Hitachi Boasts 100GB Blu-ray Disc October 8, 2007

Read more Blu-ray , Gadgets , Gizmodo UK , HD DVD , Storage

It’s sometimes easy to forget that the silly high-definition (HD) movie spat between Blu-ray and HD DVD is just one part of the HD war. The rest of the battle involves the massive market for storage technologies and, with blank DVDs creaking at the edges, Blu-ray and HD DVD want to be the blank discs we all use in the future.

Hitachi has announced that it has created a 100GB blank Blu-ray disc by stacking four layers onto it. This is double the size of the biggest Blu-ray disc currently available and takes back the HD storage crown from the triple-layer, 51GB HD DVD blank disc.

While the ‘mine is bigger than yours’ boasting continues, the really interesting bit is that the disc will work on existing Hitachi Blu-ray players and burners. All they need is a firmware update.

That said, Hitachi is still tweaking the signal quality of its quad-layer technology so the 100GB discs are a few months from release. They won't come cheap either. Hitachi is also working on an eight-layer, 200GB disc too.-Martin Lynch

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