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back to article Blue-laser alternative to Blu-ray, HD DVD launched

It's based on blue-laser technology, but that's where the similarity between the V Media disc and both HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc ends. V Media holds just 1GB of data on a disc with a diameter of about an inch and a half and a casing reminiscent of Iomega's ill-fated Clik. Developed by US company V Media Research, VM discs use …

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  1. Highlander

    So, this will work....

    Just like Sony's UMD for PSP has been *such* a runaway success. Presumably they think that being smaller will somehow make them more likely to succeed, even though the capacity of the disc is so tiny. Optical formats with 50GB I can see working, Optical formats with 2GB? No so sure about them. Too small to be high def, not significantly more portable than UMD, nor inherently better in any way. Far bulkier than flash, uses more power on the move. Why bother?

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  2. Walter McCann
    Black Helicopters

    WHY?????

    Solid state chips are now so cheap, why would anyone want this with all the asscociated downsides and no upside?

    Whoever gave the goahead for this must have been asleep for the the last 5 years.

    W.

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  3. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    A step backwards

    I thought we were moving away from moving media to solid state. This is a step backwards.

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  4. Joe K
    Thumb Down

    Evidently....

    ....flash chips haven't made it to India yet.

    Either that or there is some kind of tax on them.

    Because this makes about as much sense as having a VHS tape deck addon for a macbook Air.

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  5. bluesxman
    Thumb Up

    this will no doubt be a runaway success...

    ... in much the same way that MiniDisc and UMD have conquered the world.

    In fact, with their optical-disc-in-plastic-caddy pedigree I'm surprised that Sony aren't backing this amazing and worthwhile new format.

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  6. Frank Bough
    Stop

    ONE Gigabyte?

    I have a MicroSD card in my telephone with double that capacity that cost me <10 quid. What's the point?

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  7. Kris Chaplin
    Stop

    Thats it

    Forget blu-ray, HD-dvd, SD cards, MicroSD, and the like... this is the future.... not.

    [throws his single umd film in the bin]

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  8. Andy Worth

    Fail!!!

    The only applications this will be any use for are small portable ones, rather like the PSP, where the screens are too small to notice the clarity of picture anyway. Ok you can argue that it means you could connect your phone/device up to a TV and get "better than DVD" quality, but then how many people will bother?

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  9. Mage Silver badge

    Cost

    These are PRESSED. Maybe cost 60 cents?

    Flash memory has to be recorded. They might be 1/5th or less than cost of flash memory.

    Still, I can't see it succeeding. People want to buy the content ONCE (if at all). They want to buy it for the living room and copy to Flash for the portable device.

    Sony has realised this by officially providing a BluRay to PSP mechanism without UMD.

    UMD is only to load games now, and if there is a generation of PSP after the Slim, expect them to change to ROM cartridge compatible with Memory Stick or SD card (potentially cheaper than Flash).

    Then there is Phase Change Chips too.

    What you want is a BluRay player with SD slot and "make downscaled Video" button. with options from 176x128 up to 800x480 widescreen for all the Mobile devices.

    Since the original is 1920x1080, it's hardly a commercial quality copy.

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  10. Richard Gadsden
    Black Helicopters

    It's all about the DRM

    If it's on a physical disk then they can, in theory, DRM it and stop you copying it; if it's on a lump of storage, then you have to be able to copy it around from one lump of storage to another.

    Of course DRM never works, but what's that got to do with anything?

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  11. Len Goddard

    Missing the point

    It could have a place. If it genuinely offers better than DVD quality (all you need for a mobile device) in such a small package then it has some advantages for travellers etc. Personally if I could flash my entire DVD collection over onto this at little cost I would be overjoyed at the space saving.

    Having said that, I don't expect it to take off. The drive to HD has too much marketing momentum behind it and the physical capacity, although irrelevant for pre-recorded films, makes this of little use as a computer peripheral. Plus I suspect they will have a lot of difficulty getting major content providers onboard.

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  12. James Pickett
    Pirate

    Oink

    The disc vs. flash memory argument seems so loaded in favour of the latter (and even the pigopolists must have noticed which way the prices have been heading) that I feel there must be an undeclared reason why nothing (AFAIK) gets distributed on memory cards. I realise that the marketing people will hate the size of them, but I'm sure they can devise some nifty packaging. One can only assume that the MPA/RIAA have this fixed mental connection between computers, downloading (all of which is illegal in their little piggy eyes) and memory media. Surprised that the Indians feel the same way, though...

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  13. snafu

    ROM sticks?

    How much would a ROM or EPROM stick with adequate capabilities would cost to fabricate nowadays?

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  14. Shabble

    A product with no market

    "Even if VM doesn't find a home over here, it's hard to imagine it not appealing to a population devoted to both mobile communications and the cinema."

    WTF?

    I can quite easily imagine this! The idea of a portable movie player that fits in your pocket but can be hooked up to a TV is a good one... but this stupid pre-recorded disc method is such a bad way of doing it. I mean, whose going to spend a fortune on disks that can only be played on a single peice of hardware sold by a company you've never heard of?

    Get rid of the built-in drive, stick a USB port on the player and then produce a USB version of the drive that can clip on to the side. That way the device and the disk format aren't tied together. By making the player compatible with flash drives and USB HDD it becomes much more versatile, and therefore much more likely to sell.

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  15. Matthew Morrison

    @ Shabble

    The section you quoted is clearly referring to India, Shabble, where the piece claims computer ownership is small. The changes you note may perhaps increase popularity here, but doesn't affect the validity of the quoted statement.

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  16. Andreas
    Alert

    WTF!!!

    WHY???

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