Memorex:

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Memorex was not exhibiting at the CES show floor this year, but we did find them at the Pepcom Digital Experience event. They showed us their newest Pro Gold Archival media, along with a few other new products. Estimated pricing on the Gold media will be over 2 times that of standard media, due to the higher cost manufacturing materials that are utilized.

The new Memorex 8Gb micro-drive.

Memorex is also jumping into the iPod accessory market with their new line of Printable iPod Wraps.

Sony:

Sony had many optical products on display, including the infamous Playstation 3. Unfortunately, no release date or estimated pricing has been announced thus far. The PS3 High Definition gaming demo that Sony displayed was identical to the demonstration held at the E3 gaming show last year. This lack of new content disappointed some Playstation fans. Nevertheless, the demo is still quite impressive and Sony was at least showing a possible new design of the PS3 controller.

Sony had a Blu-ray mock up drive on display as well.

We attempted to obtain more information on Sony's Blu-ray PC drive, but unfortunately they could not provide any information on the model number, release date, pricing or manufacturing of this product.

We also asked about the upcoming SONY/NEC optical storage joint venture and what the implications of this could be regarding the development of future HD DVD and Blu-ray drives. Sony reiterated that the joint venture will be over 50% Sony owned. With a larger stake in the company, Sony will have a more powerful guiding hand into the operations of the venture. Will the independent operations of Sony and NEC optical storage release their own Blu-ray and HD DVD PC rewriters? When the Sony/NEC joint venture starts operating as one unit, will the new company drop development of HD DVD drives due to Sony's heavy backing of the Blu-ray Disc format? We'll have to wait and see. 

Another interesting development is that the next generation Sony DVD PC drive should be available in March or April according to a Sony representative. The model number should be DRU-820A according to Sony. As usual, Sony does not publicly disclose the manufacturing source for their drives, but we have a strong feeling that the 820A will be based on the hardware of BenQ's 1670 model.

Sony's BDP-S1 BD-ROM standalone player is pictured above.

Panasonic:

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We stopped by Panasonic's table at the Digitial Experience event to find them running a demo with a new prototype Panasonic Blu-ray standalone player. We spoke to an engineer from Panasonic Japan, but he was not able to provide much information on the standalone player, as it is still to be determined. He also mentioned that the developers still need to implement the digital rights management features on this unit. This unit currently has no model number, they are not allowed to disclose the chipset, and the release date is 'summer".

Panasonic Blu-ray prototype player

When we stopped in at the CES Panasonic displays, we found an internal PC Blu-ray rewriter on display.

The model number for this Panasonic Blu-ray PC drive was SW-5582-CXX. Hardware revision listed on the display unit was 1111, firmware revision listed was B071. This information was gathered from the drive sticker attached to this display unit. Speaking with a product representative, we found that Panasonic currently has no plans to reenter the retail market. This means that this drive will only be available through OEM distributers and bundled with computer systems.

Pioneer:

Pioneer BDR-101 Blu-ray PC rewriter

Pioneer was displaying their BDR-101 internal Blu-ray PC rewriter. This unit supports reading and writing to Blu-ray and DVD formats. It does not support reading nor writing to any CD formats. According to Pioneer representatives, the tentative release date for this unit is 1st quarter 2006, or more specifically near the end of March. The Digital Rights Management features have not yet been implemented on this drive, which may or may not delay the release date. We also confirmed that the slot located on the front bezel is used for ventilation and heat dissipation.

The approximated pricing for this drive is $995. According to Pioneer, the BDR-101 will not be targetted towards the retail market. This means that you won't be able to find the unit sold in major retail stores. If you want to get ahold of this drive, you will need find it through OEM distributers or business product distributers.

Pioneer BDP-HD1 ELITE BD-ROM standalone player

This product is targetted towards the high-end market and is included in part of Pioneer's ELITE product line. This is a networked product that includes an ethernet port on the rear of the unit. It also includes upscaling technology for viewing standard definition DVDs on a HDTV. This unit does not support reading nor writing to any type of CD media. The estimated retail price for this unit is $1,800 and it is scheduled to launch in June.