Acer's next Aspire desktops to sport Blu-ray and HD DVD players

[Thanks, Adam P.]
supermultiblue posts

We've known that LG has had an internal Blu ray burner / HD DVD player combo drive in the works for some time now, but the company has just now let loose the first pics of the format-agnostic device, as well as presumably final release date, in anticipation of its official unveiling at CeBIT. Of course, being an internal drive, there isn't a heckuva lot to see, but those side by side logos should be more than enough to impress anyone looking closely enough. Equally impressive is the price, with the drive, dubbed the GGW-H10N "Super Multi Blue," set to demand a hefty $1,200 when it rolls out in May. While the release date's been changed slightly, the drives specs don't appear to have been, with the same 4x recording speed for Blu ray discs, and write speeds between 6x and 10x for the usual line-up of DVD formats.
Not to be outdone with just a combination set-top Blu-ray/HD DVD player, LG has also announced the GGW-H10N combo standalone drive for computers. The drive -- which presumably incorporates the same Broadcom integrated chipset as the BH100 -- can read both blue-laser formats, but only writes to Blu-ray or standard DVDs and CDs. According to the LG press event from Sunday, the PC drive will support all iHD functionality for HD DVD titles, whereas the set-top box will not due to hardware limitations. The SATA drive is set to be released before the end of January for $1200.
LG is all over the dual-format optical game this next week. In addition to the HD DVD + Blu-ray combo player they just announced, they also touting a new Super Multi Blue dual-format drive for PCs. Not only will the GGW-H10N playback your Blu-ray Disc, DVD, CD, and HD DVD media, it'll also record -- yes record -- up to 50GB of data to dual-layer BD-R/BD-RE media. You also get 4x recording to 25GB single-layer BD-R discs -- doubling the industry's standard rate. The drive is also the first to support "SecurDisc" technology co-developed with Nero. That gives you the ability to secure your burns with password encryption, digital signature, checksum integrity checker for sharing data securely and with peace of mind. Expect the new drive to ship before March in the US for about $1,200 -- a worthwhile, convenience premium when compared to purchasing a $760 dual-layer Blu-ray burner and $199 Xbox 360 HD DVD drive (and all appropriately applied magic) separately. No pictures yet (that's their older, Blu-ray burner pictured) but will slap one up as soon LG sees fit to release them.





