Sharp and National Semiconductor join forces to make MiniDisc Data drives a new standard for PC and consumer applications; significant cost and performance improvements yield a 140 Mbyte alternative to floppy disk drives

Business Wire, Nov 1, 1995

CAMAS, Wash.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 1, 1995--Sharp Corp. of Osaka, Japan and National Semiconductor Corp. of Santa Clara, Calif. today announced the results of a team effort focused on bringing MiniDisc Data technology into mainstream computing and consumer applications.

MiniDisc is an optical technology that uses laser diodes to read and write information on a 2-1/2" (64 mm) 140 Mbyte disk. MiniDisc Audio is already a consumer standard in Japan and its popularity is now expanding in Europe, Asia, and North America with worldwide sales of 1.5 million units forecast for 1995. Features such as character input, playback order editing, and monaural extended time recording are popular with music lovers.

The MiniDisc Data format has experienced slower growth. However, the Sharp and National Semiconductor research and development efforts have decreased the cost of MD Data drives while reducing their height to 17 mm P small enough to fit in a notebook computer - thus making MD Data storage very attractive for mobile computing and consumer products.

"There is pent-up demand for a viable alternative to floppy drives," said Ingrid Story, MD Data product manager at Sharp Electronics Corp. "Multimedia applications create files that easily exceed the 1.4 Mbyte floppy capacity. MD Data has superior reliability, portability, and the cost-per-byte of storage is less than a floppy disk."

"MD Data formats provide a flexibility you can't find with any of the alternatives," said Gregory Urban, marketing manager in National's Personal Systems Business Unit.

MD Data also supports three types of disks, all of which are appropriate for multimedia - recordable, playback-only, and hybrid (areas of recordable and playback-only). Hybrid MD Data disks can, for example, allow software manufacturers to distribute software that is more resistant to piracy by limiting the number of allowable installations. Game disks can provide space for storing games in progress and keeping personal profiles of players to make games more portable.

MD Data and CD-ROM Seen as Complementary Media

CD-ROM is well established as a read-only standard. Systems with both CD-ROM and MD Data drives will give multimedia developers, for example, great flexibility. Stock photos, video clips, maps, voice, and music can be pulled from the CD-ROM, read into a multimedia program and then written on the MD Data disk for storage, editing, mastering and distribution. Consumers can use the recently released MiniDisc-Picture specification to similar advantage.

Family snapshots could be read from photo-CDs, narrative or music added and the resulting multimedia family album could be mailed to friends or relatives. This combination of CD-ROM and MD Data eliminates the need for costly writeable CD-ROM drives.

National Semiconductor Provides an Innovative MD Data Interface

National has developed the new MultiDrive Interface Controller (MDIC), a system that multiplexes the MD Data drive interface over a standard floppy drive interface. To achieve this, National moved the MD Data drive's interface electronics and command control down to an I/O chip in the PC and offloaded the drive's signal processing functions to the CPU.

In the future, the multidrive interface will be offered as a cell integrated into National's Super I/O family of products. These steps, combined with use of common production facilities for high volume MD Audio should put MD Data's $200 OEM price target within reach.

Sharp's industry-leading hologram pick-up unit and thin mechanism along with MDIC allow the drives to shrink to a 17 mm high form factor and hot-plug in to a standard floppy disk drive slot providing easy integration into new designs. The MDIC approach also provides an upgrade path for existing systems from floppy to MD Data.

Users merely purchase an MDI ISA-card and installation kit with software drivers to reconfigure their system. The system can then use 140 Mbyte MD Data and 1.4 Mbyte floppy drives interchangeably or in the same system.

MiniDisc Data/MultiDrive Interface Controller Features and Benefits:

-- Lower cost - Minimizes cost by replacing redundant hardware with software

-- Higher performance - 100 times the storage capacity of 1.4 Mbyte floppy disks, faster data rates, and a technology roadmap for performance improvements

-- Infrastructure support - Broad industry support in the consumer arena with drive makers, media manufacturers, and content providers

-- Migration path - Multidrive interface controls both floppy drives and MiniDisc Data drives over the standard floppy cable for the ultimate in transition flexibility

MiniDisc Technology Already a Consumer Standard

Optical minidisc technology was developed for consumer applications (audio) and began to spread rapidly throughout Japan in 1992 with the following features:

-- High-quality recording/playback of digital sound

-- High-speed music selection with random access

-- Guard memory to prevent skipping due to shock

-- Easy handling with the small cartridge