The CD isn't dead. Well, at least not as an optical storage format.

CDs are a handy and space saving way to store and archive information and media for both consumers and businesses, and it seems they might be about to get a whole lot more handy.

A storage technology company based in Israel is apparently "nearly ready" to bring the next big thing in optical storage disks to the shelves.

"Big thing" is about right too - as the company, Memphile, are working on a product called the TeraDisc that would see a single CD offering one terabyte of storage.

Current prototypes of the TeraDisc are upto 800GB, but Memphile think that a 1TB disk is fairly imminent.

The technology involved is different from current CDs available - the disk is made of polymethyl methacrylate and could have 200 virtual layers five microns apart which each hold 5GB of data.

So what would 1TB of storage give you? Room for around 250,000 high quality MP3 files, over 100 DVD quality movies and about 40 high-def movies on a single CD-size disk.

The technology currently uses a red laser but Mempile wants to move to next-gen blue lasers which could eventually see 5TB of data per disk.

The disks can supposedly last 50 years and are reliable. The first prototype is due in 18 months and could be on sale a year after this.

A drive for these disks should cost around $3000, and a 600GB disk will be between $30 and $50. No pricing estimates has been given for the 1TB version.

>> Via - theinquirer