Sharp has announced that it will begin volume production of its new 3.3mm
blue-violet semiconductor laser in July. With its small size and heat-dissipating CAN package, the GH04020A4G is ideal for notebook
Blu-ray and HD DVD drives. Here's part of their press release, translated from Japanese:
Sharp, the royal purple which adopts the package of industry smallest diameter
φ3.3mm mass-produces the low power output semiconductor laser , from July. The blue ray disk of the next generation DVD
of the notebook PC (BD) and it is the device which is optimum to the playback of HD DVD...
...This product, when miniaturization
is assured, in order to overcome the trade-off that temperature inside the package rises, mounted on the package of the high thermal
insulation construction which developed the laser tip/chip which to electric power consumption is converted low anew. Because of this,
the long-lived design of small-sized size and the highest level was actualized simultaneously.
Sharp will ship out samples on
June 13th and plans to eventually produce 500,000 units per month. If you'd like to read more, Sharp's entire press release can be
found here.
