Optical Storage Types: HD-DVD
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HD-DVD stands for either High Density Digital Versatile Disc or High Definition Digital Video Disc, and is a digital optical media format similar to the Blu-ray disc, its main competitor.
History
On November 2003, the DVD Forum decided that the DVD's high-definition TV successor would be HD-DVD. Prior to the decision, the optical disc format was called the Advanced Optical Disc.
Presently, leading the camp of HD-DVD adopters are Toshiba, NEC, Sanyo, the DVD Forum, Microsoft, and Intel from the IT industry, and Universal Studios, Warner Brothers, New Line Cinema, and Paramount Pictures from the entertainment industry.
Toshiba released the first HD-DVD player in Japan on March 31, 2006; the US release followed shortly on mid-April. On May 2006, the company released the first PC equipped with an HD-DVD drive. In addition, a number of films have already been released on HD-DVD, such as The Last Samurai, The Bourne Supremacy, and Van Helsing; as of May 2006, over 20 titles have already been released.
The Basics
A single-sided HD-DVD can hold 15 GB of storage, while a dual-sided one can store 30 GB. The medium's main proponent, Toshiba, has announced a triple-sided disc than can hold 45 GB. The HD-DVD's size is similar to that of the CD and the DVD – 120 mm in diameter.
The disc uses the same 405 nm wavelength blue layer employed by the Blu-ray disc. While the HD-DVD's 36Mbps bandwidth throughput is more than three times greater than the DVD's (which stands at 11.1 Mbps), it is inferior to Blu-ray's (54 Mbps).
HD-DVDs are meant to use the iHD Interactive Format, which will allow interactive content to be written for these discs. Its Blu-ray counterpart is the HDMV.
Strengths and Weaknesses
A lot of major players in the movie industry support the HD-DVD format, which only bodes well for its cause. Of course, let's not forget that the disc is endorsed by the DVD Forum itself, further lending credence to its status. Aside from having cheaper production costs than Blu-ray discs, HD-DVDs are also backward compatible – all HD-DVD players can play old DVDs, which is certainly a big boon for consumers. On the other hand, the HD-DVD suffers from lower bandwidth throughput compared with Blu-ray's astounding performance stats.
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