DVD

[Anne-Marie Traub <traub -at- ATB -dot- TERADYNE -dot- COM>]

Hello All,

Your discussion of DVD is very interesting to me because I just concluded writing an article on the topic. It seems to me that most tech writers will be confronting the technology soon. Just to clarify...

DVD stands for digital video disk or digital versatile disk, depending on who you talk to.

A DVD player plays movies. When you're talking about the equivalent to a CD-ROM drive, it is called a DVD-ROM drive, or DVD-R drive, etc.

The problem with DVD-ROM drives' backward compatibility with CD-R disks has to do with re-focusing the laser to read the lower reflectivity of the CD-R disks. You can also do this by using two lasers. This functionality is certain to emerge in the marketplace.

The standards are in flux...let the buyer beware.

A good starting point for information on this subject is a Resource Directory written by Kirk Kroeker in EMedia Professional magazine. The website is
http://www.onlineinc.com/emedia/JanEM/res1.html

I hope this posting is useful.

Rie Traub
Technical Writer
Teradyne
Boston, MA
traub -at- atb -dot- teradyne -dot- com

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