Toshiba, NEC ready to produce HD-DVD discs
Like the competing Blu-ray Disc format, HD-DVD uses 405 nm violet laser diodes to provide a much larger storage capacity than existing DVD technology. The two formats are racing to capture the support of US movie companies, PC makers and other influential groups to try to gain acceptance as the next-generation standard.
The structure of HD-DVD discs is very similar to that of DVD discs. Both disc types consist of two 0.6 mm-thick substrates bonded together, while in a Blu-ray disc the recording layer is located beneath a 0.1 mm-thick cover layer on the surface of a 1.1 mm-thick substrate. The Blu-ray discs have a larger recording capacity, but the HD-DVD discs should be less expensive to manufacture.
The Nihon Keizai Shimbun says that two production lines for making HD-DVD discs have been installed at the Ibaraki Prefecture plant of Memory-Tech Corp., which supplies optical discs to Toshiba. Due to commence production later this month, the lines can turn out one 30-gigabyte disc every 3.5 seconds.
Two more lines will be set up at Memory-Tech s subsidiary in Yamanashi Prefecture in August. The cost of installing each line has been limited to around 150 million yen ($1.3 million), about 10% more than the amount required to set up a similar facility making conventional DVDs.
Production equipment unveiled by Sony this April makes one Blu-ray disc every five seconds with a yield of about 70%, compared with over 90% for facilities making HD-DVDs.
Sony has already launched a commercial Blu-ray recorder, with Matsushita to follow suit in July. Toshiba and NEC unveiled prototype HD-DVD players at the start of this year, and aim to start selling these products next year.
