American electronics company Pioneer has announced that its new generation optical disc drive, the BDR-101A, which is spearheaded by Sony, will be widely available in the first quarter of next year.
This will not be a budget-friendly drive for everyone. The market Pioneer is targeting is professional content creators – those who need to ensure that BD-ROM films will function smoothly before they are mass-produced and distributed to consumers.
The Pioneer drive can record BD discs at a speed of 2x. Additionally, it can record DVD-R and DVD+R at 8x, as well as DVD-RW and DVD+RW at 4x. The company will announce the price only when the device hits the market.
The Blu-ray drive is in fierce competition with the HD-DVD drive. Both types of drives utilize blue laser technology to read and write information on a small surface area, allowing for more data to be stored on a single disc. This is particularly important as high-definition video becomes more popular.
However, the Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats are not compatible with each other, leading to an intense battle between the two factions and inadvertently slowing down consumer acceptance as they wait to determine which standard will prevail.
