Las Vegas (NV) - Verbatim said it will offer 8x-speed DVD+RW media within the first quarter of this year. The new media will cut recording times for a full 4.7 GByte DVD+RW to about seven minutes. DVD+R DL will reach 8x speeds by the third quarter and record an 8.5 GByte DVD+R DL in about 16 minutes.

Verbatim is preparing to launch a new generation of DVD+RW media. The disc is developed for 8x recording speed (a maximum of 10,824 kByte per second) and is currently in its final stage of testing, the company said Wednesday.

The new DVD-RW is manufactured with a proprietary recording layer (Advanced Super Eutectic Recording Layer) developed by Verbatim's parent company Mitsubishi to provide "noise-free" recording for 1,000 times, according to Verbatim.

The 8x DVD+RW already is used by drive manufacturers and software developers for drive design and read/write as well as compatibility testing. Commercial availability of the media is expected for March of this year.

In a separate announcement Verbatim also promised 8x DVD+R Dual-Layer media for the third quarter of 2005. Achieving write speed of almost 11,000 kByte per second and an average speed of about 9000 kByte per second, according to Verbatim, the media can record data about 66 percent faster than the first generation 2.4x DVD+R DL disc.

With 8x speeds, the industry is rapidly approaching what is considered a physical limit of recording speeds for DVD media. In its current state, manufacturers believe that DVDs may only be capable of a maximum of 16x recording speeds (21,648 kByte per second). Increasing the speed beyond the 10,000 rpm at 16x may crack the polycarbonate material of the DVD disc, industry sources said.