Blu-Ray

Blu-ray, also known as Blu-ray Disc (BD), is a digital optical storage medium invented in 2006 and developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association. It is designed to enable high-definition video and high-capacity storage, while maintaining compatibility with existing Blu-ray players. Blu-ray Discs have the capacity to store up to 50GB of data or up to four hours of high-def video material. It is possible to have both a Blu-ray and a DVD version on the same disc.

Blu-ray Discs are primarily used to store video content, including movies, television, and video games. The discs are read by a Blu-ray player or computer with a Blu-ray drive in order to play the content. Blu-ray discs are slowly replacing the older standard of DVDs, due to their higher storage capacity, higher quality image, and better sound.

Blu-ray is differentiable from other optical disc formats, like CD and DVD due to its use of a blue-violet laser instead of the red or infrared used in other formats. Blue-violet lasers have a shorter wavelength, allowing more information to be stored in the same area as that of a CD or DVD. Different layers can also be used within a Blu-ray disc, further increasing its storage capacity.

Blu-ray technology is constantly being improved with new features like BD-live, allowing internet-connected Blu-ray players to access additional content stored on the internet, and the playability of 3D movies. Blu-ray is a popular home-theater format, and is becoming increasingly popular for high-definition video editing, as it offers a higher quality image than DVDs.

Blu-ray is also becoming more popular in computers, as laptop and desktop computers now come with built-in Blu-ray drives. Blu-ray is the preferred medium for archiving important data due to its large storage capacity and high read/write speeds. It is now the main format for distribution of Ultra HD (4K) movies, due to its higher capacity and superior picture quality.