Sony has developed a 200GB 8-layer version of their Blu-ray disc technology they are pushing as the successor to the current DVD format. The forthcoming Playstation 3 will most likely use the 54GB version of Blu-ray Discs. The competing technology is called HD-DVD. It only holds about 30GB of data, but it is much easier (read cheaper) to produce and existing DVD production plants can be converted over with little effort. A couple of years ago my money would have been on the Sony format, but they’ve been increasingly flailing with their proprietary formats… witness Minidisc and ATRAC-3. Sony is also pushing their new SACD format as the successor to the CD, but I suspect the competing DVD-A format will ultimately win out due to the large technical hurdles present in creating SACD content. Blu-ray does seem pretty darn cool, but I don’t think it’ll end up as the next generation DVD.
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