This Ecma Standard specifies the characteristics of 130 mm optical disk cartridges (ODCs) with a capacity of 1 Gigabyte per cartridge. The standard specifies two related, but different implementations of such cartridges:
Type R/W
Provides for data to be written, read and erased many times over the whole of both recording surfaces of the disk using the thermo-magnetic and magneto-optical effects.
Type WO
Provides write once, read multiple functionality on both disk surfaces using the thermo-magnetic and magneto-optical effects.
This Ecma Standard specifies:
- the conditions for conformance testing and the reference drive;
- the environments in which the cartridges are to be operated and stored;
- the mechanical, physical and dimensional characteristics of the case and of the cartridge, so as to provide mechanical interchangeability between data processing systems;
- the format of the information on the disk, both embossed and user-written, including the physical disposition of the tracks and sectors, the error correction codes, and the modulation method used;
- the characteristics of the embossed information on the disk;
- the magneto-optical characteristics of the disk, enabling processing systems to write data onto the disk;
- the minimum quality of user-written data on the disk, enabling data processing systems to read data from the disk.
This Ecma Standard provides for interchange between optical disk drives. Together with a standard for volume and file structure, it provides for full data interchange between data processing systems. Interchange involves the ability to write, read and erase data without introducing any error.