Optware takes it international

Here's one for the venture capitalists in the house — Optware, the developer of the HVD and HVC (Holographic Versatile Disc, Card) formats, has announced they're launching a division over here in America. Both mediums use Optware's patented "collinear technology" to store data using holograms, which in the case of HVD, allows for a 1TB capacity on a disc the size of a standard DVD. Optware says the theoretical maximum capacity of the discs is 3.9TB, and the transfer rate sits at about 1Gbps. They're the real deal; sitting on the "HVD Alliance" with Optware are much bigger names such as FujiFilm, Toshiba, Alps, and Verbatim (a.k.a. Mitsubishi Kagaku Media). The company is currently looking for venture capitalists and partners, so: buy low, sell high.

[Via Impress Watch]

[3rdsun @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

put me down for 2000 shares

[evo @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

Who wants cool holographic storage in boring old disk and card form factors? Give me shiny, transparent crystal cubes of terabyte goodness. But please, put a coating on it so it doesn't scratch like the Nano.

[Burger @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

Please let's have caddies on these things finally. Then lower the error correction rate, that way we have more data and never have to worry about scratched disks either. Best of both worlds eh?

[Sean @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

And the winner of the new format wars is!...

not blu-ray or HD-DVD
=P

I always though both were too small of an increment to actually be much more usefull then DVDs. The last standard we had before CD was effen floppy disks. aprox. 500 fold increase from the previous generation. I believe it will take a format with atleast 100gig of storage before It becomes the new standard. Perhaps they could turn this format into a 200gb stick of gum form-factor and drop the price to $500 today. I think everyone would buy that eventually (esp when drive prices reach < $100.

[John @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Backing up has never been easier!!!

[Beyond @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

"Please let's have caddies on these things finally. Then lower the error correction rate, that way we have more data and never have to worry about scratched disks either. Best of both worlds eh?"

They probably won't even need caddies, if they can developed a protective coating like TDK did for the Blu-Ray which can even resist a scratch from a screw driver.

[Homer. @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

I can't wait till I have a nedia player that uses this technology. I wouldn't mind a 12 inch screen I had to carry around to watch/listen/see whatever I want.

[hemmy @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

"I believe it will take a format with atleast 100gig of storage before It becomes the new standard."

The Blu-ray spec calls for up to 8 layers (200 gigs). Last I read 4 layers (100 gigs) was already prototyped in the lab (months ago).

[Itaintrite @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

Incremental increase is the only way to make the format popular FAST. A 3tB disk is very attractive, but casual ppl don't HAVE 3tB to burn, not even 1 heh. And imagine the cost of it :)

[magnetism87 @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

1 TB of space. 1 Gbps (small b) = 128 MBps. To burn 1 disk will take 8000 seconds(2+ hours)!

[blakholephysics @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

i don't think i would really mind 2 hours to burn a TB. right now it takes what.. 10min to burn a dvd? single layer at least. so multiply 10 by 200 or so and get a tb. and you don't have to switch dvd's in between.

[zone @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

"1 TB of space. 1 Gbps (small b) = 128 MBps. To burn 1 disk will take 8000 seconds(2+ hours)!"

How much time do you think It will take to reach that 1 TB in the first place :/ anyway, 2 hours for 1 TB ain't bad at all..

[al bert @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

1 TB of space. 1 Gbps (small b) = 128 MBps. To burn 1 disk will take 8000 seconds(2+ hours)

Before nagging about a 2+hours of burning, please
show us your current TB of data and where is it stored,

Have YOU got 2 500 gb HDD OF DATA already?

[zneroL @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

WOW!!!!! and when will these become available to the public?

[dan warriner @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

i want a Tb in my iphone

[chris @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

if the people at microsoft WERE smart they would use this type of storage as an external drive insead of hd-dvd's like they are doing right now.

let me knowwhat u think everone.

next gen = $$$ expensive

[jack @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

I cant wait untill we have so much space we dont have to delete anything...

[tha rook @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

-magnetism87
"1 TB of space. 1 Gbps (small b) = 128 MBps. To burn 1 disk will take 8000 seconds(2+ hours)!"

um u do realize that 1 TB = 1000 Gb.....how fast do u really think u would fill that up. the majority of people dont even have enough files to fill up a TB neway. so 2 hours really aint all that bad.

but really.....how much is this thing gonna cost?

[Fire Hazard @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

cost is everything. I wonder how fast the read speed is. If the write speed is 1Gb per second then the read speed must be more. If you could get rw media for this I would buy one and use it for a media server that would be sweet. I want a TiVo with 1TB, watch 1000s of hours of HDTV or a life time of standard definition!

[Tyler Verkade @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

According to Business Week, the Blu-Ray disk can hold about 50 gigs of data. Isn't it quite a jump to go from 50GB to 1024GB? I mean, it is just a bit hard to believe that this could be released when the biggest disk we have now is about a twentieth of what you are proposing. Most of us do not even have a terabyte of information on our servers.

[William @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

This is funny! I just say this posted over at the PS3 forums and all the Sony fanboys are crying, "Pfft... BR is still better, I mean really who needs a TB? Microsft sucks!" Or something. But that is interesting... However... I remember in the Guiness Book of World Records 2001, that there was a disk format that could hold 200 GB... I wonder whatever happened to that... Sure a TB is way more, but it was 200 GB (or so) in 2001! So just after the time that DVDs were becoming Mainstream they already had a 200 GB disk... and now that Blu-Ray and HD-DVD with their 50 GB size (give or take a bunch) they already have a TB disk... tsk tsk... technology is really moving too fast...

[stufferino @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

is this company actually going public?
if someone knows, can they put up the quote symbol?

[williedigital @ Dec 19th 2005 2:28AM]

i have 3 tb... stored as jbod arrays. 5x200gb drives on three machines.