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In computing, an optical disc drive (ODD) is a disk drive that uses laser light or electromagnetic waves within or near the visible light spectrum as part of the process of reading or writing data to or from optical discs. Some drives can only read from certain discs, but recent drives can both read and record, also called burners or writers. Compact discs, DVDs, and Blu-ray discs are common types of optical media which can be read and recorded by such drives. Optical disc drives that are no longer in production include CD-ROM drive, CD writer drive, and combo (CD-RW/DVD-ROM) drive. As of 2015, DVD writer drive is the most common for desktop PCs and laptops. There are also DVD-ROM drive, BD-ROM drive, Blu-ray Disc combo drive, and Blu-ray Disc writer drive which are not so much demand in the market. Optical disc drives are an integral part of standalone appliances such as CD players, VCD players, DVD players, Blu-ray disc players, DVD recorders, certain desktop video game consoles, such as Sony PlayStation 4, Microsoft Xbox One, and Nintendo Wii U, and certain portable video game consoles, such as Sony PlayStation Portable. They are also very commonly used in computers to read software and consumer media distributed on disc, and to record discs for archival and data exchange purposes. Floppy disk drives, with capacity of 1.44 MB, have been made obsolete: optical media are cheap and have vastly higher capacity to handle the large files used since the days of floppy discs, and the vast majority of computers and much consumer entertainment hardware have optical writers. USB flash drives, high-capacity, small, and inexpensive, are suitable where read/write capability is required. Disc recording is restricted to storing files playable on consumer appliances (films, music, etc.), relatively small volumes of data (e.g., a standard DVD holds 4.7 gigabytes) for local use, and data for distribution, but only on a small scale; mass-producing large numbers of identical discs is cheaper and faster than individual recording. Optical discs are used to back up relatively small volumes of data, but backing up of entire hard drives, , typically containing many hundreds of gigabytes or even multiple terabytes, is less practical than with the smaller capacities previously available. Large backups are often made on external hard drives, as their price has dropped to a level making this viable; in professional environments magnetic tape drives are also used. == History == The first laser disc, demonstrated in 1972, was the ''Laservision'' 12-inch video disc. The video signal was stored as an analog format like a video cassette. The first digitally recorded optical disc was a 5-inch audio compact disc (CD) in a read-only format created by Philips and Sony in 1975. Five years later, the same two companies introduced a digital storage solution for computers using this same CD size called a CD-ROM. Not until 1987 did Sony demonstrate the erasable and rewritable 5.25-inch optical drive. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Optical disc drive」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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