Toshiba buys into Optware's holographic storage plans

Optware, the company working to develop terabyte-class holographic discs, has received an influx of capital from Toshiba, which should give it a boost as it gears up to get its first generation of next generation discs (which will have a mere 100-200GB of capacity) to market. Of course, we're sure this means that Sony is inevitably going to invest in Optware competitor InPhase, guaranteeing that the format wars for next-next-gen storage and media platforms will continue just about forever. Makes sense, if you think about it.

[Dennis - Help me fight for my son @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

There is already a format war for the next next generation.. GEEZ, wait til BluRay and HD-DVD format wars are done!

[Shawn @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

1: No kidding, us not even being able to look at bluRay or HD-DVD players without handing over $600. I don't blame engadget we blame Sony and Toshiba come on people lets get this settled and start lowering these prices

[Michael @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I'm not so sure that Optware is completely in the Toshiba camp - if you look at their site both the CEO and "Chief Evangelist" of Optware are guys who had long careers at Sony. Also their current investors already include Fujifilm and Matsushita (Panasonic) so Toshiba's investment is not that big a deal.

[OddManOut @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I don't know if this is really a bad thing...

Consider that none of use have yet spent a dime on either blu-ray or HD-DVD (although judging by the venility of some of the comment threads on the subject, the EMOTIONAL investment has been astronomical for some). So if this new 200gb media becomes available soon we can perhaps skip the comparitively miniscule sub 50gb media and move on to bigger or better things w/out anyone having to have brand new hardware/software go obsolete in less than a year.

Basically, I'd rather have this holographic storage stuff come out 6 months before the new disc formats do than six months after so I don't waste money on somthing that will be WAY out by next year.

This would probably disapoint PS3 enthusiasts more than anyone else, since it will detract slightly from their bragging rights. But If Sony's gonna go so far as to release UMD movies, I think it's a fairly sure bet that they will release Blu-Ray movies as well if BR isn't the dominant media.

Of course, it remains to be seen what this holographic storage suite will COST the end user...

[cecil @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Screw that, If I can use this instead of Magnetic Tape for backup, this needs to come out now, 200GB will do just nicely, and they can start working on increasing the density funded by sales.

[Ray @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I completly agree with #4. In my mind there should be no blu-ray vs. hddvd -- the next media format should be holographic. If this stuff is a year after the 50gb stuff im waiting... plsu look how cool the little disks are!!

[Jon @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I could care less about blu-ray or hddvd. Widescreen up sampled DVD's, and MPEG4/DivX files are good enough for me. I'd much rather have something with NO MOVING PARTS and a giant leap in storage capacity. What do you "really" gain by blu-ray/hddvd compaired to what is available today? (not enough in my opinion) The benifits of holographic sounds like a big enough reason to upgrade. The world of spinning disk days are almost over!

[MrFloppy @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Now I prefer these instead of the DVD-esque next gen.

[Samuel Lago @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I confess I need this storage right about now. But think about it for a moment, do you really want 1.6TB of your information on removable media, a 'detatched HDD'?!

How will you enjoy that content? How will you search it and access it at will. This will be good for backing up files but the real thing to get excited about will be when HDD hit the multiple TB mark.

Or just give me a PetaByte and be done with it.

[Jonathan @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I personally don't see this Holographic Media disc format catching on.
Firstly, I don't know the access speed of the drive. It would be one thing if this thing could access data as quickly as a typical DVD player but somehow, I don't see this working much faster than a ZIP drive. If thats the case, this device would only be good for data archival.

Secondly, I don't think this device could be marketed at a price competing with the current Dual Layer DVD drives and their media.
A typical Memory Jump Drive still costs around $50 so I suppose something like this would have to be $500 or more.

As for the DVD war, I'm still betting on BLURAY. People are going to pick storage capacity over quality.

the problem with HD-DVD is convincing people that the HDDVD will be so much better than current DVD's. Frankly, I'm very happy with the quality of current DVD's. In fact, I own a SONY Plasma TV and I personally don't buy into the High Definition craze either. I'm very happy with my current video quality and I don't see myself changing to anything that claims to look better. However, the storage capacity issue does bother me in terms of current DVD's. I'd love to get more than an hour on my DVD handycam. I see myself online for the first or second wave of BLURAY DVD camcorders.

[mr.karmalicious @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

The readers for the disc cost about $1000. The discs are actually only a dollar each.

[Tom W @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I'm really getting tired of burning DVD backups of my constantly growing 50GB (at the moment) mp3 collection. A cheap, high capacity, removable media is what I need. External hard drives fall short due to the fact that they are still vulnerable to fire or theft. I need a cheap, convenient backup that I can put in my bank safe deposit box. Holographic looks like the ticket. I hope business realities don't bury another superior technology.

[totalundone @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

i think what's most important concerning the HVD media is how much does the media cost? I have no idea on how much blank DVDs cost, but i'm going to guess that it would be in the cents. No industry will take up HVD media if the actual media costs a lot.

As far as BluRay and HDDVD are concerned, they're already outdated.

[Stephen Searer @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

>External hard drives fall short due to the fact
>that they are still vulnerable to fire or theft.

Not to get too nit-picky, but wouldn't "cheap, high capacity, removable media" be just as vulnerable to theft and fire as an external hard drive?

[010111 @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

"12. Posted Jul 19, 2005, 1:39 AM ET by totalundone

i think what's most important concerning the HVD media is how much does the media cost?"

from a previous posting about this technology it was stated that the drives themselves were quite spendy (like $2000) but the media itself was dirt dirt dirt cheap. like literally $2/per.

i seriously can't wait. this would be great for monthly offsite backup archival.

i'm more curious about write/read speed. and i never do remember seeing if it was write-once or rewriteable.

[Piko @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Price is always going to come down. How many naysayers have decried this in the past?

Can anyone really argue that they have *too* much storage?

[Qazar @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I want a YottaByte storagemedium, so I can begin to catalogise my brains atoms. And after that I'll be searching for that one mp3 file I downloaded til it's year 3005.

[Brad @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Optware's HVD drives can also read HD DVDs, DVDs, and CDs...

[Tom W @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

"Not to get too nit-picky, but wouldn't "cheap, high capacity, removable media" be just as vulnerable to theft and fire as an external hard drive?" -Stephen Searer

Stephen,
Not if you kept it at a different location than your computer. It doesn't matter where. Your car, your mother's house, your bank safe deposit box, your office desk, anyplace except the same building where your computer is. The odds of your computer AND your backup copy at another location BOTH being lost at the same time are remote.

[Shenook @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Well my 2cents. From the data from the two companies websites and forums and holographic naysayer forums I've come to the conclusion that the general consensus is this.

The Data cards can go up to 1tb each and with multi-card readers you could have as many as you want to read at once.

The second item is that it will be much faster than dvd or cd due to the fact there is no spinning media. All done by multiple-lasers or whatnot.

Third though is data integrity. Until they perfect the integrity factor the backup factor is not up to par yet. You can get bad data on these currently.

Yes they will be expensive at first and so will the media but......it's only cause it's new. Each card can be produced (theoretically) at less than a $1 each. Eventually reading prices of dvd media currently.

Fourth, this media won't see a day of light in the consumer market until at least 2007 and more likely 2008 as long as vaporware isn't produced in the interim.

[Troy Daniels @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Holographic Search times will be faster than magnetic ... thats all i have to say about that come on sony buy out inphase **crosses fingers**