First external Blu-ray drive coming soon

Posted by T3 Online on Fri 29 Feb 2008

It was always bound to happen, but now that Blu-ray has a stranglehold on the next-gen DVD market we can expect a raft of new Blu-ray centric tech to flood the market

First up then is PLDS or Philips & Lite-On Digital Solutions, which has unveiled the world's first USB-connected external BD-ROM drive. The catchily titled Lite-On DX-4O1S can read BD media at 4x, single layer DVD at 12x, dual-layer at 8x and CD at 32x maximum.

Explained Jelmer Veldman, Euro marketing manager at PLDS in a blindingly obvious comment on the launch, "Due to recent market developments we can expect an increasing volume of movies to be released in High-Definition on Blu-ray discs. The market adoption of Blu-ray as the optical disc standard for High-Definition content results in a growing demand for Blu-ray playback solutions."

The DX4O1S allows users to play back Blu-ray discs on any PC via a USB 2.0 cable, but don't fire up the poota just yet as it won't start shipping until the second quarter this year with an as yet undisclosed price.