Will CDs Go the Way of Floppy Drives – Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

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In 1980, Sony introduced the 3.5 inch floppy disk that you now see on PCs. The floppy disk stores 1.5 MB, but still uses the same basic technology of the 1970s. Although it cannot compete with the vast storage capacity of the CD, many are still using floppy disks, and PC owners are offered an optional floppy drive. After all, floppy disks are cheaper than CDs, and they seem much more user-friendly to those who are technology-shy.

Also, in the 1980s, the CD or compact disk was invented as a result of the collaboration between Philips and Sony. Its initial function was to replace the unwieldy vinyl records of the time.

However, the CD slowly but surely began to replace floppy disks because of its higher data storage capacity. So, in this age of DVDs, is the CD going the way of the floppy disk, destined to be used only by the next generation of technology –shy users?

CDs Face the Music
In the music arena, at least, the CD is no longer hot. Plunging CD sales are forcing music stores to shut down. DVDs are taking over with their capacity for higher storage (some DVDs can store seven times more data). Says Roy Trakin, Senior Editor of the California based ‘Hits’ magazine, “The CD is turning out to be a transitory sort of item. The future of the CD may be in its enhanced content -- in a hybrid CD DVD and the more upscale formats like DVD audio and super audio CDs."

So it is seems that all is not yet lost for the CD which is poised to evolve into the Super CD.

On the other hand, David Miller, a consultant for a research group in Britain, says that the inexpensive CD single has a bleak future. It hasn’t had a chance to establish itself because instead of hoarding audio CDs, people prefer to download the music they want from the internet. There is another view on this subject of downloads. Some experts say that CDs will remain because many consumers do not feel that they own the music they download onto their hard drive.

Surely, this trend in the music industry is going to have an impact on the availability of the CD as a storage medium. There is still quite a way to go, since, as the experts say, there are an estimated 1.5 billion CD players in the world, and new media will take some years to establish itself.

And in the case of DVDs, he says that the new DVD-ROM offers much more than the consumer needs for storing games, movies and text. In his words, "The technology is ahead of the application."

So, once again, the case for the CD-ROM is not entirely lost, especially if it can evolve into something that can store a higher density of data, for the fact is that, currently, a large data backup requires many CDs.

Quick and Portable
CD technology offers many benefits for the corporate world. CDs and CD drives are highly portable, and this is important, as the idea of lugging around a magnetic tape drive is highly impractical. Compared to tape cartridges, CDs are lightweight, and relatively durable.

What’s more, every notebook computer comes with optional or built-in recordable CD drives. Whether you are transferring large amounts of data, video, or image files from one system to another, CDs are perfect. You can write them in three minutes flat.

An Inexpensive Medium
CDs are cheap. When purchased in bulk quantities, CDs cost a fraction of a cent per megabyte, and that’s not all. The prices of drives keep falling. Plus with all the big multinational companies that have put their names on CD technology, you can be sure that support will always be around tomorrow.

CD-R or CD-RW?
While you can only write data into a CD-R once, a CD-RW today can take a 1000 rewrites! So, unless you have backups elsewhere, it makes sense to store your most precious data on CD-R so you have less chances of losing the data.
And if you find it difficult to believe in the decade-long or century-long guarantees that sometimes come with CDs, make sure to check up on your discs every few months to determine whether your data needs re-backing up.
So, hold on to your CDs. They will survive for many years to come.

Source: Free Articles
http://www.articlecircle.com/computers/data-recovery/will-cds-go-the-way-of-floppy-drives-out-of-sight-out-of-mind.html

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