Topic: News

The DVD Forum, the body that oversees the DVD-R specification, has decided to stick with red laser technology and current storage capacities rather than make the move to blue light and more capacious discs. Instead, it will offer Internet integration to tempt upgrade-hungry consuemrs.

We have a copy of the new firmware for the NEC ND1300 which will allow burning at 4x on the very popular Datawrite 4x Reds. You can download the firmware here.

A report on Mandrake's web site suggests that there are some unexpected problems occurring running the OS in connection with Lucky Goldstar (LG) CD-ROMs. But the real question is whether it's the software or the hardware at fault – so we guess LG has to battle it out with the software vendors.

Canadian Federal authorities say they suspect some DVD players may be causing havoc for emergency radios on military aircraft. Ron Houston recently got a visit from Mounties and representatives of Industry Canada, which regulates radio communication, at his home in Cold Lake, 290 km northeast of Edmonton.

Roxio have updated their popular Easy CD/DVD Creator software to version 6.2, adding support for burning to 90 and 99 minute media and a new compression engine to reduce the size of DVD movies so they will fit on DVD discs.

US software company 321 Studios has submitted its response to legal action which aims to stop it selling its DVD back-up software in the UK. 321 declared that it will fight the Warner Home Video lawsuit "all the way", and is facing similar lawsuits from seven major film studios in the US.

BTC (Behavior Tech Computer Corp.) has announced the specifications of its new 8x DVD writer, the DRW 1008IM. Compared with its predecessor, the DRW 1004IM, it's mainly the DVD+R/RW write speed that has changed from 4x/2.4x to 8x/4x.

321 Studios, the software house behind the popular DVD backup program DVD X COPY, has announced the release of three new digital imaging software titles DVD X MAKER, DVD X SHOW, and DVD X POINT.

RealNetworks has signed a deal under which its RealOne Player streaming-media software will be incorporated into Linux-based phones built by Motorola. The companies said on Wednesday that the phones, which will let people access both audio and video content using RealNetworks applications, will become available sometime during the first half of 2004.

Software giant Symantec have said that computers are damaging health because they are turning us all into absolute raving berserkers.

The good news: the MPAA and Hollywood's major studios are about to revoke the Oscar screener ban. The bad news: Academy members will be the only ones to receive tapes, to the exclusion of the directors, writers and actors guilds, members of the press and your hipster friend Bob, who knew a guy that knew a guy who could get him copies.

Following on from the news that Memorex are to bump up CD-R prices by 10 to 15% in the new year, Moser Baer India Ltd, the world's third-largest producer of recordable compact discs, plans to lift prices by up to 10 percent after a sharp rise in global demand, executive director Ratul Puri has said.

Sony's widely anticipated PSX, based on the popular Playstation 2 platform, will include audio and video functions but will not support DVD+RW recording in its initial incarnation. That capability will be added later, Sony said at Ceatec, Japan's largest electronics show.

Imagine if your stereo were linked directly to an online music store. Four major Japanese electronics makers on Tuesday unveiled a prototype of an audiovisual system that can download song files from an online store without a PC and is expected to go on sale early next year.

Encouraged by the recent surge in popularity of DVD music video discs, music labels will offer dozens of special packages this autumn that combine a CD with a DVD.

Sony will launch a new optical-disc format in November that allows for storage of up to 23.3GB per disc, the company said today. The format, called Professional Disc for Data, is being positioned by the Tokyo company as a replacement for the 5.25-inch MO (Magneto-Optical) disc format that it currently sells in the professional data storage space. MO has been on the market for around 15 years and the highest-capacity version sold by Sony can store 9.1GB per disc.

Our regular contributor Flash has been in touch with good news for owners of Pioneer clone drives from Asus, Acer & TEAC. Flash says, "I have succesfully modified the firmware for the following Pioneer DVR-106D OEM clones to flash them into true Pioneer Drives: Asus DRW-0402PD, Acer OEM Pioneer DVR-106RD and the TEAC DV-W50D. The drives once flashed to TRUE Pioneer can then be flashed to any firmware of your choice." Excellent! You can download the firmware from our download section.

The specifications of Sony's new 8x DVD writer are now listed on SonyStyle's website. We brought you news of Sony's latest internal drive offering last month but now we have more detailed specs and an image.

Press Release from Memorex: "Due to supply shortages, rising costs from overseas disc manufacturers and the stringent enforcement of patent royalties, Memorex is forced to increase CD-R and CD-RW media prices 10 to 15 percent beginning January 2004. The incremental increase in product pricing is intended to enable Memorex to continue to deliver the industry's leading blank CD media and still cooperate with its retail partners to actively market the products to consumers."

Recording industry investigators said on Friday they have begun asking suspected Internet song-swappers to settle copyright-infringement charges before taking them to court.