Blue-laser DVD recorder on sale in Japan

Posted by Simon Perry on 17 April 2003 at 12:41 pm | Tagged as: Platforms, Gadgets

Sony started selling the first blue-laser DVD recorder, the BDZ-S77, in Japan on 10 April at a cost of ¥450,000 ($3,760/£2,380).

Conforming to the Blu-ray standard, it’s capable of recording two hours of high-definition video at maximum quality, or four hours of standard-definition digital broadcasting or up to 16 hours of lower quality analog terrestrial, all in MPEG-2 format.

By using a blue laser, which has a shorter wavelength than the current red laser standard, it stores information more densely giving at least 23Gb on each disk (¥3,500/$30/£18), around five times the capacity of a standard DVD.

As ever, there are going to be competing standards for HD DVD recordings, three others this time, but Sony is the first to release a product.