Cupertino, Calif. — The Optical Storage Technology Association (OSTA) and Ecma International announced today that the International Standards Organization (ISO) has approved ISO/IEC 10995, a global standard for optical media archive life testing for recordable and rewritable DVDs.
Approval of the new standard is the culmination of joint development efforts by OSTA and ECMA to define standard procedures for media archive-life testing and classification, and then fast-track the archival-grade optical disc testing specification through the ISO process.
OSTA established the Optical Disc Archive Testing Committee in 2005 to enable a broad team of industry experts, including global manufacturers of 120mm optical media and drives, as well as university and government participants, to define the test methodology. In 2006, OSTA and ECMA agreed to work together to fast-track the test methodology, initially approved as ECMA-397, through the ISO process
“Optical discs are an excellent archival medium for secure, removable, portable storage of important photos and documents,” said David Bunzel, OSTA president. “Approval of this global standard is an important milestone in our goal to enable end users to more easily identify and select archival-grade optical media, and we encourage industry-wide implementation of this standard to assist them in their purchase decisions.”
OSTA’s membership includes optical product manufacturers and resellers from three continents, representing more than 85 percent of worldwide writable optical product shipments, according to the trade association.
More info on OSTA is available here at www.osta.org.
