100 GB on a Blu Ray Disc? Now, thats SHARP!

Bring on the layers - the more, the merrier

Bring on the layers - the more, the merrier

It is common knowledge for anyone on this page that Blu Ray got its name because of the revolutionary blue-violet laser that allows a disc the size of a  DVD to hold 6 times as much data.

Now, with a little step from Sharp, comes a giant leap for manki…er, Blu Ray. Their new blue-violet laser, at 500 mW, apparently holds the key to Blu Ray discs that can hold an impressive 3 or 4 layers. Sharp has hit this home run of sorts by introducing an aluminum oxynitride layer between the laser crystal and the protective dielectric film above it. This enables the layer to improve its performance above what just the dielectric film could’ve, and does provide.

In not-so-geek speak, what that means is that the Blu Ray laser can now read to twice the depth of a 50 GB Blu Ray drive, and also let it burn to all 4 layers at 8X speeds, no less. Maybe that’s still geeky, but it does translate to a better Blu Ray disc!

Current Blu Ray discs can hold 25 GB a layer, which translates to possible 75GB , even 100GB recordable discs, which could be a dream come true for those looking to backup data. For those who edit high definition, high length movies and videos at 1080p, that extra length or those extra features they always wished to add would be accomodated with ease.

Before you sigh in relief, though, there’s no news from Sharp yet, as to how much time they’d need to roll out the discs. Bated breath here as well.