GE Bets On Holographic Optical Storage

Lucas123 writes "Years after announcing they had developed holographic optical disc technology that could store 500GB of data, GE this week said they're preparing to license the technology to manufacturing partners. At the same time, InPhase, which failed to actually get its holographic disc product out the door for years, says GE's product is nothing more than a 'science project,' and its own optical disc is almost ready to go to market — again. But, as one analyst quipped, the old joke about optical disc is that 'there's more written about optical disc than stored on it.'"

A risky bet

[whiteboy86]

Mechanically driven spinning disks technologies? Are they easy to manufacture? Nope. Cheap? Nope. Simple? Nope. Future proof? Nope. Bug free? Nope. Patent free? Nope. Fast and solid state? Nope.

Re:Sounds like they may be too late...

[Thavilden]

Maybe too late for consumer use, but I can see companies that wouldn't want to put their information in the cloud using them for backup. If their shelf life is longer than other optical media it may also be put to good use for archival in libraries and musuems.