Panasonic plans to mass produce 1TB optical discs that last 100 years

Panasonic has announced it plans to mass produce next generation optical discs with increased capacity together with Sony. Currently the discs are available in a capacity of 500GB and Panasonic plans to increase capacity to 1TB. The discs are called 'Archival disc'.

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The Japanese electronic giant writes that it estimates that the 1TB discs can reliably store data for more than 100 years. Higher capacities in optical storage are made possible due to smaller sized pits and marks and shorter wavelength lasers and improved drawing rates.

In the case of the 'Archival Discs', Panasonic adopted 2 new technologies to realize a capacity of 300GB per disc. Where the land areas between grooves is traditionally unused, Panasonic has found a way to record data on land tracks as well, a technology it callsĀ "land-and-groove technology".

Another technology used on the Archival Discs is,"Crosstalk-cancelling technology". This technology cancels crosstalk noise generated by adjacent tracks. This should ensure playback quality without read errors, even with narrow track pitches.

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It's unclear when and even if, Panasonic and Sony will take the discs in production, so far the company only reports about 'plans'.

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