NEWS: Holographic Storage Disc Ready to be Released Next Year

InPhase Technologies of Colorado says that they will be ready to market a storage disc next year that will hold three hundred gigabytes of information. The disc is slightly wider than a DVD, but instead of allowing for one bit of information to be recorded at a time, millions of bits can be written and read simultaneously. Although the holographic technology was first suggested as a medium for storage in 1963, this is the first time such has become viable. The final test will be the willingness of the market to embrace the new technology.



The envelope of technology seems to know no boundaries. The ability for an optical disc roughly the size of a CD/DVD to hold such a huge amount of data would certainly be welcomed by those who have lots of data to back up, but one has to wonder whether there is a market for so much data on a single disc for movies, music and the like. Of course, the storage size is not the only advantage. The ability to read such large amounts of data so quickly could revolutionize the video game industry.

Related News Links:
www.newscientist.com
www.optware.co.jp
www.theregister.co.uk
www.theregister.co.uk

Related AboveTopSecret.com Discussion Threads:
Holographic Storage Due late 2006

[edit on 2005/12/4 by GradyPhilpott]

i am extremely excited to see the capabilities of this and it is an extremely good find. im looking foward to this and im going to go look into it further. i always kinda figured this would happen but now im glad its finally coming out.

That is nuts! 300 GB?! Jeebus!

I wonder if it will go... Did everyone feel the switch from Laser Disc to DVD players annoying? anyone willing to buy a new player for these discs? Also, what will happen to the new 'blue ray ' DVDs...are they obsolete, before they even come out?!

Technology just won't quit, will it, haha. I waiting for a holographic iPod now, hahaha.

As a backup media this is godlike.

Tape backups are vulnerable to electromagnetic radiation.
These disks alow for massive amounts of data to be backed up to a media thats only vulnerable to actual physical damage.

Not to mention that the age of 1080i media is at hand.
When you buy for instance a season of CSI:New York, its multiple DVD disks for just one season at only DVD quality (720*480 resolution).

HDTV is 1080i (1920x1080) and 720i (1280x720) which is higher res then DVD's, media in these formats need quite a bit more diskspace to store then DVD media.

With this kind of media, you can buy seasons of series on single disks or when a series is cancelled, buy 1 single disk with all seasons of this series on it.



[edit on 4/12/05 by thematrix]

and break a terabyte by 2008

joystiq.com...


-UnterMir

Don't get too hooked on this not yet available technology. Looks what's right behind it:





[edit on 2005/12/4 by GradyPhilpott]

can this sort of thing be applied to hard drives?

If a holograhphic disc could be written and rewritten in the way magnetic hard drives are now, I don't see why not. Somehow, I don't think they are there yet, but I could be wrong.

Sounds like a form of disc similar to the "Yellow Book" disc that may or may not exist. The Alien Yellow Disc was meant to of been obtained in the 50's or 60's i think. There's a lot of misinfo about this disc thou and no solid evidence but it's interesting to see that folklore has led to a real technology if that's all it is?

Maybe this is technology that originally came from space and in the future will be developed into something similar to the "help me obi-wan Kenobi" form of messaging?

Maybe flat Holographic data is only step 1 in the world of holographic discs?

**Warning - UFO conspiracy inside**
www.trunkerton.fsnet.co.uk...

"The Yellow Book is reported to be a physical record of the communications from an extraterrestrial, who was recovered from a downed UFO and kept in custody by MJ-12, before he died several years later. This extraterrestrial was called EBE-1. A second extraterrestrial is reported to be currently in custody under MJ-12, and she is called EBE-2, but BT calls her Charlene. She is the actual author of the Yellow Book.

The Yellow Book is reported to actually be a sort of holographic compact disk, which can project images of the information it contains. It is alleged to contain references to Biblical events, even including a holographic depiction of the crucifixion of Christ. "

Wow, I was just here yesterday at ATS, then the next day, I hear technology like this is nearing our doorstep.

My idea for uses of the technology.... My entire music collection, in a high quality format, could fit in my hand. This is beyond MP3, no longer would you have to listen to a lesser quality compressed music file.

Troy

Originally posted by cybertroy
Wow, I was just here yesterday at ATS, then the next day, I hear technology like this is nearing our doorstep.

My idea for uses of the technology.... My entire music collection, in a high quality format, could fit in my hand. This is beyond MP3, no longer would you have to listen to a lesser quality compressed music file.

Troy

AAC is compressed lossless.

About that 1 TB disc. would a normal DVD player be able to play it, since it's a DVD size, or would he laser and computer need to be different as well? Anyone know this stuff? I'm horrible when it comes to new tech.

That's true, there are lossless compression formats. WMA files have a lossless format too.

I'm thinking since it is a new technology, it wouldn't be compatible with a normal DVD player. We would be dealing with holograms, which I don't really understand how that would work, but with new technology, it would seem that you would need a new type of drive to play these disks.

Troy

Check out the links provided in the news submssion and check here:

computer.howstuffworks.com...

Google Search

think of what is to come. Mass data storage. As if Echelon 4 wasn't bad, and the newly released Echelon 5, and the current insurgence of Permanently fixed red light and speed cameras in the newly lowered 50kmph speed limit around the cities, this will be the next phase. More and more surveillance cameras in more places will be able to watch us, with the footage and audio surveillance stored for longer, with higher resolution, detail, power, and ability to monitor greater distances.

Ha! $10 says it won't hit the shelves for at least 3 more years.

Originally posted by FallenOne
About that 1 TB disc. would a normal DVD player be able to play it, since it's a DVD size, or would he laser and computer need to be different as well? Anyone know this stuff? I'm horrible when it comes to new tech.

The old DVD would not work, if only for the fact that it's R/W heads do serial R/W's and the new hologram disk uses flashes of light to read or write a megabit or more of data at a time in parallel.

can this sort of thing be applied to hard drives?

Unlikely, IMO, since it would require too many R/W heads. The big if is What Grady Said; can we flash a hard drive?

But a new computer wouldn't necessarily be required. All of the translation could be done on the hologram interface card.

I wonder how long the military has had this technology...

I will repeat what I said in the other thread about this.

This will not replace BluRay/HD DVD's. It is a replacement for Magnetic Storage as the Price per GB is still much more expensive then DVD's it's comparable to a 300 GB Magnetic Drive ATM (100 $ per 300 GB Disc) As for the read/write problem, DVD's have been able to outstrip 7200 RPM drives in data transfer for a while now, the only reason you didn't notice it is cause your HD was limited to the same palty 35 MB/s transfer rate it's been stuck at since '98.

This technology removes one of the last roadblocks standing in the way of a fully optical computer, we have had the technology to create almost a full Optronic Based computer since '04 now I believe we do have the tech. Hopefullly by '08 the first Optichips will come out. I personally can't wait!

Oh and JSO one of my profs told me the other day that if it was optically based rather then magnetic there is virtually no limit to the amoumt of R/W heads inside the casing. He also thinks flashing them should be possible as well.

[edit on 5-12-2005 by sardion2000]

Does that mean we have to go out and buy a new machine that will play movies, ect?? or is this just for gaming? I read the article but I have amnesia right now.
Sound brilliant and kudo's to the inventor, but i still ain't going out to buy a new machine.. we just would a dvd/video/mp3 player! i have a feeling this will go by as fast as beta did... unfortuneately, and i say that because people dont want to give up their newly bought products. if they blew this up a few years down the road i would reconsider, but right now isn't a good time to be pushing this..
my 2 cents.

why make a disk I want data cristals use this technology make it smaller on the nano scale,.

cubical cristal on every side same nano sized holograpic systems multi-threathed parallel data distribution. why write it holograpic on a 2 dimenisional disk if you can use 3 dimensional spaces 3d storage on a 3d cubical cristal.data one can be split up and written down on the atomic scale on every side of the cubical storage crystal.

Just think, an archival backup copy of the entire internet on a few 100 pack spindles