New DVD Standard to Allow 8.5GB per Disc

The DVD+RW Alliance is announcing a new dual-layer DVD+R standard that will boost disc capacity to 8.5GB. The new format promises to also retain compatibility with DVD Video players and DVD-ROM drives while offering the additional space, enough for about 4 hours of DVD-quality video.

As anyone who has tried to make a backup copy of a commercially-pressed movie knows, the traditional 4.7GB recordable DVD formats (DVD-R, DVD+R) don't hold nearly as much as a dual-layer DVD-Video disc (the silver kind you normally see used to ship movies). This new dual-layer technology nearly doubles the old DVD+R capacity by adding another layer to the optical disc, that can be read and written separately from the usual top data layer on the disc.

The technical accomplishment here is not just adding an extra data layer, but the promise that the new discs will be readable (including the extra data layer) by ordinary DVD players designed for DVD-Video discs. The DVD+RW Alliance expects drives that support this new DVD standard to become available during 2004.

See Also

• Our own guide to DVD standards.
• The original press release on the new dual-layer DVD standard.

October 20, 2003October