New Blu-ray Disc Spins At 15,000rpm
Posted: Wed May 30, 2007 3:18 pmI don't think this technology will ever make its way to consumers, but its pretty slick.
http://www.digitalartsonline.co.uk/news ... ewsID=7982
http://www.digitalartsonline.co.uk/news ... ewsID=7982
Engineers at the Science and Technical Research Laboratories (STRL) of Japan's public broadcaster, NHK (Nippon Hoso Kyokai), are working on an optical disc recording system based on consumer Blu-ray Disc technology that can spin as fast as 15,000rpm without these problems and demonstrated it last week.
It's needed because broadcast quality HDTV signals of the type NHK records stream at 250Mbps, making a fast-spinning optical disc a necessity. A 1x Blu-ray Disc records at 36Mbps so the new system is equivalent to 7x speed.
NHK has gotten around the stress problem by making a flexible disc that is just 0.1mm thick. The disc, which was co-developed with Ricoh, is essentially the recording layer from a Blu-ray Disc without the 1.1mm plastic substrate that is used to give the disc rigidity. It won't break apart at higher speeds but is not rigid enough to be useful in a drive at any speed.
To solve this second problem a thick stabilizing plate has been added into the drive. When spun, the disc is kept steady by the stabilizer and can be used up to 15,000rpm, said Daiichi Koide [cq], an engineer at NHK STRL.