Industry leaders demonstrate real-time DVD+RW recording

Hewlett-Packard Company, MCC/Verbatim, Philips Electronics, Ricoh Company Ltd., Sony Corporation and Yamaha Corporation today reinforced their commitment to 4.7 Gigabyte DVD+RW technology in the first public demonstration in Europe of both real-time recording and immediate playback on currently available DVD-Video and DVD-ROM players.

The demonstration featured the use of a Ricoh prototype recording device. Video content was recorded on DVD+RW media from Ricoh, then played back on a variety of currently available DVD-ROM and DVD-Video devices. 4.7GB DVD+RW technology is a natural evolution of the successful CD-RW format and an important step in the growth path from CD to DVD. The 4.7GB DVD+RW format was
designed to be compatible with the rapidly growing installed base of more than 30 million DVD-ROM drives and DVD-Video players. DVD+RW media do not require a cartridge, further enabling playback in the majority of current DVD equipment.

“We’ve achieved a major milestone in the development of 4.7GB DVD+RW technology,“” said Takeshi Matsui, corporate councilor, Ricoh Company Ltd. “Real-time recording and playback of 4.7GB DVD+RW media brings us one step closer to the capability, compatibility and capacity that our customers expect to see in an out-coming product. Our final target is to install the data file and video file recording capability.“”

Thomson Multimedia recently announced its support of DVD+RW technology. In addition to the companies demonstrating technology at CeBIT, Thomson announced last month that it will also support the DVD+RW format for future recordable products. As an evolution of existing CD technology, which has an installed base of approximately 1 billion units worldwide, DVD+RW drives can be expected to read CD-ROM, CD-RW, CD-Recordable (CD-R) and CD Audio discs, as well as DVD-Video titles. DVD+RW is expected to have broad-based appeal for both PC and Video applications. The format is specifically designed to enable compatible content interchange for data, audio, still photography and high-quality video applications.

The first 4.7GB DVD+RW drives and media are expected to be available by the end of the year.

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