DVD History

Once you got a DVD disc, you may be interested in the history of DVD. If you want to know about the DVD history, this article just tells you about the history of DVD development in detail.

Tips: You can get other information on DVD from the articles what is DVD, DVD video format standard, and the DVD disc formats. If you want to rip or copy DVD disc on Mac, you can just turn for help to DVD Copy for Mac.

DVD History Details

As the full name of is "Digital Versatile Disc", DVD is a successor of CD / VCD. It only took more than a year's time since the initial specifications to the first DVD prototype released in early 1996. The birth of DVD and its standard can't be so easily and quickly without the rapid development of the entertainment industry. The CD and VCD discs (the predecessors of DVD discs) were also born out for this reason. The ever-increasing demands of media moguls stimulated hardware manufacturers to develop a brand new digital disc, that's the DVD disc.

In the early nineties, the Advisory Committee of US Film Producer on behalf of seven major Hollywood movie production company drafted a paper on their aspirations. In this drawn up petition, they requested on a CD disc which can be used to record a video program with standard length (135 minutes) with much higher picture and sound quality than LD. This request was made in mid-1990 and ensured in 1994. The resolution of VCD images at that time can only met 352 × 240 (NTSC format) or 352 × 288 (PAL format). That's to say the video performance of that time is far from sufficient to meet the above requirements. This was the first step of DVD history on its development.

Sony first released the "format and technical specifications on single-sided double-layer 12CM (5.25 inch) high-density multimedia CD", which was referred to as MMCD (Multi Media Compact Disc). This is the first a DVD specifications. It is full of competition since the beginning of the birth of DVD. The fierce flame broke out between the MMCD (single-sided double-layer structure) from Sony and Philips Group and the SD (double-sided structure) from Toshiba. Even if both sides become reconciled finally, the fight did not come to a completely end.

The fight later extended to the dispute on the specifications of DVD burner. Philips and Sony, who lost the DVD standards battle, could not wait to develop the recordable DVD when the DVD has just launched in 1996. And they co-founded the DVD + RW Alliance with HP. The DVD + RW Alliance is the DVD + RW and DVD + R specification makers.

At the same time, Pioneer also came up with its recordable DVD technology in 1997 - DVD-R and the subsequent DVD-RW. Since the recordable DVD technology was geared to the needs of the mainstream market of DVD video and an important supplement to the weakness of DVD-RAM that it was quickly certified by the DVD Forum and become the official recordable DVD standards on data storage applications. (DVD-R and DVD-RAM were both received by the DVD Forum). So there are three categories and five standards on DVD recording technology finally. They are DVD-RAM, DVD-R/RW, and the DVD + R / RW.

That's all about the DVD history. Even HD DVD and Blu-ray discs are coming out nowadays, the DVD is still the most widely used disc now.