Sony's Blu- Ray Recorder hits Japan in December
The Tokyo based electronics giant, Sony Corp. on Tuesday announced its plans to launch its Blu-ray high-definition optical disc recorder in the Japanese market in December this year.
Sony, once a strong brand name, has been severely hit by a series of setbacks in the recent past, thus pulling down its goodwill, market share, stock prices and consumer confidence. The seven million Sony-made laptop batteries recall and the delay in the launch of its new game console PlayStation 3, in Europe have together threatened the company’s reputation.
Sony is planning the launch about a month later than rival Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd. The product is thus set to hit the market at the peak of the year-end shopping season.
Blu-ray, an optical disc format has been jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) along with a group of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers. Sony is one of them.
The format provides five times larger capacity than today’s DVD’s with unprecented storage capacity of 25 GB (single layer) and 50 GB (dual layer).
Standing different from the current optical disc technologies such as DVD’s which rely on a red laser to read and write data, the new format Blu-ray DVD uses a blue-violet laser instead.
As blue-violet laser (405nm) has a shorter wavelength than a red laser (650nm), the Blu-ray products can easily be made backward compatible with CDs and DVDs through the use of a BD/DVD/CD compatible optical pickup unit.
Shorter wavelength makes the laser spot focus with greater precision. This in turn allows data to be packed tightly in a smaller space, thus enabling Blu-ray Discs to hold 25GB/50GB.
Sony will release its two models in the Blu-ray recorder series, the BDZ-V9 with a 500 GB hard disk, on December 8 and the BDZ-V7 with a 250 GB hard disk, on December 16.
While the BZD-V9 has been priced at 300,000 yen, the BDZ-V7 will be available for 250,000 yen, reported the company officials.
Keeping its fingers crossed, the company is looking forward for a smooth launch that can help it come out of the recent blues and keep up to its earlier reputation of a top-class manufacturer.
