Question: What is HD DVD and Blu-Ray?
What is HD DVD and Blu-Ray?
Answer: Blu-ray and HD DVD are two competing high-capacity disc technologies backed by various consumer electronics and computer manufacturers. HD DVD and Blu-ray will include Set Top Recorders, as well as Computer Burners. Both will be capable of recording High Definition broadcasts.
On one side you have Blu-ray, led by Sony, that includes Panasonic, Samsung, Dell, HP, Philips, and several others, and HD-DVD which is supported by Toshiba, NEC, and a couple of others . Both formats use blue laser technology, which has a shorter wavelength than red, allowing it to read the smaller digital data "spots" packed a lot more densely onto a standard-size disc. HD-DVD is capable of holding 30GB on a dual layer disc (compared to 8.5GB for standard dual layer DVDs). Blu-ray will go up to 50GB at launch, and Sony is reportedly working on a quad-layer 100GB disc.
These discs (and the accompanying players and recorders) are set to be released later in 2006.