Development of European Magneto-Optical Drives

Objective

Rewritable drives are expected to become the major source of revenue for optical system manufacturers within the next five years. Intensive work has been done by the consortium during its first period of activity to establish a European technology for optical media, heads and drives. The baselines of this programme consist in the development of two magneto-optical drives: a 3.5 inch drive with a capability higher than 200 Mbyte, and a 5.25 inch drive of 5 Gbyte.

Medium-term goals (1989-92)

- Development of a 3.5 inch magneto-optical medium for the current and next generation of data storage systems with improved functional specifications, including partial ROM.
- Realisation of a new 3.5 inch magneto-optical disc drive complying with the extended ISO standard, with capacity > 200 Mbyte, access time < 50 ms, SCSI/AT interfaces, average data transfer rate > 0.5 Mbyte/s, and a partial ROM zone.
- Completion of an integrated optical head.
- Media development for direct overwrite (RE-TM and oxide media).
- Mock-up of a 5.25 inch multiplatter erasable optical drive with a storage capacity of 5 Gbyte, access time < 40 ms, SCSI interface, and an average data transfer rate higher than 2 MB/s.

Programme(s)

• FP3-ESPRIT 3 - Specific research and technological development programme (EEC) in the field of information technologies, 1990-1994

Topic(s)

Data not available

Call for proposal

Data not available

Funding Scheme

Data not available

Coordinator

Société d'Applications Générales d'Électricité et de Mécanique

Address

6 Avenue D'iena
75783 Paris
France

Participants (4)

Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique (CEA)

France

Address

Centre D'études De Grenoble 17 Avenue Des Martyrs
38041 Grenoble

Coventry University

United Kingdom

Address

Priory Street
CV1 5FB Coventry

NEDERLANDSE PHILIPS BEDRIJVEN BV

Netherlands

Address

Prof. Holstlaan, 4
5656 AA Eindhoven

PHILIPS DUPONT OPTICAL

Netherlands

Address

Buizerdlaan, 2
3435 SB Nieuwegein