Oak Technology today announced the availability of the OTI-9797S 32X Compact Disc - Recordable/ReWritable (CD-R/RW) optical storage controller. By recording at 32 times the speed of the original single-speed CD specification, the new controller will enable drives to record a full 650 Megabyte compact disc in three minutes or less. The OTI-9797S controller is capable of 32X write speeds as well as 48X CD-ROM read speeds, and is pin-compatible with Oak's 24X OTI-9797 controller to provide an easy upgrade path for OEMs. The OTI-9797S is suitable for use in PC-based or consumer audio CD-R/RW applications. Oak's OTI-9797S controller employs advanced features to achieve one of the fastest overall recording times while still maintaining high reliability and buffer underrun protection. It supports Constant Angular Velocity (CAV), a writing technique that achieves faster write seek times and reduces overall recording time by maintaining a constant rotation speed. For best performance, the new controller also incorporates support for the Mt. Rainier standard, and integrates Oak's patent pending ExacLink™ buffer underrun protection, thereby providing one of the highest functionality CD-R/RW controllers on the market.

The OTI-9797S employs partial and full CAV write and audio DAC/filter circuits that offer the best performance in the industry, plus dyanamic write strategy, allowing a high degree of programability and flexibility in the implementation of CD-R and CD-RW write strategies. In addition to a highly automated block decoder/encoder, the OTI-9797S integrates a 48X CD-DSP that uses a proprietary slicing technique and digital symmetry control to offer increased frequencies and gain programmability. The OTI-9797S digital CD servo provides highly accurate and advanced track counting, enabling the unit to jump an exact number of tracks - up to 2047 tracks - to substantially reduce seek time. The CD wobble servo block supports speeds up to 32X and allows CD encoding at all legacy speeds from 1X to 32X.

Oak's OTI-9797S provides a high level of integration that includes an Ultra DMA IDE/ATAPI controller and USB1.1 interface. It uses digital processing techniques to minimize the amount of required analog circuitry, providing increased flexibility and greater immunity to system noise. An advanced architecture affords reduced error rates, greater seek accuracy, and improved seek access time. Power management is provided to reduce power consumption and increase power efficiency. Oak's OTI-9797S controller is available now, priced at $15 each in sample quantities, and under $10 each in production quantities of 10,000.