Article - Recordable, Rewritable Media

Host your site on our high performance virtual domain and non-domain accounts.

Let Netpanel design your web site the way you want it.

Submit your web site to 15 major search engines quickly and easily at no charge.

Download some of our free 32-bit software programs for Windows.

Find every news story, article, and special feature ever published on Netpanel.

Take a moment to fill out our quick survey, and earn a free utility in the process.

Recordable, rewritable media
Published on 8/25/97

There are two new types of recordable and rewritable media that are either now available or soon to be so. The first type, which first became available in June, is CD-RAM (or more commonly know as CD-RW, for CD-Rewritable). The second, which will be available near the end of the year, is DVD-RAM. Whereas the compact disc industry went from CD-ROM to CD-R (CD-Recordable), and now to CD-RW, the market for DVD-R (DVD-Recordable) devices will be fairly small, and the industry will progress more quickly to DVD-RAM.

Both rewritable technologies improve upon their write-once, recordable predecessors. Instead of burning a platter in one session and hoping to get it right the first time, as is necessary with CD-R, you can write to the platter, delete everything, and write again. Even though CD-RW media will store substantially more data than a standard floppy disk, the DVD version of the rewritable technologies will offer even greater storage capacities than that.

Although DVD-RAM devices will in fact store multiple gigabytes of data, they won't reach the capacities obtainable by standard DVD-ROMs (see the article, The Arrival of DVD). One major benefit of DVD-RAM drives is that most will have native DVD-ROM and CD-ROM support. If the manufacturers are convinced to do so, most DVD-RAM drives will also have additional support for CD-R and CD-RW media types.

Following the pattern of most new computer technologies, the cost of DVD-RAM drives will be expensive at first, but over time they will become more affordable for the average user. This will create a larger installed base, and DVD-RAM will then have a greater impact on most computer users. As Werner Glinka, director of marketing for Hitachi America storage products group, says, "This technology has the potential to be the single removable medium that anyone really needs. This could be the converging element."

While not as spectacular as its DVD counterpart, CD-RW is a technology that is already here. It probably won't reach DVD-RAM's popularity either, however it is a less expensive option. One limitation of CD-RW is the data transfer mode. While it does support packet-mode recording, similar to the method used by hard disks, this technique only works on data files. To copy audio CDs and special video formats you would need to transfer them track-by-track, or the whole platter at once. Another drawback of CD-RW is the fact that its media will likely be incompatible with existing CD-ROM drives. Additionally, the write speeds of current CD-RW devices are significantly slower than the read speeds.

Overall, the DVD-RAM drives are a better choice when it comes to storage, however the CD-RW drives are less expensive. Also, if you need a rewritable storage solution immediately, CD-RW is already available in the market. Your best bet may be to wait until DVD-RAM prices are within an affordable range, sometime after their year-end release.