20x DVD writers to become mainstream by year-end

With Hewlett-Packard (HP) and Dell evaluating the feasibility of adopting half-height 20x DVD burners, and other PC brands already having decided to adopt such burners for market segmentation and the promotion of sales of desktop PCs equipped with Windows Vista in the second quarter, 20x stands a good chance of replacing 16x to become the mainstream writing speed of DVD burners in the fourth quarter of 2007, according to leading Taiwan optical disc drive makers.

Lite-On IT started volume production of 20x DVD burners in late 2006, while Hitachi-LG Data Storage (HLDS) and Toshiba-Samsung Storage Technology (TSST) began production of 18x DVD burners but were not interested in producing 20x models then, the sources indicated.