Blu-ray Disc Specs Due This Year

The Blu-ray Disc Association is optimistic about adoption of its vision for the next-generation optical disc. The promotional promotional group represents the 13 companies backing Blu-ray Disc (BD), one of the formats vying with HD-DVD (High Definition/High Density-DVD) to become the standard. A representative stopped by PC World recently to talk about the group's progress.

Already, two BD recorders are available?but you?ll have to cross the Pacific to find them. Sony and Panasonic are both selling models in Japan, but these expensive (about $3000) units are for playing back conventional DVDs and recording high-definition video only. When pressed BD-ROM disc content rolls out in the next couple of years, neither recorder will be able to play these discs. That?s because the full spectrum of the BD spec is still being finalized, says Richard Doherty, director of professional AV at Panasonic. While the capacity is now firmed up (25GB for write-once, rewritable, and BD-ROM), the video codec is not. Current recorders record MPEG-2 content; future recorders will support some other video codec. "We plan to make a decision on the advanced video codec soon," says Doherty. And Doherty expects the spec to be final by the end of the year.

If the Blu-ray format sticks to that timeline, Doherty says, it will be some time before we see products that support the full spec. "We expect the earliest launch of products to be at the end of 2005 or early 2006," he reports.

Blu-ray?s proponents include Panasonic, Pioneer, Samsung, Sony, Thomson, and Philips; NEC and Toshiba are backing HD-DVD.

There are some advantages to the Blu-ray format biding its time. In a couple of years, Hollywood content may start becoming available; plus, the manufacturing cost for producing media will come down from the stratosphere, to within 10 percent of what it will cost to produce DVDs, Doherty says.

But if you?re like me, and yearn to record the Athens Olympic Games in high-def, well, you want 2006 to be here today.

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