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[Panajev2001a]

From Beyond3d.com's console forum (McFly):

Perhaps not everyone will agree with us, but here at Gizmodo, we've officially declared Blu-Ray the winner over HD DVD in the battle to be DVD's replacement format. It's technically superior to HD DVD, has a stronger backing, is further along as far as commercialization is concerned, and as of today, even offers a "bridge" format between CD and Blu-Ray. I will hopefully get a chance later this week to outline exactly why Blu-Ray is simply kicking the ass of HD DVD, but for now, this announcement from Sony should suffice.

The announcement I'm talking about came at this year's "International Symposium on Optical Media" (ISOM), where Sony unveiled a concept to put both Blu-Ray and CD data layers on a single disc. Understandably, they're calling it "BD/CD Dual Format Disc." More after the jump.

I could get into quite a bit of technical mumbo jumbo about how the "BD/CD Dual Format Discs" are supposedly going to work, but to make a long story short, there's two variations: the first variation has both "Blu-Ray" and "CD" sides of the disc, and the second variation consists of having both "Blu-Ray" and "CD" recordable layers on the same side of the disc. The dual format discs are possible thanks to the essentially mirrored layer setup of Blu-Ray and CD.

When looking from the data side of the disc, CDs have a substrate layer, recording layer, reflective layer, then protective layer. Blu-Ray, on the other hand, is setup in almost the exact opposite fashion - protective layer, recording layer, reflective layer, and substrate layer. Moreover, you can even supposedly do dual layering for your Blu-Ray side of the disc. While I'm not going to get too far ahead of Sony, I expect that it won't be long before we start seeing "BD/DVD Dual Format Discs," which would certainly spell doom for HD DVD.

http://www.gizmodo.com/archives/bdcd-dual-format-disc-announced-bluray-beats-hd-dvd-023660.php

Read - "Enter the Blu-Ray Disc and CD Integrated Disc"

Read - "BD/CD Dual Format Disc"

 

[Nerevar]

what? No news of it being in PS3? I'm disappointed in you, Panajev.

 

[Panajev2001a]

lol.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Dual BD/DVD discs... well, they could be quite interesting .

 

[jarrod]

How would DVD/BD discs work though, it says CD/BD works only due to the mirrored setup... is DVD layered the same as CD?

 

[kaching]

As much as I'd like to see BRD be successful, that's a dumb reason to declare the BRD/HDDVD war over.

Wasn't something like this announced recently for SACD/DVD-Audio discs? Wasn't one of them going to get bonded with a CD layer as well? I don't see why HDDVD couldn't end up doing the same.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Let me check: yes they do.

http://home.fujifilm.com/products/media/technical/dvd_r.htm

http://www.samsungodd.com/eng/Information/ODDTech/ODDTech.asp?FunctionValue=view&no=9&type_no=4

http://www.optodisc.com/d_word_l.htm

 

[Panajev2001a]

As much as I'd like to see BRD be successful, that's a dumb reason to declare the BRD/HDDVD war over.

Wasn't something like this announced recently for SACD/DVD-Audio discs? Wasn't one of them going to get bonded with a CD layer as well? I don't see why HDDVD couldn't end up doing the same.

They can do it, but so can Blu-Ray for CDs and DVDs.

It would make the transition to Blu-Ray even easier: takes away a big weapon from benefiting purely the HD-DVD camp.

 

[GIR]

If either camp were smart they’d be releasing dual BR/DVD or HD-DVD/DVD* movies right now in an effort to shove their respective HD formats down our collective throats, but quite frankly both of these formats seem to me just as half arsed DVD were, wake me up when UHDV arrives until then I’ll tolerate DVD’s

But just what is the purpose of creating a BR/CD? BR/DVD I can understand, BR/CD is like adding a 1.44mb floppy drive to a digital camera, stupid!

(*no technical reason why it cant be done, if I’m not mistaken there was talk of creating dual SACD/CD discs, or did it that actually happen?)

 

[kaching]

It would make the transition to Blu-Ray even easier: takes away a big weapon from benefiting purely the HD-DVD camp.

I'm not sure why - as long as BRD drives can read DVDs and CDs like they're supposed to then this seems redundant.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Well they could start packing Blu-Ray teasers/previews/full lunght movies on the other layer before Blu-Ray players come out.

 

[jarrod]

Dual DVD/BD or DVD/HD-DVD movies would be a nice way to transition the market... one disc that ypu can use on two players. It'd give consumers an incentive to upgrade sooner... unfortunately publishers will never go for it. Why raise costs selling a dual disc when you can just profit more off an industry standard DVD release? The only companies with any incentive to do this are hardware providers...

 

[mrklaw]

as nice as this is, it almost sounds like they discovered it by accident. This is the sort of thing they should have designed the Bluray spec to do from the outset. Its not a difficult concept to grasp

 

[Panajev2001a]

This thing has no place in the Blu-Ray format spec suite.

Jarrod, I know that at least Columbia Tri-Star and MGM (if not more companies) might be interested in such a solution .

 

[jarrod]

Jarrod, I know that at least Columbia Tri-Star and MGM (if not more companies) might be interested in such a solution .

Noy if it eats at their bottom line... or are you suggesting some sort of new found synergy?!

 

[Panajev2001a]

Well I hope they find this synergy and see how ti can help the hardware their own mother company produces and then in turn help them when they start releasing super-duper editions in Blu-Ray .

 

[McFly]

From Beyond3d.com's console forum (McFly):

Hehe, that's me.

Fredi

 

[Tenkei]

Would it be possible to house DVD and BRD on the same disc in practice? DVDs have two substrates (a sandwich), while CDs have only one (open-faced sandwich). All three formats have the same disc thickness of about 1.2 mm, correct?

I can see how flipping over a BRD to use the CD/DVD side would work, but I don't think having the DVD/BRD on the same side of the disc would be possible, with the reflective layer and all.