It’s a valid question: Is a Blu-ray compatible computer required for using Blu-ray disks? If you listen to the marketing propaganda the computer manufacturers are putting out, you might believe it to be true. Since a question like that was recently asked by a consumer at a popular computer store chain, it deserves an answer.
If you do a search on Amazon, for example, with the keywords of “blu-ray notebook”, you’ll get a list of laptop computers with Blu-ray drives installed on a page titled “Blu-ray Disc Enabled Laptops and Desktops”. This is nothing more than marketing hype.
Blu-ray and High Definition Video
Blu-ray is a disk media format capable of holding up to 25 gigabytes of data for the single-layer type and up to 50 gigabytes of data for the dual-layer type. The type of data is what’s important, not the format of the disk.
After extensive testing, high definition video has been verified to display on most modern computer monitors. The limitation is in the number of pixels the monitors can display and not even the video format itself.
Of course, the computer requires enough installed memory to prevent jerky playback. One gigabyte of memory, as long as all other applications are closed, is sufficient for smooth playback. Anything less and the swap file will start being used. That’s what causes the playback to be choppy. It has nothing to do with the data or the disk.
Why the hype?
Notebooks are being advertised as “Blu-ray enabled” in order to sell more notebooks with Blu-ray optical drives installed instead of the standard DVD drives. The goal is to boost Blu-ray sales, of course, since Blu-ray optical drives are the most expensive optical drives on the market right now.
Instead of buying a new notebook in order to use it with a Blu-ray optical drive, you’d be better off buying a USB external Blu-ray optical drive. You can then use it with any computer you have access to as long as that computer has USB ports. All of the computers built within the last three or four years have USB ports.
The Future Blu-ray Technology
Several companies continue to work on advancing the storage capacity of Blu-ray disks. One disk-producing company has even developed a 10-layer Blu-ray disk capable of holding 250 gigabytes of data, although it hasn’t been demonstrated yet. Another company has already demonstrated a four-layer, 100 gigabyte disk which should be able to work on the current Blu-ray optical drives with merely a firmware upgrade.
If anything would cause you to pause before buying into the hype, it’s the fact that the technology continues to evolve. The answer to the original question is no, you don’t need a Blu-ray compatible computer in order to use or play Blu-ray disks. You just need a method of reading the data on the disks and that can be done with an external optical drive as well as an internal one.