Topic: News

For those of you old enough to remember the heady early days of computing when so-called experts were widely predicting the dawn of the paperless office there comes a similar claim about CD and DVD. Forrester Research have predicted a steep fall in CD sales, as audio and video file sharing over the Internet continues to emerge as a preferred option among consumers.

Philips has developed a re-writable optical disk-based, Portable Blue standard and it is something to behold. Already able to hold 1000 megs, they claim the ability to increase the storage capacity to "several gigabytes" with a dual layer disk, already in development. Will it undermine the solid-state rivals such as Secure Digital, Compact Flash and Memory Stick? A PC card housing for the Portable Blue disks has also been developed and Philips intends to use a storage housing that will fit into existing Compact Flash slots. So they have their sites set on the solid state market.

ATI has finally decided what it will call the R360 and now it's no secret anymore. ATI had two names for this technology from the beginning. One was Radeon 9900 PRO the only step left for this generation of cards, and the other the Radeon 9800XT.

Whether you just got a new PC with a DVD burner, or you bought a drive to add to your system, chances are you've run into the same roadblock as consumers everywhere: The availability of blank media from suppliers doesn't match the speed rating on your new drive.

Primera, a leading manufacturer of CD and DVD duplicators and printers, have announced it's integration of DVD-R and DVD+R recording formats for the Composer and Bravo lines of CD/DVD duplicators.

During the IFA press conference of the DVD+RW alliance we noticed that currently Toshiba and Panasonic are also listed as producers of DVD+RW drives. The two companies were both supporters of the DVD-RW format, and Panasonic is best known for promoting their DVD-RAM standard. Both companies have not joined the DVD+RW alliance, the group that is promoting the DVD+RW standard, but have bought the licenses to manufacture DVD+RW drives.

In the high-tech industry's ongoing quest to shrink electronics, Panasonic staked a claim Friday in the category of smallest camcorder. Panasonic announced it is the first to make a pocket-sized digital camcorder that can record DVD-quality video onto a removable flash memory card. The gadget, called the SV-AV100, is due to be available in October for $999.95 (£637).

Archos is about to release the AV300 series, the next generation of portable video/image/MP3 player based off of the Archos Jukebox Multimedia. Features include a 3.8" LCD screen for viewing movies and photos, FM tuner, MP3 playing and recording, 20GB or 40GB HD models, USB2.0 (optional Firewire) connection, TV-out, MPEG-4 encoding from a video/audio-in signal, digital photo (3.3 megapixel) and video camera, and much more.

The DVD+RW Alliance has announced 8-speed write specifications for its optical format, claiming the fastest current write speed in the world. Devices designed to the 8-speed specification will write at 88Mbits/sec, claims the association, taking less than 10 minutes to write a full disc. Currently the -R format is limited to 4-speed.

Pioneer Electronics has the solution to the high-end audio format war; just put them all in the same unit. The company has begun shipping the DV-563A, a universal DVD player that offers both DVD video, DVD-Audio and Sony's Super Audio CD (SACD) support, plus MP3 playback.

InterVideo has announced the first software solution that fully supports the DVD-Audio functionality of Creative Labs' Sound Blaster Audigy 2 series of sound cards. The DVD-Audio Pack will be an option in InterVideo's WinDVD 5 Gold and Platinum DVD player software.

Film fans are being ripped off over DVD prices, consumer watchdogs have warned. The falling cost of DVD players has sparked huge demand for the digital discs which are rapidly overtaking the popularity of video cassettes. But major retail outlets are deliberately keeping the cost of DVDs artificially high.

Warner Home Video, part of AOL Time Warner, the US media giant, is suing a UK-based internet company which it claims is involved in the distribution of DVD pirating software. The media company, which is behind recent box office hits such as The Perfect Storm, is seeking an injunction against HRC Distribution Limited, which would appear to be the company behind the distribution of DVD X Copy in Europe.

SunnComm has been working in the lab for the past few years to develop a way to prevent consumers from copying CDs while still retaining replay compatibility with most CD and DVD players. After several fits and starts, the company is reporting that its latest mutation, MediaMax CD-3, may be able to do the trick. Earlier this summer, SunnComm and BMG entered into an agreement to use MediaMax on CD releases worldwide.

Microsoft has won federal approval for a wireless adapter for its Xbox video game console that allows players to connect to the Internet without cabling, according to a posting on a regulatory Web site.

Verbatim have announced a new series of 52X CD-R and 32X CD-RW media. The comapany also announced new 8X DVD+R media available in the market by September 2003, and the first 8X DVD-R media, available one month later.

Sony announced that a new 650nm semiconductor laser diode is currently developed, allowing DVD recording speeds up to 16X. First samples of the new "SLD1236VL" series are planned to be available by December 2003, while mass production will start in June 2004. According to the company, current laser diodes used for Sony DVD recorders are capable of 8X recording.

The high court in Australia has thrown out an appeal by Sony Australia against legal costs on an earlier appeal loss in the Federal court.

Via a press release Elaborate Bytes, or Elby for short, announces that they have just released a completely new revised version of their CloneDVD software. Besides several bug fixes this new version adds a 'Quality Bar,' which should give users an idea of how much the compression of the data affects movie quality.

CD and DVD media manufacturer Ricoh has announced that they will release 8x DVD+R media in the 4th quarter of this year. The price of the media is unknown at present.