___________________________________________________________________ _________ / Marcus Clenney ___ ___ /___ ___/ ________ / U. of Central Florida / | / | / / / ______/ / Dept. of Computer Science / /| | / /| | / / / / / Orlando, FL 32816 / / | |/ / | | / / / /_____ / wordproc@ucf-cs.ucf.edu /_/ |___/ |_| /_/ /_______/ / ____________________________________________________________/
russ@Alliant.COM (Russell McFatter) (12/29/89)
I had a mailing from Tandy Corp. about a year ago which is probably what this is all about; a glossy letter announcing the development of something called "THOR-CD" (if I remember correctly, this stands for "Tandy Hi-density Optical Recording). Tandy Corp. had, at that point, developed working prototypes of the disk media, and was searching for partners to help develope the recorder/player hardware. The concept is quite revolutionary; although erasable MAGNETO-OPTICAL disks have been around for a while, THOR-CD is a purely optical, eraseable format that is entirely compatible with existing CD (audio) and CD-ROM! I have no idea if a CD recorder for audio, data, or both would arrive first; I also would suspect a tremendous fight from the recording industry if a CD recorder was developed that could copy / edit audio CD's. I haven't heard anything about this effort other than the introduction. At least as of a year ago, there was a technological limitation on erasable optical disks. To write a disk, one uses a high-power, narrow-focus laser to evaporate the aluminum substrate from the desired areas of the disk. A low- power, narrow beam is then used to read the disc without damaging it. (This is where WORM drive technology ends.) To erase a disc, a high-power, wide laser beam evaporates all the aluminum from a track and the area around it; some of the aluminum condenses into the "holes", covering them up and thus erasing the data. You should be able to sense the problem with this already: continued write/erase cycles do NOT deposit the substrate evenly; since the erase process scatters the substrate molecules more-or-less randomly, the area where most of the data is written tends to get thinner and thinner; eventually the "erase" beam fails to fill all the "pits", and at that point the disc must be replaced. The recording industry has long fought against inexpensive CD recording technology, and possibly for different reasons than you think. The usual claim made to the public is that digital-to-digital copying capabilities would create a "boom" in illegal copying; since a digital copy does not deteriorate with each generation, the industry speculates that such piracy would spiral out of control. At least that's what they tell the public. There is another angle, though; the recording industry may not be worried about CONSUMERS' copying habits, but of competition from small "basement" studios. Right now, if you are in the music business and want to put out an album, you have to sell your soul to one of the "big" record companies in return for a puny royalty. (It costs only a couple of dollars to manufacture and distribute a $15 disc; the artist only sees a tiny fraction of the proceeds; but the cost of the production equipment for CD's, records, and tapes is currently beyond the reach of independent producers). If the operators of a "basement" studio had the capacity to bypass the "big guys" and get CD's directly into the stores, they'd have lost their lock on the market and would be in serious trouble. (Maybe we'd see reasonable prices for a change!) The industry has some amazing tactics to date: They lobbied for a national tax (5 to 10%) to be placed on all blank tape and tape recording equipment, with the proceeds to be turned over to the recording industry itself; they have intimidated Japanese DAT manufacturers from exporting DAT hardware for resale by U.S. companies (One U.S. company, Philips, had a deal with a Japanese outfit to buy import DAT drives and sell them in the U.S.; they announced that they were prepared to fight a court battle if necessary to get DAT drives to market. One of the recording industry associations then threatened to sue the Japanese manufacturer, if they went through with the deal.) I would thus expect a long, hard fight in the recordable-CD market (at least for audio). I really hope that the technology triumphs over the politics; like other opinions so far, I think that it's about time that we unify the different kinds of media.