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Blu-Ray's Time Is Short: Holography Is Where The Money's At

April 27, 2009 in Blog comments 17

William Usher of Blend Games discusses why "Blu" might not be the way that the next gaming consoles are headed. The future might be a little more "Star Wars" than you had expected...

The NY Times recently ran an article about a General Electric science and research team and their findings of storage capacity in the medium of holography. This isn’t particularly new news, given that holography has been around for ages. However, what it is new about these findings is that they can use holographic optical media to maintain data storage equivalent to 100 standard DVDs.
RKRigney via cinemablend.com »
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  • 1
    Red 9* Apr 28, 09
    If I have to buy another player for this, no thanks. People are spending enough on DVD and Blu-Ray players, we don't need another format to clutter the market with...
    • 0
      Fury Apr 28, 09
      You'll probably come around to it... or you'll have to come around to it, I should say. DVDs became obsolete with the introduction of HD. Blu-Rays will probably become obsolete for a similar reason, whether its even higher resolution television, or even 3D holograms.
      • 1
        HisServant77 Apr 29, 09
        Kyle, DVDs have NOT become obsolete. In fact, DVDs are still more popular and more widely used than any HD Media such as BD. And I believe this will continue to be the fact until BDs become equal in price as DVDs, and at least 70-75% of the TVs in our homes are HDTVs. Believe it or not, but the majority of consumers have NOT switched over the HD. For the simple fact that it's not the easiest transition to enjoy. Sure, buy an HDTV. But you won't get HD unless you get an HD signal from the cable/sattelite, or from an HD media player such as HD DVD or BD or some sort of upscaler. Then you'll have to have the proper wires/connections which the average person is oblivious to. Then you'll get a nice picture, sure. But then you'll also have to have the proper sound system to enjoy the sound as well so that you get the right value.

        It's not like other jumps in media which weren't so specific to the upgrade that it required more than just the player to fully enjoy it. (Ex: cassette to CD = just buy the CD player. VHS to DVD = just buy the DVD player. DVD to HD experience (HDDVD/BD/upscaler) = buy HDTV, Wires, Sound system, and the player (plus the no-how you need to set it up and tweak the settings for the full experience). )

        Understand what I mean?
        • 0
          Fury May 2, 09
          "Obsolete" was just a poor choice of words on my part. Doesn't change the fact that you still can't fit an HD movie on a DVD, and something similar will probably happen to Blu-Ray.
        • 0
          HisServant77 May 2, 09
          Well, talking about BD being out-spaced by other media/discs, that's inevitable yeah. But for entertainment purposes such as games and movies, I doubt it will be done for that reason. The next step for entertainment (movies) would be holographic or 3-D or so. The next step for entertainment (games) would be --- in my opinion --- not giving more space on disc, but working more on faster read/write speeds so that loading times will become very minimal to none (And devs will be able to load more things at once if they wish to go that route).

          But . . . all these things are speculation. Who knows what will come next. I don't know why but I honestly believe we'll be seeing more of a move not toward disc-media, but memory sticks and the like as a major thing. Odd and void of reasoning, but just a thought I imagine.
  • 3
    Mr Gray Apr 28, 09
    This is *bleep*ing old news. This info has been known/released since we heard of blu-ray. Point is, it's still far from mass-producable. It'll take, but in another decade or more. We still haven't tapped 3d gaming, which is the next visual step-up.
    • 1
      anacreon Apr 28, 09
      and what a step up it will be... hopefully. anyway new huge jumps in technology always needs a few decades to make it compact, and cost friendly enough to sell to the mass market as well as getting rid of the problems.
  • 0
    HisServant77 Apr 28, 09
    I highly, highly doubt they'd do something like this for the next consoles. EXCEPT for Sony. Sony seem to aim for using media that is not the norm but the "future norm." Or what they hope will be the future norm.

    But even that is highly unlikely. I believe the consoles will be BD, except for Sony. What will Sony use? Haven't a clue. There's still so many years in between, that many different media mediums could appear. But I doubt these game systems are going to look for larger capacity mediums for their games. There's only so many GBs to aim for in a game medium until it just becomes ridiculous and completely wasteful. No, I think they're going to head to faster transfer/read rates for their game media.
  • 0
    Slumpy monkey Apr 28, 09
    Companies who are creating HVD disks aren't aiming for a mass market at the moment, there just aiming for companies and the like. I'd say its a good 5-10 years before we see the start of this.
  • 1
    DragoniteBallZ Apr 28, 09
    The thing about BluRay though is it brought nothing but technical improvements and nothing practical. Which is probably why BluRay is so slow to take over and if this HVC takes over, Bluray won't take over at all. People care more about the practical improvements. And BluRay doesn't improve over DVDs as far as practicality is concerned. To those who are non tech savvy, and never cared to check out what digital TV is all about, it's just a more expensive disc.

    That's why CDs were able to take over cassetes and DVDs take over VHS. No need to rewind. You can fast forward to the next music track or chapter in a mover with the click of a button. People embraced discs because of that - it added a new level of practicality. Not because the sound or picture was clearer or the increase in storage capacity.

    The thing about HVC is it's the size of a credit card. Can contains more memory more than DVDs and BluRays. Scores of gigabytes can be read in less than a second rather than only one piece of data can be read at a time by 1 lens while the disc spins. Saves energy because there's no motor having to spin a bulky disc. I think if anything is going to take over it's this. mainly because it adds another level of practicality and that's what sells storage mediums into the mainstream
    • 1
      Armed Rebel Apr 28, 09
      You denounce technical improvements but then mention storage space and read speed of an "HVC"?


      You're silly.


      I agree with your point though. Blu Ray to DVD is nowhere near the same as DVD to VHS or CD to cassette. Blu ray's (and any high definition movie format) success is tied to the success of HDTVs. People have to get HDTVs to want HD movies. The cost of blu ray players is also a factor. I've got an HDTV but a $200-300 (I have no idea what the actual cost is, but I'm guess they're still high?) Blu ray player isn't worth it.
      • 0
        DragoniteBallZ Apr 29, 09
        quote Armed Rebel
        You denounce technical improvements but then mention storage space and read speed of an "HVC"?


        You're silly.
        Oh that's somewhat a practical improvement too though. With read speeds like that there's no loading to wait on(except maybe someday when some program or game needs to read a terabyte of date at a time), it's quieter, it's more compact. But point being, it's aspects like those that win over consumers. Not the same thing with the only increase being data capacity. But same read speed, same level of portability.
    • 2
      Onvacation Apr 29, 09
      Uh what, HDV disks have to spin like every other disc, and the data needs to be read by a Green and blue/red laser so if anything it uses up more energy. so i don't understand your reasoning there.

      and lol. Your the only person i've ever seen who describes DVDs as bulky xD
  • 1
    Livewire_19 Apr 28, 09
    They speculate that the Xbox 720 and PS4 may have this, but it's really Nintendo that's interested in holographic discs.

    http://www.gamegrep.com/industry_news/12098-nintendo_looking_to_holographic_data_storage/

    Wouldn't it be a strange turn of events, if the Wii2 was the next gen console with the most cutting edge tech?
  • 0
    Urban Apr 28, 09
    This instantly made me think of a YBox or Zbox for some reason. Holography? The next step i suppose. Though in my opinion, Blu-Ray wasn't much of a step, So what if the gey's blood is a little bit more red, or the ghost's transparency a little bit more clearer.
    • 0
      SS4Gogeta Apr 28, 09
      Blu-ray wasn't a step up? Everyone that watches movies at my house is AMAZED. If I watch a movie or play on a SDTV I hate it. Are you watching on a HDTV?
    • 0
      Play ISDF Apr 28, 09
      Try HD on big TV's. You'll end up seeing just how big a step in quality it is. Surround sound makes it even better too.

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