We're getting awfully close to switching from DVD to either Blu-ray or HD DVD. Are you ready? Apparently Panasonic is; they'll be shipping Blu-ray drives for your PC as early as January of next year.

Matsushita Electric Works Corporation announced Blu-ray (BD) drives for PCs o­n the 5th.

Sample shipments of drives for PCs (half-height) will begin this month, and mass production will begin in January of 2006. Also, sample shipments of notebook PC drives (12.7mm) will begin before the end of the year, with mass production to begin in March of 2006. The price is undecided.

The notebook PC drive is possible thanks to the use of a proprietary multilayer glass prism, enabling volume of the pickup part to be about 1/12th that of previous products.

Both the desktop and notebook drives support writing to Blu-ray, DVD, and CD. Single layer (25GB) and dual layer (50GB) Blu-ray media can be used, and writing is at a max of 2X.

The company also plans o­n beginning mass production of BD media such as rewriteable discs (BD-RE) and single-write discs (BD-R) from Spring of 2006.

The discs use "Pro Hard Coat II" surface processing technology said to be strong against damage and dust. The media is also cartridgeless. Writing up to 2x is supported. Both disc types will be available in single and dual layer varities.

Inspired by:
http://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/2005/1006/pana.htm

Press Release:
http://panasonic.co.jp/corp/news/official.data/data.dir/jn051005-2/jn051005-2.html