Computing

An Easier Upgrade to Holographic Storage

(Page 2 of 2)

  • Friday, October 10, 2008
  • By David Talbot

GE's technology differs in subtle yet important ways that could broaden its appeal significantly. While both versions use lasers to record data, InPhase's technology encodes information using thousands of overlapping 3-D patterns known as pages, each containing 1.4 million bits. These pages are about one millimeter long and 0.8 millimeters wide, and a single disc can contain as many as 1.7 million pages. They are recorded through the whole depth of the media, and can coexist in the same physical space. The InPhase disc reader simply reads a specific page by viewing the disc from a different angle. However, this calls for sophisticated recording and reading optics.

In the GE version, each hologram measures 0.3 micrometers by 5 micrometers and represents a single bit of information. They are patterned across a disc in a way that resembles the patterns on the surface of a regular CD or DVD, and they're arrayed in a plane, with multiple planes layered throughout the body of the disc. The company's current prototypes have 21 layers, but Lawrence says that the goal is to achieve between 50 and 100 layers, or one terabyte of data storage.

The way that GE's holograms are arranged across a disc means that playback machines will be able to play older media, Lawrence adds: "Our technology uses formats similar to those in existing optical media but does it in the entire volume of the disc in many, many 'virtual layers'. These discs will be very similar to the DVD or Blu-ray discs but are much higher capacity."

GE is talking to several electronics companies about creating playback machines, and it wants the technology to fit well with existing disc-manufacturing techniques. While the InPhase version sandwiches its special optical recording media inside another type of plastic, the GE discs are made from a polycarbonate that can be processed with conventional manufacturing methods. The material can be melted, injected into a mold, and cooled to form a disc, the same way that today's optical media are made.

InPhase claims to be unconcerned about competition from GE, arguing that each company is targeting a different market segment. "I think that's a great design goal for GE," Rancis says. "But for our particular customer base, none of those people have material on DVDs. We are only doing high-end customers."

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winterspan

4 Comments

  • 1223 Days Ago
  • 10/10/2008

believe it when I see it

InPhase spun off from Bell labs eight years ago and they've been promising production ready holographic discs for over two years now and they continue to miss release deadlines... Between them and other companies in the "HVD alliance", holographic discs have become the "Duke Nukem Forever" of storage media..

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holoman

37 Comments

  • 1223 Days Ago
  • 10/10/2008

GE, InPhase Technology All Wrong

If their technology ever works it will be limited by banal densities and transfer rates, i.e., a waste of R & D time and money.

Here is a technology that will work.

http://colossalstorage.net

Reply

protn7

72 Comments

  • 1217 Days Ago
  • 10/16/2008

Re: GE, InPhase Technology All Wrong

yawn

Reply

ArtInvent

67 Comments

  • 1219 Days Ago
  • 10/14/2008

Cost does not compute

I continue to fail to see how a 300GB InPhase holo disc costing $180 makes any sense at all when a 320GB HDD can be had today for less than a third that. In two years when their 1.6TB holo disc comes out, HDD tech will probably continue to be 2 to 4 times cheaper, at the least. Factor in that the holo disc doesn't even include the very expensive drive needed to record it or play it back, while a HDD is both storage and rec/playback device. That can be plugged into any computer and read/wrote. And if you want archival offline storage, just put the HDD in a vault. So what can holo discs do that HDD can't do for a tenth the cost?

I. Do not. Get it. The only way recordable discs like this make sense is if they are higher density AND cheaper than magnetic HDD.

Reply

techguy12

1 Comment

  • 1211 Days Ago
  • 10/22/2008

Re: Cost does not compute

GE's technology is aimed at the consumer market.
That includes low cost disks, readers and writers.
Imaging writing a TB onto a $15 disk using a $200 disk drive.

Reply

SVE

51 Comments

  • 1216 Days Ago
  • 10/17/2008

Optical Storage is the Future!

Always has been. Always will be.

Reply

andysmcallister

1 Comment

  • 1097 Days Ago
  • 02/13/2009

Who cares????

In just a few years the memory density of a SD flash card will be around 1 TB and that will need no moving parts and therefore little energy to run.  I fail to see why or how tech like this will matter by then.  Unless of course the price drops to a reasonable cost ie $1-$10 per disk.

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