CDRLabs.com

Hitachi-LG Data Storage has announced that they've developed the industry's first 4x Blu-ray Disc drive. Here's part of their press release:

Hitachi-LG Data Storage (under CEO Kazuya Hori) has developed the half-height Blu-ray disc drive GBW-H10N for built-in use in PCs that achieves 4x high-speed recording for the first time in the industry. Production is slated to begin in late July 2006.

This product or so-called super-multi Blu-ray disc drive can record and play back Blu-ray format discs BD-R and BD-RE, play back BD-ROM, record and play back all-format DVDs (DVD-RAM/R/RW, +R/RW), as well as CD-R and CD-RW, and play back DVD-ROM and CD-ROM.

The GBW-H10N can record and play back 25GB large-capacity Blu-ray discs BD-R and BD-RE suitable for storing high-quality images. For BD-R in particular, this product achieves quadrupled data transfer speed as fast as 144 Mbps for the first time in the industry. Video data saved on a HDD can be transferred to a disc and a large volume of data backed up in a short time. Moreover, the BD-RE 2x recording speed is realized as the currently highest speed in the industry.

No word on pricing. As we find out more, we'll let you know. In the mean time, Hitachi-LG Data Storage's entire press release can be found here.