Sony recently announced 6 new Blu-ray recorders in Japan that are now coming to the market. But these are special. The support the next-gen BDXL format that support up to 128 GB Blu-ray discs – more than double that of the current Blu-ray standard.
Sony BDXL recorders
Sharp was first to announce BDXL players and we also introduced the BDXL standard in this article. Now Sony has announced six new 3D BDXL recorders in Japan.
The new Sony recorders support the BDXL format that can hold up to 128 GB on a Blu-ray disc but they can also playback current 3D Blu-rays and 2D Blu-rays that are compatible with the current BD standard. However, BDXL discs are not playable on current Blu-ray players.
Sony BDXL recorder
Sony mentions that the players have an amazing boot time of just 0.5 seconds and that all models include twin tuners (except for the smallest BDZ-AT300S) for the recording functionality. All of the new HD sound formats are also supported. The recorders can even write on 100 GB BDXL discs if you find that the massive hard drive capacity is a bottleneck.
The two flagship models are called BDZ-AX1000 and BDZ-AX2000, and will feature a 1TB and 2TB hard drive, respectively. These also support DLNA, and have a SD/memory stick reader is built in.
The lower priced BDZ-AT900, BDZ-AT700, BDZ-AT500 & BDZ-AT300S models will have 1TB, 500GB, 320GB, and 500GB hard drive built-in.
These players will be available in stores in Japan from October 22. No words on an international launch yet but it seems that the BDXL format is slowly gaining foothold. Now Sony, Panasonic and Sharp has BDXL players/recorders coming.
Sony announces BDXL 3D Blu-ray recorders
