GE Shows Off 1TB DVD-Sized Disks at the Emerging Tech Conference

(PhysOrg.com) -- At the September '09 Emerging Tech Conference in Boston, GE announced it has been developing a 1TB DVD size disk that can be read by a modified Blu-ray player.

The first products using this technology will be 1TB drives used for archival storage. GE expects this to reach the market in two to three years with another two or more year before it's available to consumers.

GE is anticipating that this technology can store an entire 3D move that would be impossible to store on current blu-ray disk. The holographic drives will have a 3ms access time and data transfer rates up to five times faster than a DVD.

Holographic storage involves holograms, images of data being stored in layers on a DVD size disk. The drives work by splitting a laser beam into a reference beam and a signal beam, which is encoded with data. By crossing the two beams an interference pattern is created which is then stored on the disk.

Older versions of holographic drives store pages of a million bits stacked ten thousand deep at hundreds of locations on a disk. GE researchers discovered by reducing the page size to a single bit, called micro holograms, they could store as much data per unit area but was much easier to read. It turns out that the upper data layers can be read by a standard Blu-ray player and by slightly increasing the tracking range of the Blu-ray read head all layers can be accessed.

GE is planning to license the technology to manufactures for construction of the drives and disk. Peter Lorraine, GE lab manager stated at the Emerging Tech Conference, that license announcements could be expected soon.

Via: The Inquirer and The Register

© 2009 PhysOrg.com

   

• flashgordon - Sep 30, 2009
  • Rank: 3 / 5 (6)
  I don't even know what I need such a disk for! Still, it's kind of nice to know such a technology exists! It kind of reminds me of the "Forbidden Planet" technology; i mean technology is getting there! Maybe, I could have all of my James Burke video's on one disk!? Or, maybe, all the mechanical universe, or Universe: the Infinit Frontier could all be had on one disk!? I'm thinking maybe I should wait till then!?
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• Dhan - Sep 30, 2009
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  GE has healthcare services and this is a good DVD to store the DICOM imges as back ups
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• Graeme - Sep 30, 2009
  • Rank: 4.5 / 5 (4)
  Yes it would be great to back up the 1TB hard drive
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• MorituriMax - Sep 30, 2009
  • Rank: 3.7 / 5 (3)
  I know what I need it for. Data Backup. If 1) they can let you use them to store ANY kind of data on, 2) they are affordable enough to match the price of blank DVDs, and 3) they are stable enough to store for long periods of time, then I'll become a silent partner in the darn company.
  
  If so, sign me UP!
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• NeptuneAD - Oct 01, 2009
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  @flashgordon Seriously dude, at the moment the only option to backup large amounts of data is on another HDD.
  
  This technology will be well used, I for one have several TB, try backing that up on standard DVDs or Blu-ray discs, it would take several weeks and you would have to compress a lot of it.
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• Nartoon - Oct 01, 2009
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  The key to all this is price! How much for the 'modified' Blu-ray writer, several hundred dollars in todays market. And the DVDs will cost in the $10's each. If you're lucky enough to be in Canada they tax the blank media that can be used to record illegal music, with 1T the tax would be enormous.
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• akhiltuffy - Oct 01, 2009
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  the only thing i can think of is , GOD quality VVVVVVVVVVVVHD movies and sounds , but with tht we would require the quality if televsion etc. systems too ,also probably a lot of movies on it ....i mean a LOT .
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• Velanarris - Oct 01, 2009
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  The key to all this is price! How much for the 'modified' Blu-ray writer, several hundred dollars in todays market. And the DVDs will cost in the $10's each. If you're lucky enough to be in Canada they tax the blank media that can be used to record illegal music, with 1T the tax would be enormous.

  
  This isn't for home use yet. This is enterprise storage media, replacing old unreliable DAT.
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• otto1923 - Oct 01, 2009
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  don't even know what I need such a disk for!

  Increases in info storage capacity will allow routine recording of bigger slices of our lives. Instead of shooting an hour or so of a family vacation we will shoot the whole 5 day trip. We will record classes in school and intelligent progs will distill out the necessary info. We will eventually record our entire lives as we see the shocking inferiority of our brain-based memories.
  
  Our memories will become links to records we can totally rely on forever- sights, sounds, biometry, thoughts, feelings, etc.
  
  These disks are a step to caching your lives for selective, high fidelity replay.
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• otto1923 - Oct 01, 2009
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  @velanarris Sir
  Stretch your brain like Mr. Fantastic. 'Yet' is tomorrow. I remember discussing a 5 dimensional disk storage tech story (here?) in the spring and someone said 'soon meant 10 years.' And now we are shown this. Progress is now a parabola, feeding on itself.
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• Velanarris - Oct 02, 2009
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  And now we are shown this. Progress is now a parabola, feeding on itself.

  
  It always has been.
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• MorituriMax - Oct 03, 2009
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  As long as the price for the media is anywhere near the cost of a DVD I would buy it. I'd even buy them if they were 3 to 4 times the cost of a blank DVD, just the time saved of only needing to backup a fraction of the disks needed now would be worth the extra premium cost.
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• Sonhouse - Oct 04, 2009
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  The key to all this is price! How much for the 'modified' Blu-ray writer, several hundred dollars in todays market. And the DVDs will cost in the $10's each. If you're lucky enough to be in Canada they tax the blank media that can be used to record illegal music, with 1T the tax would be enormous.

  
  
  So how much is a blank DVD in Canada? You could probably calculate the upcoming price of these super DVD's then. I wonder if they are DVD ROM or DVD RAM, can you erase and re-record? The price should come down in any event, the price of Bluray is already following the same path as the rest of the digital recording market. It would seem this product would be only for industrial use but memory products have a habit of finding its way into the commercial market as well when new aps are invented that takes more and more memory. These DVD's will be in everyone's lives soon.
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• El_Nose - Oct 05, 2009
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  everyone is talking data backup but you missed the commercial properties... studios are spending 50 million dollars to convert each movie to 3D. These remakes take up a lot of extra space so in the event of release a 3D Toy Story like the one that just hit theaters this week you need blu-ray to be a little bit bigger.
  
  Granted the storage is awesome but seriously they created TB optical disks a long time ago. wiki HD DVD its pretty impressive.
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• El_Nose - Oct 05, 2009
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  --- correction to earlier post -- wiki Holographic Versatile Disc -- HVD
  
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