Optical Storage Devices

Optical Storage Devices

• An optical disk is a high-capacity storage medium. An optical drive uses reflected light to read data.

• To store data, the disk's metal surface is covered with tiny dents (pits) and flat spots (lands), which cause light to be reflected differently.

• When an optical drive shines light into a pit, the light cannot be reflected back. This represents a bit value of 0 (off). A land reflects light back to its source, Representing a bit value of 1 (on) CD-ROM

• In PCs, the most commonly used are the following:

Optical storage technology is called Compact Disk Read-Only Memory (CD-ROM).

• A standard CD-ROM disk can store up to 650 MB of data, or about 70 minutes of audio.

• Once data is written to a standard CD-ROM which causes light to be reflected differently. After that, the data cannot be altered or overwritten.

Optical Storage Devices - DVD-ROM

• A variation of CD-ROM is called Digital Video Disk Read-Only Memory (DVD-ROM), and is being used in place of CD-ROM in many newer PCs.

• Standard DVD disks store up to 9. GB of data— enough to store an entire movie.

Get quality help now

Sweet V

Verified writer

Proficient in: Computers

4.9 (984)

“ Ok, let me say I’m extremely satisfy with the result while it was a last minute thing. I really enjoy the effort put in. ”

+84 relevant experts are online

Hire writer

Dual-layer DVD disks can store up to 17 GB.

• DVD disks can store so much data because both sides of the disk are used, along with sophisticated data compression technologies.

CD-Recordable (CD-R)

This drive lets you record your own CDs, but data cannot be overwritten once it is recorded to the disk. CD-Rewritable (CD-RW) This drive lets you record a CD, then write new data over the already recorded data.

Photo CD This technology is used to store digital photographs.