The average current Blu-ray burners can record at 2x or 4x and NEC drives can burn at 5x. For the most part, thanks to high prices, Blu-ray burners have taken a back seat to drives that are only capable of reading Blu-ray discs but it appears NEC is doing its best to change that.
Samples of the new 8x chipset have already been sent to manufacturers and the technology should "merge a digital signal processor (DSP) with an analog one." The analog processor was originally intended for 20x DVD burners.
NEC is combining circuits that would normally be housed separately and by doing so will reduce the size of the system-on-chip by 20 percent and cut power consumption by one-third.
The drive maker has also created a cheaper version that can read Blu-ray discs at fast speeds but does not offer Blu-ray recording. There was no word on commercial availability but NEC did add that it was working on technology for 16x BD drives.
Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 20 Jun 2008 15:27
