Could magnetic tapes, hard drives and optical disc formats like Blu-ray be replaced by a data storage format that uses holograms? The world's first commercial holographic storage system will be launched this fall, with the product able to store the equivalent of 64 DVD movies on a disc about the size of a CD.
Holographic storage has been talked about since the 1960s, but it's taken more than 40 years for technology to catch up.
InPhase Technologies, based in Longmont, Colorado, is the latest company to get behind holographic storage. InPhase has spent 13 years developing materials, systems and processes. Its first products -- marketed under the Tapestry brand -- will be a 600 gigabyte write-once disc and a drive.
Biggest challenge
Wolfgang Schlichting, a research director at analysis group IDC, says: "The biggest challenge was developing the media. There was a lot of work on complex crystalline rewritable media, but the success of [Compact Disc-Recordable] showed that write-once media could succeed, so then there was a switch to photopolymer materials. The cost and complexity of the optics has also decreased -- you're now talking of technology that's similar to a digital camera."
The increasing demand for data storage makes it necessary to look beyond conventional forms of storage technology, such as optical discs or magnetic tape. The storage capacity of optical discs has increased over successive generations, from CD-Roms, which store around 700 megabytes of data, to DVDs (18 gigabytes), and now next-gen formats such as Blu-ray and HD-DVD, which each hold upwards of 25 gigabytes. And there are plans for even larger capacity discs.
But despite this, optical disc technology has struggled to keep up with our insatiable appetite for data. That's why many archival systems still use magnetic tape, which offers large storage capacities at a cost-effective price.
However, tape has its problems. Wlondek Mischke, director of research at technology company DaTARIUS, says: "Magnetic tape is very difficult to handle and very expensive [and] is waiting for something to replace it. Holographic storage could be the one."
But how successful will holographics be? Jim Porter, president of market research company Disk/Trend, says: "Any holographic storage system will have to be reliable, easy to use and be sold at a price that is considered by prospective buyers to be appropriate for the application."
FIRST PRODUCTS
The first holographic products are certainly not mass-market -- a 600 gigabyte disc will cost around US$180, and the drive costs about $18,000. Potential users include banks, libraries, government agencies and corporations.
Kevin Curtis, InPhase's chief technology officer, says: "Very large companies are showing the most interest, which is interesting, because large companies tend to be technology laggards. The amount of data they're getting through is becoming unmanageable."
However, Bill Foster of consultancy Understanding & Solutions, says: "Tape technology is well established. It will be difficult to sweep aside."
And tape technology is still evolving. IBM and Fuji Photo Film have shown that data can be packed onto magnetic tape with a density 15 times that of standard tape. And magnetic hard disk capacity is also increasing thanks to perpendicular recording.
Nor does holographic storage look like replacing optical disc formats any time soon.
"Any storage system with the capability to supersede today's optical discs will have to have rewritable versions and be offered at more attractive prices. Holographic products will not reach these objectives in the foreseeable future," Porter says.
Jean-Paul Eekhout, TDK's corporate strategy director, adds: "Holographic storage will be complementary to formats like Blu-ray. It's more a B2B [business-to-business] technology and will find a place in the archival market. But I don't expect holographics in its current shape or form to cross over to the commercial market."
Even InPhase acknowledges that we are unlikely to see pre-recorded videos on holographic discs for a long time -- if ever.
"We're not looking at [packaged] content," Curtis admits.
Conventional optical discs and drives are cheaper to make and there is a huge hardware-software infrastructure based around them.
But Walden says: "We believe the technology lends itself to both business and consumer applications. Almost every company involved in optical storage is also looking at holographics as a potential candidate for the next generation of optical disc."
IDC thinks that by 2011, the holographics drive market will be worth around US$200 million globally, a small portion of the multibillion-dollar data storage market.
David Mercer, the principal analyst at research group StrategyAnalytics, says: "The challenges will revolve around production economics and industry standards, and these alone are likely to delay the emergence of significant consumer volume opportunities."
Consumer applications
Mercer thinks holographic technology will play a role in storage devices for consumer applications, such as archiving and creation, but adds: "It will be more challenging to develop a video distribution and publishing standard around holography, as this will involve the coordination of interests in content ownership and protection, device manufacturers and others. By the time these pieces fall into place, video distribution will have migrated to some degree towards online models, so the need for a physical media platform may be in doubt."
Indeed, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates thinks that formats such as Blu-ray and HD-DVD represent the last generation of physical video formats.
But Foster says that holographic storage might stand a better chance at challenging another storage medium -- flash memory.
"Holographic storage doesn't have to be on a disc -- it can also be on solid state medium," he says.
So perhaps holographic storage's day has finally come.
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