Kenwood 52x TrueX CD-ROM drive

Ladies and Gentlemen,

At the very begining I would like to thank you all for coming. My name is Jan Stria and the reason of my being here today is just to inform you about a new CD-ROM using a different reading technology than the others drives we know today. If you had a question, do not hesitate and ask me.

Structure of my presentation will be following: Firstly I will briefly present some facts from manufacturer’s history. Secondly I will say some important facts about standard way reading CDs and comparing it to new ZenResearch CD reading technology. I will show you sheet with both technologies schemes as well. After that I will spend a little time with technical specification and hardware requirements of Kenwood TrueX CD-ROM drive.

Kenwood Coprporation brief history review:

In December 1946 was established Kasuga Radio Co., Ltd. in Nagano Prefecture, Japan. It began with production of audio components and test & measuring instruments. Company name changed to Trio Corporation in 1960. Three years later, in 1963, was established Kenwood Electronics in the U.S. as a sales company. In 1986 company name changed again, this time to Kenwood Corporation. Ten years later, in 1996, Kenwood Loginet Corporation was established to handle logistic and also Kenwood TMI Corporation, which specializes in the manufacture of Test & Measuring Instruments. Finally Kenwood Technologies was set up in 1997. That’s all from this corporation brief history review, so let’s move further on.

The CD-ROM has become very important commodity in area of multimedia computing. Drives continue to get faster and faster, and it's become increasingly difficult for manufacturers to differentiate their products in the marketplace. Today, we see CD-ROMs selling for as little as $10. CD-ROMs at 40x, 50x, drives with "true speed" and "max speed," Quite frankly, there was little new technology for advancing the CD-ROM, and with DVD-ROM dropping drastically in price, the compact disc appeared to be a dying breed. Touting an innovative new approach to reading CDs, Kenwood's new 52x "TrueX" CD-ROM is making some very bold claims - "fastest CD-ROM drive on earth" standing out in our minds. Now I’m going to tell you what's so new about this technology, and how does it work.

Standard way reading CDs

The vast majority of high-speed CD-ROMs today use a method of reading discs known as CAV, which means Constant Angular Velocity. This method will spin the disc at a constant rate (for the Asus drive, at 10,000 Rotates Per Minute (=RPM), and thus the pick-up heads will read the disc at different speeds depending on where the data is located on the physical disc. There are a few disadvantages to using this method. First of all, data will only be read at the "Max" speed if it's on the outer rim of the disc. Data on CD-ROM is stored from the inside-out, which means that you won't be able to take advantage of the "max" speed unless you're reading data at the end of the disc.

But there are also drives using CLV method, which stands for Constant Linear Velocity. These drives are called “true speed”. They change the speed of the disc depending on where the read-head is operating. Need the center of the disc, where it spins the slowest, the motor will speed up to increase the data read rate. Near the outer edge, where the disc spins faster, the drive will slow down the rotation rate to keep the data transfer steady. CLV drives stay more true to their claims than CAV drives, but in general they tend to be available only at slower speeds, since it's harder to dynamically vary the rotation rate of the disc in relation to the position of the read head's laser.

So how does the 52X TrueX attain its phenomenal 52x speed? This question brings us to Zen Research's TrueX technology. TrueX as implemented on the 52x is separated into Multibeam illumination and a parallel-processing Application Specific Integrated Circuit, in short ASIC.

ZenResearch CD reading technology

Multibeam works by taking a conventional laser beam (780nm infrared) and splitting it 7 equal ways through a diffraction grating. These seven beams are focused and equally distributed across the CD to hit seven contiguous tracks in parallel. The middle beam is a focusing and tracking laser and serves to keep the others on-track. The three beams on each side of the focusing beam read information off their respective tracks simultaneously. These beams are then send back down to the detector array, which features 7 discrete detectors, one for each split beam. The data from each beam is distributed and interpreted by a special ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit). The ASIC used in TrueX is designed to read multiple streams of parallel coming from each of the 7 diffracted beams. It integrates read functions with analog control elements, decoding, servo motor control for the read heads, and converts the data stream from parallel to serial.

Now, you would surely want to know what is the result of all this. So, by reading multiple beams at once, the transfer rate on TrueX drives should be massively greater than that on a standard CD-ROM. In addition, it's possible to tone down the extreme rotation speeds on the actual disc. For instance: Asus' 50xMax drive rotates at an insanely high 10,000 RPM. Kenwood's 52x rotates a data disc at at 1900-4750 RPM, which is equivalent to a 9.5X CLV drive.

Slower rotation rate increases the lifetime of the product and its components, and greatly reduces the noise and vibration associated with high-speed CD-ROMs. This also allows the drive to be read in CLV format, keeping the data transfer rate consistent throughout the entire disc.

Technical Specification

Drive Interface: EIDE/ATAPI, Disc Loading: Motorized Tray

Supported Formats:
CD-ROM Mode 1 and Mode 2, CD-R, CD-RW, CD-Extra, CD-DA Audio, Photo CD (Single- and Multi-Session),

CD-I/FMV, Video CD, CD-ROM-XA, Karaoke CD, CD-WO, I-Trax CD

Data Transfer Rate: 6,750 to 7,800 KB/sec. (typical)

Burst Data Transfer Rate: 16.6 MB/sec. (PIO Mode 4 and DMA Mode 2)

Average Random Seek Time: < 90 ms

Disc Diameter: 8cm(3in), 12cm(5in)

Data Buffer: 2048 KB ; CD-Audio out 4-pin (analog), 2-pin SPDIF (digital)

The drive is cleanly and clearly labeled, and supports the standard Master, Slave, and Cable Select modes. Also included are analog and digital audio out headers to sound cards. Booting up Windows 98, the drive is automatically detected, and works instantly. No hassles, no problems.

Conclusion

In conclusion I would like to summarize all the characteristic. As Kenwood says: “it is the fastest drive on planet” and all I can do is to agree with it. When operating, the drive is exceptionally quiet and virtually there is no vibration. Reading discs in CLV mode keeps the data rate steady as a rock, while ZenResearch's multibeam technology allows for a sustained 6-7MB/s transfer rate on a 3,000 RPM throughout the entire disc. A SCSI version of this drive should also be available in the near future. If you are thinking about buying a new CD-ROM, lots of recommendation says just for Kenwood TrueX drive, it has already gained many prizes for new technology, huge reliability and quality. For more information please visit the Internet site: www.kenwoodtech.com or www.firingsquad.com. That’s all for today, thank you all for coming.