Sony Optiarc today released the BWU-500S internal Blu-ray disc (BD) rewritable drive, which can write BD-R media at up to 12X and dual layer BD-R media at up to 8X speeds, recording a full 25GB disc in about 10 minutes. The Sony BWU-500S comes bundled with a 25GB Sony BD-R blank disc and CyberLink’s Media Suite 8 software for capturing, authoring, editing, backing up, viewing high-definition personal content and playing back Blu-ray disc movies including 3D Blu-ray movies. The drive is also able to record standard 4.7GB DVD+/-R discs at up to 16X speeds, 8.5GB DVD+/-R Double/Dual layer at up to 8X, DVD+RW at up to 8X, DVD-RW at up to 6X, CD-R at up to 48X, CD-RW at up to 24X, and support DVD-RAM recording at up to 12X speeds. The Sony BWU-500S is now available through authorized distributors, resellers and selected online sites. [Akihabara]
Pioneer has just unveiled the world’s first 12x Blu-ray writer for desktop computers called the BDR-205. The drive features a 4MB cache memory, a SATA connection interface and provides 12x write speeds for Blu-ray Disc media, 16x for DVD and 40x for CD media. The Pioneer BDR-205 will start shipping in Q1 2010 for $249. [CrunchGear]
Buffalo Japan is set to release two new optical drives for the Japanese market in the form of the BR-H1016SU2 (external) and BR-H1016FBS-BK (internal) Blu-ray writers. Both drives feature a 4MB of buffer memory and provide write speeds of up to 10x for BD-R SL, 8x for BD-R DL, 2x for BD-RE SL/DL, 16 x for DVD-R/+R, 12x for DVD-RAM, 8x for DVD-R/+R DL and DVD+RW, 6x for DVD-RW, 48x for CD-R and 24x for CD-RW. They also come with several connectivity ports including SATA and USB 2.0 for BR-H1016FBS-BK, and eSATA for BR-H1016SU2. The BR-H1016SU2 and BR-H1016FBS-BK will hit Japanese stores in early September for around $359 and $300, respectively. Read more
