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Optical Drives

The optical media came into existence after the use of floppy disks. The floppy disk uses the magnetic storage. Since the technique involved here is of laser interpretation hence the other name that is given is Laser Disk. The data is however stored in the digital format over a plastic coated disk. The surface is scanned using the laser.

The hardware should essentially consist of a laser that is used to access the data over the optical media. The optical disks that is presently available in different disks like the CD ROM, DVD ROM etc.

Light is used to read or write the data over the disk. The media discussed above are read only disks; it means that the data once written cannot be erased. The disks like the CD-RW, DVD-RW have the ability such that they can be erased and again rewritten; hence the name RW.

The rewritable disk uses the technology that is called as the magneto-optic technology or the phase change technology. The CD drive or the DVD drive may essentially not be only that related to computer but it may also be the one used in the television or the music players. The disks are available in many sizes including the physical and also the size based on its memory. The memory in the case of DVD is very much high.

In the motherboard these optical drives can be connected to the IDE connectors. There is an IDE for the hard disk and also for the optical drive. The optical drive may also use the USB interface to connect to the computer if the drive is an external drive. The external drive comes in a hard casing and is slightly costlier than the regular drives.

The optical drive can also be connected to the SCSI port. The DVD drive can usually read the CD’s also but the vice versa is not true. The most popular brands in the optical drives are the Sony, Samsung, Asus, HP, Liteon, etc. In case of optical disks the brands also do major business.

The next generation optical disk is the Blue – Ray disk or the BD. The optical drive used for this disk is also different and the DVD drive or the CD drive cannot be used for reading the BD. The BD offers the capacity of about 100GB and may even extend to the TB. Right now the DVD available has the capacity of about 40 GB.

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