What is Blu-Ray?


Blu-ray, also known as Blu-ray Disc (BD), is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers (including Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson). The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc. This extra capacity combined with the use of advanced video and audio codecs will offer consumers an unprecedented HD experience.

While current optical disc technologies such as DVD, DVD±R, DVD±RW, and DVD-RAM rely on a red laser to read and write data, the new format uses a blue-violet laser instead, hence the name Blu-ray. Despite the different type of lasers used, Blu-ray products can easily be made backwards compatible with CDs and DVDs through the use of a BD/DVD/CD compatible optical pickup unit. The benefit of using a blue-violet laser (405nm) is that it has a shorter wavelength than a red laser (650nm), which makes it possible to focus the laser spot with even greater precision. This allows data to be packed more tightly and stored in less space, so it's possible to fit more data on the disc even though it's the same size as a CD/DVD. This together with the change of numerical aperture to 0.85 is what enables Blu-ray Discs to hold 25GB/50GB.

Blu-ray is currently supported by more than 180 of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer, recording media, video game and music companies. The format also has broad support from the major movie studios as a successor to today's DVD format. In fact, seven of the eight major movie studios (Disney, Fox, Warner, Paramount, Sony, Lionsgate and MGM) have released movies in the Blu-ray format and six of them (Disney, Fox, Sony, Warner, Lionsgate and MGM) are releasing their movies exclusively in the Blu-ray format. Many studios have also announced that they will begin releasing new feature films on Blu-ray Disc day-and-date with DVD, as well as a continuous slate of catalog titles every month.

Can I Copy Blu-Ray Formatted DVD Movies?

Yes you can? DVD Cloner 5 supports Blu-Ray DVD/HD DVD movie copying.

DVD Cloner 5

What Else Should You Know About Blu-Ray/HD DVD Movie Copying?

In order to successfully copy Blu-Ray encoded DVD movies, you need a decrypter to read a Blu ray (BD) DVD. At present (May 2008), there are no decrypters that can handle BD+ consistently (free or otherwise).

It's unlikely there will ever be a "universal" decrypter that will work on all BD DVDs because each DVD must be cracked to obtain the disc key. This means that unless the provider of the decrypter can provide a key for every DVD that will ever be released, you may be very disappointed waiting until a key for your movie becomes available.

BD-R media come in two sizes: 25 Gig and 50 Gig, which cost about $15 and $30 respectively. Unless you have a transcoder and the ability to remove all the extra crap they will incorporate to make BD+ copying a nightmare, you must copy the DVD one-to-one on a 50 Gig DVD. At current BD-R prices, it's cheaper and easier to buy a second original DVD.