Size Matters, Again.

The next big thing--make that the next small thing--in data storage was talked about at PC Expo in June, but what was shown was only a mockup: the product itself wasn't ready for prime time. I'll go so far as to say that if it does hit its marks when it's released, it will be an extraordinary achievement. But I'll wait to see if it can it do that before I give it a thumbs-up.

I'm talking about DataPlay: a removable optical disk system due to ship later this year from DataPlay Inc., of Boulder Co. It uses media the size of a quarter-dollar that's spec'd to hold 250MB per side. The disks can be factory-replicated, like CD-ROMs, or written to, like CD-R. The key to their high areal density is that the recording layer is write-once. (There's no rewritable version in the works, according to Jennifer Finzen, of Imation, which is making the media.)

But both premastered and recordable tracks can reside on the same disk. So with the right combination of the two, and some firmware in the drive, what's recorded can be copy-protected to a greater extent than a CD or a DVD or any other distribution medium today can provide.

Which explains why the music and audiobook industries are drooling over the prospect. DataPlay's spokespeople say that, with next-generation compression, a 500MB two-sided DataPlay disk could hold more than 11 hours of programming, and yet retail for only about $10.

I suspect that's premastered (not user-recorded) programming. But it reminds me of the question I asked at the launch of the Compact Disc. Why wasn't the CD's optical storage technology scaled up from a 120mm disk drive to something the same size as an analog LaserDisk player or an LP turntable? The developers (Sony and Philips) replied that they couldn't afford to pass along to customers the cost of licensing so many hours of programming--that it would push the per-piece price prohibitively high.

The music industry is different today, in many ways, but I have to wonder if the underlying issue is still unresolved: will users get everything from this technology that they could?

Iomega hasn't made much headway with its PocketZip. You might know PocketZip under a different name. It's a magnetic floppy disk, about an inch in diameter, that was developed as "nHand," was renamed "Clik!" at launch, and is now being licensed to music and audiobook publishers as "I-Jam."

When I-Jam disks arrive they'll be an upgraded version Clik!, still single-sided, and still priced around $10 apiece, though with a 100MB capacity. But I-Jam developers must be sweating at me prospect or a 500MB competitor, even if DataPlay is more expensive.

How Small is Too Small?

I do believe that size--small size, that is--matters. The market for 12-inch optical disks isn't static because the media doesn't hold enough data: it's because they and their drives weigh too much and therefore cost too much. And DLT is (albeit slowly) losing market share to other midrange tape systems as much because of its significantly larger form factor as because of capacity and price competition.

The capacity of IBM's MicroDrive--an HDD in a form-factor of about the same tiny dimensions as DataPlay--is now up to 1GB. I've been impressed enough by IBM's earlier (340MB) version to recommend it over solid-state Compact Flash and SmartMedia cards as the ideal storage device for digital cameras (in the mid-range, from Casio, and at the high-end, from Canon and Nikon) that are built to take it. But can the MicroDrive itself "take it"?

At today's prices, I'm no drumbeater for solid-state, but solid-state is nothing if not rugged. A reviewer of digital cameras for another magazine, whose judgment I have long relied upon, told me at the PC Expo that there are reliability issues with MicroDrives in cameras. He said that they can take only so much handling, jostling, etc., without developing problems.

But miniature HDDs are very appropriate for less strenuous portable apps. Shortly before PC Expo I got a preview of Toshiba's new model MK5002MPL.

Toshiba has squeezed a full 5GB onto a single 1.8-inch hard disk in a PCMCIA Type 11 card form factor. Consider the advance that represents: Two years ago, Calluna could justifiably brag about offering 260MB in a Type 11 package; and Toshiba released a 2GB Type 11-size HDD last year. There isn't a laptop in the world that couldn't benefit from having five extra gigabytes in one PC Card slot. And Amy Lian, the HDD director in Toshiba's Disk Products division, told me that 5GB is by no means the end of the line, capacity-wise, for 1.8-inch platters.

But just to round out this column and this subject, I note without comment that Toshiba is also a partner in DataPlay Japan, Inc., a joint venture that will sell, market, and support DataPlay technology in Asia.