WHAT FEATURES WILL THE MULTIMEDIA PC DEMAND OF ITS CD ROM DRIVE?

One storage product undergoing a major change in the wake of increased multimedia PC demand is the CD ROM drive. As reported in the first pages of Data Storage Report this month, PC companies debuted systems with 8X speed CD ROM drives. Only a year ago, PCs shipped with 4X speed drives.

Earlier the 6X speed CD ROM drives failed to garner widespread support from PC suppliers. Instead PC vendors wanted the faster 8X speed drives to provide smoother more interactive graphics in 3D game software coming on the market.

Typical of the new breed of drive is the XM-5602B from the Toshiba America Information Systems Inc., Disk Products Division in Irvine, Calif. The 8X speed drive has a 1.2-megabits per second transfer rate—about the speed of a high speed T1 telephone line. The faster the data transfer rate the smoother the graphics and video presentation on the host PC.

With the higher data transfer rate, the drives can handle MPEG-2 video streams. MPEG-2 is similar to MPEG-1, but is intended for digital transmission of broadcast TV quality video.

The drive has a 120 millisecond random seek time or 135 ms random access time. The faster the average access time, the more interactive the screen display for the user on the host PC. The drive also has a 256-kilobyte buffer.

Introduced on June 18, the drive offers MPC-3 compatibility, multisession Photo CD support and CD-EXTRA support. It can also read CD-DA, CD-ROM XA, CD-I, CD-I Ready and CD-I Bridge disc formats.

Toshiba enters a market with many competitors. In June, the Multimedia Products Division of Sony Information Technologies of America in San Jose, Calif. introduced its 8X speed drive, the CSD-880E.

In addition, NEC Technologies Inc. of Boxborough, Mass. debuted its MultiSpin 8Xe and MultiSpin 8Xi 8X speed drive. The Sony and NEC drives transfer data at 1.2 Mbits/s, but average access time of the Sony unit is 160-ms while NEC’s is 140-ms.

At the PC Expo Show in New York City, last month, Panasonic Computer Peripheral Company of Secaucus, N. J. debuted three 8X speed drives. TEAC America, Inc. of Montebello, Calif. also announced the CD-58E, an internal enhanced IDE 8X CD-ROM drive. The CD-58E transfers data at 1.2 Mbits/s, but boasts a 125 ms access time and 99 ms seek time.

All these new drives have entered a highly competitive market. Instead of selling for a premium these feature rich drives are already finding sharp price competition. Take the example of Creative Technology Ltd.

The Singapore-based company this month discontinued the manufacture of its 8X speed CD ROM drive, citing insufficient margins. The 8X-speed drive prices have slumped from $130 earlier this year to $70 currently.

However, the company is remaining in the CD ROM business. It will jointly develop a new 12X speed CD-ROM drive by the end of the year. Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea expects to sell up to US$300 million of the new products in the first six months of 1997.

Development of 12X speed drives suggests the lifetime of the 8X speed drives is limited. Another factor confusing CD ROM development is the digital videodisc drive, which begins shipping this fall. Sold initially as a VCR replacement, will PC makers offer the drive on future systems instead of CD ROM drives?

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