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Panasonic Announces 216 Mb/s Blu-ray Media

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Tokyo (Japan) - Panasonic claims that it is first to have succeeded in developing 6x Blu-ray write-once media, featuring a stunning data transfer speed of 216 Mbit/sec., which is almost 30-percent faster than a 16x DVD and almost four times quicker than a 48x CD drive.

The race to increase data reading and recording speeds on optical media has hit another milestone as Panasonic said that it will be rolling out 6X BD-R media in July. 6X translates into a data transfer rate of 6 x 36 Mbit/sec. or a total of 216 Mbit/sec. (roughly 27MB/sec).

Compared to previous optical media, the media are substantially faster than 16x DVDs, which achieved 169 Mbit/sec. (21.1 MB/sec.) and 48X CDs that offered a maximum transfer rate of 56 Mbit/sec. (7 MB/sec.). The next speed upgrade, however, is already on the horizon. Researchers are looking for ways to enable optical discs at up to 15,000 rpm (current discs support a maximum of 10,000 rpm) and data transfer rates of up to 250 Mbit/sec.

There are no changes in terms of capacity: The 6x Media will be offered in 25 GB and 50 GB versions. However, Panasonic limits the availability of these media initially to Japan and said that it plans to commercialize 6x media in Japan by the end of September 2008.

7 Comments Comment from the forums
  • SykaSirKits 21 June 2008 07:37
    WOW that is awesome. Maybe I should take out a second mortgage now so I could buy a blu-ray burner and 100 of these disks. Or perhaps I will wait until they become as commonplace as DVD drives and companies stop hyping "theoretical" transfer speeds that will never be seen on common configurations in any generation of optical media in the near future.
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  • liemfukliang 21 June 2008 08:46
    I hope this 6x is TRUE Speed like 6x DVD or 6x CD, not just marketing speed like 52x CD, or 16x DVD. And I hope the bluray media at least in sigle layer will be at IDR 4000 :D.
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  • nukemaster 21 June 2008 11:57
    Like all optical disks i am sure the 6x (27megabytes per second) is on the outer rim. Its all marketing...
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  • Wheat_Thins 23 June 2008 19:39
    nukemasterLike all optical disks i am sure the 6x (27megabytes per second) is on the outer rim. Its all marketing...
    BluRay uses a constant read rate; I wonder if this transfers over to write rate? The speed for reading is exactly the same at the first sector as it is the last sector.
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  • nukemaster 23 June 2008 20:44
    Well thats news. They must slow down the disk as it gets farther along.
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  • aleluja 23 June 2008 22:14
    DVD's can be written in CLV mode at speeds up to 6x. Starting from the 8x it uses CAV (constat angular velocity) method all the way up to 20x. The average speed to write a full DVD at 16x is 12x.

    Tho, it is possible to write in CLV mode at 8x, but i doubt it is possible at higher speeds.
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  • nukemaster 24 June 2008 05:10
    or too loud. i just never did see many drives writing that way(most do CAV, but i burn at max, so i guess thats why.)
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