Visitors of the IFA Consumer Electronics show will have the chance to see the new GGW-H20N drive, the first 6x Blu-Ray burner also capable of reading HD DVD discs. The new GGW-H20N is the successor of the currently available GGW-H10N Super-multi Blue Blu-Ray /HD DVD combo drive. Basic specifications include 6x burning for BD-R media using the CAV (Constant Angular Velocity) writing strategy, 3x HD DVD-ROM reading, 16x writing for DVD+/-R media and 40x for CD-R. Another strong advantage of the new drive is the support for 4x BD-R DL (50GB) burning, which means that you will be able to write approximately 46 GB of data in less than 50 minutes. The BD-RE burning speed is set at 2x. The SATA drive is also compatible with the DVD-RAM format.

Availability of the drive is expected in the third quarter of 2007, priced at approximately €400.

HLDS also plans to release a Blu-Ray/HD DVD reader, keeping up with the demand for more affordable drives for entertainment PCs.

IFA will be held in Berlin Aug 31 - Sep 5 2007.