Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!crdgw1!rpi!mketch
From: mketch@pawl.rpi.edu (Michael D. Ketchen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Why is Apple pushing CD-ROMs? (was Re: A/UX V2.0 questions)
Message-ID: <0LF#BW_@rpi.edu>
Date: 27 Mar 90 16:52:47 GMT
References: <22775@topo.UUCP> <-286499949@hpcupt1.HP.COM> <858@ashton.UUCP> <1134@vector.Dallas.TX.US> <7409@goofy.Apple.COM> <33521@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU>
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy NY
Lines: 71

In article <33521@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU> lange@lanai.UUCP (Trent Lange) writes:
| This leads me to a question which has almost certainly been asked before:
| 
| Why is Apple pushing CD-Roms and not Erasable Optical drives?
| 
| If I were Apple, I'd be *embarrassed* trying to hawk this limited,
| expensive, and dead technology when NeXT sells optical drives that
| can do everything CD-Roms do and "a whole lot more."

The reason is that CD-ROM is a cheap, efficient way to send large amounts of
extremely non-volatile data to just about anybody.  You can buy all the Adobe
fonts on a CD-ROM and then pay to have the ones you need unlocked.  Companies
like Microsoft can package large quantities of software (ie. Microsoft Office)
into a nice little bundle with lots of room for bells and whistles that just
wouldn't get added in a floppy distribution.

Now, I'm sure you're sitting there saying, "Why can't they do that with an
erasable optical disk?"  The key words are found in the second line of the
above paragraph: non-volatile.  Even though the word 'optical' appears in
the name 'erasable optical drive', it's still a magnetic disk.  The 'optical'
part comes in because the drive uses a laser to heat the disk surface, making
it easier to change the data on the disk very accurately, and hence giving
the incredible amounts of information on the disks.  However, it's still
magnetic storage, and thus is subject to random change.

CD-ROM, on the other hand, stores its data via tiny 'pits' burned into the
surface of the disk.  This is extremely non-volatile, and is very similar
to the way WORM drives work.  The big difference is that once a CD-ROM master
is made, it is extremely easy to press out as many copies of it as are needed.
With erasable optical technology, the disks would still have to be copied the
old fashioned way.

| ...
| 
| On the other hand, I definitely *would* consider spending the $2000
| that NeXT charges for an erasable optical drive.  Now *there* is
| something useful.  Who couldn't use a 300 Meg removable drive?
| With that, the availability of software on CDs from Apple and elsewhere
| would just be the icing on the cake.

Feel free to buy one.  There are several on the market now, with an average
storage of 650Mb of data per disk.  The problem is, there are also several
formats floating around.  CD-ROM is standardized, making it nicer for mass
distribution.

| Surely Apple could either contract with Canon or some other optical
| manufacturer to sell their own optical drives, or at least bless
| an optical standard for the Mac and distribute their CDs on it.

They already do bless an optical standard: CD-ROM.  And while they could
come out with their own erasable optical drive, I don't think they will.
See each of the three optical storage media has a best use: CD-ROM for mass
distribution, erasable optical drives for daily or weekly data backups, and
WORM drives for long-term archiving of data.  None are anywhere close to the
speed of today's hard drives (which can be purchased in sizes comparable to
those of the optical technologies), so hard drives will remain the standard
for regular use in most computers.

| - Trent Lange
| 
| **********************************************************************
| *  College Basketball Fever:  Catch it!                              *
| *  Yeah, I mixed my slogans.  So what are you going to do about it?  *
| **********************************************************************

- Mike
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