/ TECHNICAL PAPER

The Digital Versatile Disc (DVD): System Requirements

and Channel Coding
By Kees A. Schouhamer Immink

The digital versatile disc (DVD) is a new optical recording medium with a design issues and choices that had) to
storage capacity seven times higher than the conventional compact disc bemade. /
(CD). The major part of the capacity increase is achieved by the use of
optics, shorter laser wavelength, and larger numerical aperture, which Physical Aspects -
reduces the spot diameter by a factor of 1.65. The track formed by the The main physical parameters of the
recorded pits and lands, as well as the track pitch, can be reduced by the single-layer DVD are listed in Table 1.
same factor. The storage capacity is further increased by a complete The parameters of the dual-layer disc
are more conservative. Mechanical
redesign of the logical format of the disc, including a more poweiful error specifications such as outer diameter
correction and recording code. The system requirements of the DVD and and center hole diameter of the DVD ·
the related channel coding are outlined in this paper. are equal to those of the CD, allowing
full backward compatibility. The disc

T he compact disc (CD), introduced

more than a decade ago, is a very
successful medium for the distribution
at MPEG-2 quality accompanied by
multiple audio and subtitle channels.
Applying multilayer technology, a
thickness was halved to 0.6 mm, which
resulted in a higher storage capacity
than possible with a disc of 1.2-mm
and storage of digital audio and other storage capacity of up to 17 Gbytes thickness. Specifications of the obso-
digital information. It is anticipated was obtained. The major part of the lete 1.2 mm thick Multimedia CD disc
that its storage capacity, 680 Mbytes, capacity increase is achieved by the can be found in Ref. 1.
will be insufficient for future graphics- use of optics, shorter laser wave- Mechanical instabilities, such as disc
intensive computer applications and length, and larger numerical aperture, warp, of the 0.6 mm thick disc have
high-quality digital video programs. which reduces the spot diameter by a been solved by back-to-hack bonding
An extension of the compact disc fami- factor of 1.65. The track formed by of two 0.6 mm discs. Clearly, overall
ly, the digital versatile disc (DVD), is a the recorded pits and lands, as well as thickness of the sandwich is the same
new optical recording medium with a the track pitch, can be reduced by the 1.2 mm of the CD, and the sandwich
1
storage capacity seven times higher same factor. The storage capacity of has the same· mechanical stability. By
than the conventional CD. the DVD is also increased by a com- employing a red laser at 635-nm wave-
From a consumer vantage point, plete redesign of the logical format of length and a numerical aperture (NA)
DVDs will be capable of storing high- the disc, including a more powerful of 0.6, the read-out resolution is
definition video/audio for feature- Reed-Solomon product code (RS-PC) increased by a factor of 1.65. The sub-
length movies and are expected to and recording code (EFMPlus). The sequent scaling of the track pitch and
gradually replace videocassette tape next sections will discuss the various the pit length per bit increase the actual
and CD-ROM computer data disks
once DVD becomes accepted as a
commercial product. The DVD format
will support a variety of uses. There
will be at least two types of products
introduced in 1996: the DVD movie
player and the DVD-ROM. An audio-
only version of the DVD is still under
development.
The single-layer disc can hold 4.7
Gbytes, which amounts to seven times
more data than an audio CD.
Typically, this is 1~oom for 135 min of
widescreen (16:91aspect ratio) video
reference wavelength NA margins EFM- ClRC- other gains
Revised version of a paper presented at the !37th lCD) 780-635 0.45-0.6 EFMPlus RS-PC no subcode
SMPTE Technical Conference in New Orleans, La. no 3rd layer CRC
(paper no. 137-33) on September 7, 1995. An unedited
version appeared in Moving Images: Meeting the mill Decodin~
Challenges, SMPTE, 1995. Kees A. Schouhamer
Immink is with Philips Research Laboratories,
• Optics Design
I Drive and
Drive Precision B Electromcs
Eindhoven, The Netherlands. Copyright © 1996 by the
Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, Inc. Figure 1. Overview of factors determining the capacity increase.

SMPTE Journal, August 1996 483


0.6mm
Figure 2. Dual-layer reading principle diagram.
Figure 3. Double dual-layer reading principle diagram.
physical data density by a factor of 3.5.
The nomimil read-out reference speed
goes up from 1.2 to 4 m/sec. An
overview of the various factors that
underlaid the capacity increase is
shown in Fig. 1.
The various sources that contributed
to the capacity increase into optics,
drive precision, and electronics have
been partitioned. It can be seen that the
drive and disc margins have become
more stringent by a factor of 1.75. It is
anticipated that the manufacturing of
players and discs can be done with
greater precision than. was the case 15
years ago when the CD was conceived.
A second method to increase the
capacity by a factor of two is by using a
dual-layer disc, where the layers are on
one side of the disc. The principle of
operation of the dual-layer disc is
shown in Fig. 2. The dual-layer CD is
similar to the standard CD. It adopts the
same molded substrate for the first data
layer. The second layer is made by
overlaying a fully reflective aluminum
layer on a partially reflective aluminum
layer. The second layer is applied using
the same principles as the 2P (photo
polymerization) process. Focal plane
servos are used to switch from one
layer to the other. The two layers can
484
TECHNICAL PAPER
Info layer I: fully reflective
/ ifications of the playe,r and disc will
be accessed without flipping the disc.
Continuous play of video signals is
obtained by reading outwards on one
layer, then inwards on the other.
By bonding two dual discs, the struc-
ture depicted in Fig. 3 is obtained. The
sandwich dual-layer disc has a capacity
of 18 Gbytes.
Disc Thickness Considerations
The disc thickness played a major
role during the discussions between the
various electronics companies. In this
section, we will answer the intriguing
question of why a thin disc can hold
more information than a thick disc.
The number of data bits, Nb, that can
be stored on the disc is given by
(1)
where A is the useful area of the disc
surface, d is the diameter of the laser
light spot on the disc, and 11 is the effi-
ciency of the recording method. The
(areal) information density is thus
given by
Nb /A = 11Aitf2 (2)
The spot diameter d is one of the
most relevant parameters of an optical
recording system. The channel coding
can give a higher value of 11 and thus
of N b· Some of the aspects of the
recording channel that govern the spec-
now be explained briefl~'..
The quality of the c . annel is deter-
mined by the player an ',1 the disc; these
are mass-produced and the tolerances
cannot be made unacceptably small.
One example is given to illustrate the
way in which such tolerances affect the
design. Specifically, the choice of the
spot diameter d and disc thickness D
are discussed. Defining d as the half-
value diameter for the light intensity
we have
d= 0.5 IJNA (3)
where A is the wavelength of the laser
light and NA is the numerical aperture
of the objective. To achieve a high
information density (Eq. 2), d must be
as small as possible, and according to
this equation there are two design para-
meters. ,
The laser chosen for this syste~ is a
state-of-the-art, solid-state laser, which
is inexpensive and has a waveJength
of A -:::: 635 nm. This means that in
order to have a small spot diameter, we
must try to make the numerical aper-
ture as large as possible. With increas-
ing NA, however, the manufacturing
tolerances of the player and the disc
rapidly become smaller. For example,
the tolerance in the local skew of the
disc (the disc tilt) relative to the objec-
tive-lens axis is proportional to D/NN.
The tolerance for the disc thickness is
proportional to D/NN, and the depth of
focus, which governs the focusing tol-
erance, is proportional to DINA 2 • In
practice the most stringent tolerance
condition arises from disc tilt. It is very
difficult to manufacture players and
discs where disc tilt angles are much
smaller than 0.5°.
After considering all these factors in
relation to one another, for the CD
having a disc thickness of D =1.2 mm,
a value of NA =0.45 was arrived at. As
the disc skew tolerance is proportional
to D, the second parameter entering the
capacity arena is the disc thickness.
For given disc tilt tolerance, halving
the disc thickness allows an NA
increase by a factor of 2 113 "" 1.26, and
a consequent decrease of the spot
diameter. The disc capacity will there-
fore increase by a Jactor of 1.262 = 1.6.
The benefit of the potential increase
in capacity by a factor of 1.6 as a rdult
SMPTE Journal, August 1996

of halving the disc thickness is only
one side of the balance. On the other
side of the balance we have a loss in
compatibility with the conventional
CD. Replication equipment should be
modified, and also, objective lenses
capable of reading both "thin" and
"thick" discs could be more expensive
than standard lenses optimized for one
thickness. On September 15, 1995,
after some debate, the world's elec-
tronics industries decided to adopt the
sandwich 0.6-mm disc.
Electronics Aspects
1
The main audio/video specifications
of the DVD are listed in Table 2. In the
CD system, a concatenation of two
codes, namely EFM (Eight-to-Fourteen
Modulation) and CIRC (Cross
Interleaved Reed-Solomon Code) is
used. CIRC is used for correction and
detection of erroneously retrieved
information, while EFM is used for
transforming the digital audio bit
stream into a sequence of binary sym-
bols, called channel bits, which are
suitable for storage on the disc. 2 .
Not only are the EFM and CIRC
coding schemes useful for the CD for
which they have been designed, but
they have been extensively employed
in a large variety of digital audio play-
ers and home-storage products such as
CD-ROM, CD-~ and MiniDisc. As in
CD-ROM, the Qser data is organized
into sectors. Sixteen sectors make one
ECC block.
Under DVD format rules, sectors of
2048 user bytes are translated into
2418 bytes (2048 user + 52 sync + 16
SMPTE Journal, August 1996
TECHNICAL PAPER
header + 302 error code), which are in
tum translated into 16 x 2418 channel
bits. Thus, one user bit is translated
into 4836/2048 = 2.36 channel bits. In
a conventional CD, an audio bit is
translated into 588/192 = 3.05 channel
bits/ and we conclude that the "format
efficiency" of the DVD is improved by
32%. The new format is even 47%
more efficient with respect to CD-
ROM, which uses a "third" error cor-
rection layer. Even though consuming
a significantly lower data overhead, the
error correction code, RS-PC, can cope
with longer bursts and burst sequences,
and more random errors. A comparison
of the format efficiency of the DVD
with conventional CD audio is provid-
ed in Table 3.
E"or Co"ection Code: RS-PC
The errors found in both the CD and
DVD systems are a combination of a
random and bursty character, and in
order to alleviate the load on the manu-
facturing process some form of error
correction is required.
As mentioned earlier, the CD system
uses the CIRC error correction code
(ECC). The interleaving scheme is tai-
lored to the specific requirements of
the compact disc audio system. In par-
ticular, the adopted "cross"-interleav-
ing technique will make it possible to
effectively mask errors if correction is
found to be impossible. Depending on
the magnitude of the error to be con-
cealed, this is done by interpolating or
by muting the audio signal. The con-
cealment will make errors almost
inaudible, and as a result, it offers a
graceful degradation of the sound qual-
ity. Specifically, sharp temporary
degradation of the audio signal, or
"clicks," are avoided. The judicious
positioning of the left and right stereo
channel, as well as the audio samples
on even- or odd-number instants within
the interleaving scheme, are key para-
meters to the success of the conceal-
ment strategy.
For the DVD a much more powerful
error correction has been developed.
Enhanced error correction capability is
required for several reasons. First, the
increased physical density implies that
485

of halving the disc thickness is only
one side of the balance. On the other
side of the balance we have a loss in
compatibility with the conventional
CD. Replication equipment should be
modified, and also, objective lenses
capable of reading both "thin" and
"thick" discs could be more expensive
than standard lenses optimized for one
thickness. On September 15, 1995,
after some debate, the world's elec-
tronics industries decided to adopt the
sandwich 0.6-mm disc.
Electronics Aspects
\
The main audio/video specifications
of the DVD are listed in Table 2. In the
CD system, a concatenation of two
codes, namely EFM (Eight-to-Fourteen
Modulation) and CIRC (Cross
Interleaved Reed-Solomon Code) is
used. CIRC is used for correction and
detection of erroneously retrieved
information, while EFM is used for
transforming the digital audio bit
stream into a sequence of binary sym-
bols, called channel bits, which are
suitable for storage on the disc. 2
Not only are the EFM and CIRC
coding schemes useful for the CD for
which they have been designed, but
they have been extensively employed
in a large variety of digital audio play-
ers and home-~torage products such as
CD-ROM, CD4J, and MiniDisc. As in
CD-ROM, the luser data is organized
into sectors. Sixteen sectors make one
ECCblock.
Under DVD format rules, sectors of
2048 user bytes are translated into
2418 bytes (2048 user + 52 sync + 16
SMPTE Journal, August 1996
TECHNICAL PAPER
header+ 302 error code), which are in
tum translated into 16 x 2418 channel
bits. Thus, one user bit is translated
=
into 4836/2048 2.36 channel bits. In
a conventional CD, an audio bit is
translated into 5881192 = 3.05 channel
bits,3 and we conclude that the "format
efficiency" of the DVD is improved by
32%. The new format is even 47%
more efficient with respect to CD-
ROM, which uses a "third" error cor-
rection layer. Even though consuming
a significantly lower data overhead, the
error correction code, RS-PC, can cope
with longer bursts and burst sequences,
and more random errors. A comparison
of the format efficiency of the DVD
with conventional CD audio is provid-
ed in Table 3.
E"or Co"ection Code: RS-PC
The errors found in both the CD and
DVD systems are a combination of a
random and bursty character, and in
order to alleviate the load on the manu-
facturing process some form of error
correctionisrequrred. , required for several reasons. Frrst, the
As mentioned earlier, the CD system
uses the CIRC error correction code
(ECC). The interleaving scheme is tai-
lored to the specific requirements of
the compact disc audio system. In par-
ticular, the adopted "cross"-interleav-
ing technique will make it possible to
effectively mask errors if correction is
found to be impossible. Depending on
the magnitude of the error to be con-
cealed, this is done by interpolating or
by muting the audio signal. The con-
cealment will make errors almost
inaudible, and as a result, it offers a
graceful degradation of the sound qual-
ity. Specifically, sharp temporary
degradation of the audio signal, or
"clicks," are avoided. The judicious
positioning of the left and right stereo
channel, as well as the audio samples
on even- or odd-number instants within
the interleaving scheme, are key para-
meters to the success of the conceal-
ment strategy.
For the DVD a much more powerful
error correction has been developed.
Enhanced error correction capability is
increased physical density implies that
485

,physical imperfections affect propor-
tionally more bits. It is further antici-
pated, since the system margins are
much tighter, that the random error rate
of DVD is larger than that of conven-
tional CD. Secondly, as we can no
longer rely on the concealment tech-
niques used in the audio CD, the relia-
bility of the decoded data must be
much higher. As DVD is a true multi-
media disc, its data integrity must be
comparable to that of computer data.
The Reed-Solomon Product Code
(RS-PC), like CIRC, uses a combina-
. tion of two Reed-Solomon (RS) codes
denoted by C1 and C2•4 In CIRC, C 1 is
[32,28] and C2 is a [28,24] code, where
[n,k] denotes a code with k input and 11
output bytes. The redundant n-k bytes
are generated under the rules of the RS
code. The rate of CIRC is 24/32 = 3/4.
In other words, under CIRC rules one
redundant byte is added to three user
bytes. The RS-PC code is a classical
product code where, as in CD, two
codes cooperate. A product code is
also part of the format of the digital
audio tape (OAT) audio recorder.
The two codes form the two dimen-
sions of a rectangle. In RS-PC, the C 1
and C2 codes are significantly longer
than in CIRC, namely [208,192] and
[182,172]. As a result, the rate of RS-
PC is much higher than that of CIRC,
namely. 172*192/(182*208) = 0.872.
Sixteen sectors of 2,048 bytes user data
make one ECC block.
Figures 4 and 5 depict schematically
the principle of operation of the CIRC
and RS-PC codes. The C 1 and C2 codes
cim be represented by the rows and
columns of a matrix. The combination
of C 1 and C2 is designed in such a way
that in RS-PC the parities generated by
cl are also taken into account in code
C2• These "checks on checks" have the
advantage that the error correcting
capability of the codes in tandem is
improved relative to the CIRC code
where this "double" check is absent.
486
TECHNICAL PAPER
The product - matrix, or structure
of the RS-PC code - cures a difficulty
of the CIRC code, namely, its convolu-
tional structure. In a cross-interleaved
structure the data are formed into an
endless array and the codewords are
produced on columns and diagonals.
Block structures, such as in RS-PC, are
much better adapted to the data world,
which operates in small segments of
information. The CIRC structure of
interleaving was specifically designed
for very long, nonblocked data seg-
ments, such as digital audio or video.
Other examples of cross-interleaved
structures are found in the professional
audio and video recorder formats. The
disadvantage of a product code struc-
ture relative to a CIRC structure is the
requirement of twice the memory
capacity .4 As a result of the fallen price
of solid-state, this is a less important
requirement than in 1979, when the
CD was designed.
The maximum correctable burst
length is approximately 500 bytes (2.4
mm) for CIRC, while it is 2200 bytes
(4.6 mm) for RS-PC. RS-PC is capa-
ble of reducing a random input error
rate of 2 x 10·2 to a data error rate of 10·15 ,
which is a factor of 10 better than in
CD.
EFM Recording Code
The EFM code (and the EFMPlus
code, to be discussed later) is a mem-
ber of the family of de-free runlength-
limited (RLL) codes. The number of
32
Figure 4. Block diagram of CIRC encoder.
sequential like symbols in a (binary)
sequence is known as runlength. A run-
length-limited sequen~ is a sequence of
- binary symbols characterized by two
parameters, Tmin = (d::rl) and Tmax =
(k+ 1), which stipulat~ the minimum
and maximum runlength, respectively,
that may occur in the sequence. The
parameter d controls intersymbol inter-
ference when the sequence is transmit-
ted over a bandwidth-limited channel.
The maximum runlength parameter k
ensures adequate frequency of transi-
tions for synchronization of the read
clock. ·
There are two reasons why EFM sup-
presses the low-frequency components.
First, the servo systems for track fol-
lowing and focusing are controlled by
low-frequency signals, so that low~fre­
quency components of the information
signal could interfere with the servo
systems. Second, low-frequency distur-
bances resulting from fingerp]\ints on
the disc can be filtered out withQut dis-
torting the data signal itself.
Under EFM rules, the data bits are
translated eight at a time into 14 chan-
nel bits, with minimum runlength para-
meter d = 2 and a maximum runlength
=
parameter k 10 channel bits (this
means at least 2 and at most 10 succes-
sive zeros between successive ones).
Part of the EFM coding table is pre-
sented in Table 4, which shows the
decimal representation of the 8-bit
· source word (left column) and its 14-
bit channel representation.
The codewords are described in such ,
a way that a "one" represents a transi-
tion of either positive or negative
polarity, and a "zero" represents the
absence of a transition. At least two
bits, called merging bits, are required
to ensure that the runlength conditions
continue to be satisfied when the code-
words are cascaded. If the runlength is
in danger of becoming too short,
"zeros" are chosen for the merging
28
CIRC
..L
SMPTE Journal, August 1996

/
1728
N
:::
\0
I -25 '----'--'-"~LW...L.L--'-~-'--I....WU...WL-__...i-.c.......>~'-'-:'-':-'
Figure 5. Block diagram of RS-PC encoder.
bits; if it is too long a "one" is selected
for one of them. If we do this, we still
retain a large measure of freedom in
the choice of the merging bits. This
freedom is used for minimizing the
low-frequency content of the signal. In
itself, two merging bits would be suffi-
cient for continuing to satisfy the run-
length conditions. A third merging bit
was added, however, to give sufficient
suppression of the low-frequency com-
ponents.
The measure of the low-frequency
content is the running digital sum
(RDS),1 which is the difference
betwee~ the totals of pit and land
lengths accumulated froin the begin-
ning of the disc. The system now opts
for the merging combination that
makes "the RDS at the end of the sec-
ond codeword as close to zero as possi-
ble. The power spectral density (PSD)
function of conventional EFM has
been obtained by computer simulation.
Results are plotted in Fig. 6.
Description of the EFMPlus
Encoder
The aim of our investigations was the
design of a new "EFM-like" code hav-
ing a higher rate than EFM. The most
important design issue is that critical
parameters such as low-frequency (lf)
content and timing should definitely
not be worsened. 1\bese parameters are
considered to be $tremely critical, as
they affect the seivos and the timing
recovery, which arethe Achilles' heels
of the system.
The principle of operation of the
EFMPlus encoder can be represented
SMPTE Journal, August 1996
TECHNICAL PAPER
lOB----
0.0001
Figure 6. Spectrum of conventional EFM. Both axes are normalized for
fixed user bit rate fb.
by a finite-state machine with an 8-bit
input, a 16-bit output, and four states
that are functions of the (discrete) time.
The states are connected by edges, and
the edges, in turn, are labeled with tags
called words. A word in this context is
a 16-bit sequence that obeys the pre-
scribed ( d = 2, k = 10) constraints.
Each of the four states is characterized
by the type of words that enter, or
leave, the given state. The states and
word sets are characterized as follows:
• Words entering State 1 end with {0,
1 } trailing zeros
• Words entering State 2 and 3 end
with {2, .... , 5} trailing zeros
• Words entering State 4 end with
{6, .... , 9} trailing zeros
The words leaving the states are cho-
sen in such a way that the concatena-
tion of words entering a state and those
leaving that state obey the (d = 2, k =
10) channel constraints. For example,
words leaving State 1 start with a run-
length· of at least two and at most nine
0.0010
Freq. 1/fb
0.0100 0.1000
zeros. In an analogous manner, we
conclude that words leaving State 4
start with at most one zero. Obviously,
the sets of words leaving State 1 or 4
have no words in common. Words
emerging from State 2 and 3 comply
with the above runlength constraints,
but they also comply with other condi-
tions. Words leaving State 2 have been
selected so that the first most signifi-
cant bit (MSB), x 1, and the 13th bit,
x 13 , are both equal zero. Words leaving
State 3 have x 1x 13 :t:. 00. Any walk
through the graph, stepping from state
=
to state, produces a (d 2, k 10) con- =
strained sequence by reading the words
tagged to the edges that connect the
states.
It can be verified that from each of
the states at least 351 words are leav-
ing. An encoder is constructed by
assigning a source word to each of the
351 edges that leave each state. Excess
edges are removed. As a result, each
edge in the graph now has two labels;
487

namely, a 16-bit word and a source
word numbered from 0 to 350. Given
the source word and the encoder state,
the encoder will transmit the word
tagged to the same edge as the source
word at hand. It is immediate which
codeword will be sent, and also which
state will be next. A sequential input
will define a walk in the graph, and as
said, this walk generates a (d 2, k= = response to input 8, while being in State
10) constrained sequence.
As a result, the above finite-state
encoder graph is a (d =2, k = 10) RLL
encoder that freely accommodates 351
source words. The encoder requires
accommodation for only 256 source
words. The excess, 95 words, will be
used for controlling the low-frequency
power. This will be discussed in a later
section.
I
I The encoder graph is defined in
l terms of three sets: the inputs, the out-
puts and the states, and two logical
functions: the output function and the
next-state function. The specific code-
''
r; word, x 1, transmitted by the encoder at
instant t, is a function of the source
word b1 that enters the encoder, but
depends further on the particular state,
s1, of the encoder. Similarly, the "next"
state at instant t+ 1 is a function of x 1
and s1• The output function h(.) and the
next-state function g(.) can be suc-
cinctly written as
x1 :::: h(b 1, s1)
st+ 1 =g(b 1, s1) (4)
Both the output function h(.) and the
next-state function g(.) are described
by four lists with 351 entries. A part of
the output function and the next-state
function is listed in Table 5. This table.
has an entry column that describes the
source (input) word i by an integer
between 0 and 255. The table also
shows h(i,s) the 16-bit output to a par-
ticular input i when the encoder is in
TECHNICAL PAPER
one of the four states s. A "one"
means, as in EFM, a transition pitlland
or land/pit, while a "zero" means the
absence of such a transition.
The third, fifth, seventh, and ninth
columns show the next state function
g(i,s). For example, let the encoder.
graph be initialized at State 1, and let
the source sequence be 8, 3, 4. The
1, equals h(8,1) = 0010000010010000
(Table 5). The new state becomes g
(8,1) = 3. As a result, the response to
input 3, while now being in State 3, is
0010000001001000.
In the next clock cycle, the encoder
state becomes g(3,3) =2. From State 2
with the input equal to 4 we find from-
the table that the corresponding output
is h(4,2) =0010000010010000.
The decoder translates 16-bit words
into 8-bit data words. It does not suf-
fice to look at the 16-bit word only.
The decoder must also look at symbols
at positions 1 and 13 of the upcoming
codeword, namely
(5)
Thus, decoding of the new code is
done by a logic array that translates
(16+2) channel bits into 8 bits. In con-
trast, under EFM rules, it suffices to
observe 14 of the 17 channel bits that
constitute an EFM codeword.
The encoder defined above can
freely accommodate 3 51 source
words. In order to make it possible to
use a unique 26-bit sync word, 7 can-
didate words were barred, leaving a
code size of 344. As only accommoda-
tion for 256 source words is needed,
the surplus words can be exploited for
minimizing the power at low frequen-
cies. The suppression of low-frequen-
cy components, or de-control, is done
by controlling the running digital sum
(RDS). The 88 surplus words are used
as an alternative channel representa-
tion of the source words 0, ... ,87. The
full encoder is described by two tables
called main and substitute table,
respectively (Fig. 7).
The source words 0, ... ,87 can b,e rep-
resented by the designated entries of
the main table or alternatively by the
entries of the substitute table. For
source words 0, ... ,87 the encqder opts
for that particular representation from
the main table or the substitute table
that minimizes the absolute value of ·
the RDS. The power spectral density of
the new code has been computed by a
computer program that simulated the
encoder algorithm. The results are
plotted in Fig. 8.
During the DVD debate, an alterna-
tive "EFM-like" code of 8/15 rate was
discussed. As there is no such thing as
a free lunch, the code will have much
more low-frequency (lf) contt:nt than
EFMPlus (Fig. 9). Although the extra
6% of density increase this 8/15 rate
code offers is very attractive, the
increased If-content of the code (16 to
18 dB above EFM level) may impose
0 Substitute
Table
87
-. - ----- - -
Main
Table
25
Figure 7. Block diagram of EFMP/us
encode~ ·
SMPTE Journal, August 1996

/
/
0
·5
·10
iii'
:!2.
0 ~
"'0.. ·15
·20
·25
0.0001
Freq. 1/fb
Figure 8. Spectrum of EFMPius. The upper curve shows the spec-
tral density without look-ahead; lower curve shows the spectral
density using 3 bytes look-ahead.
too great a risk for the servo systems
and data recovery. This is particularly
so sipce typical tolerances, such as
defocusing and mistracking, are
approximately two times tighter than
with CD.
Conclusion
The DVD is a new optical recording
medium with a storage capacity seven
times higher than the conventional CD.
The user capacity of the single-layer
disc is 4.7 Gbytes, and the dual-layer
disc increases the data capacity to 8.5
Gbytes. A significant part of the capaci-
ty incr~ase has been achieved by the use
Kees A. Schouhamer Immink was
born in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
He received an M.S. in electrical engi-
neering in 1974 from the Eindhoven
University of Technology, The Nether-
lands, and a Ph.D. from the same uni-
versity in 1985. He has spent his entire
professional life at the Pfiilips
Research Laboratories in Eindhoven,
where he currently holds the position
of Research Fellow. In addition, he is
adjunct professor at the Institute of
Ex"perimental Mathematics, Essen
University, Genfany.
Dr. Immink ~as contributed to the
design and develppment of a variety of
digital audio recorders, such as the
compact disc, compact disc video,
SMPTE Journal, August 1996
TECHNICAL PAPER
le ·151---+-----t-------1-------1
·201------j-------· +-----
0.1000
Figure 9. Spectrum of 8115 rate "EFM-Iike" code.
of optics, shorter laser wavelength, and
larger numerical aperture, which
reduces the spot diameter by a factor of
1.65. The track formed by the recorded
pits and lands, as well' as the track pitch,
can be reduced by the same factor.
The system requirements of the DVD
and the related channel coding have
been outlined. The conventional GIRC
and EFM codes have been replaced by a
more powerful error correction, RS-PC,
and recording code, EFMPlus. As a
result, the format efficiency of the DVD
relative to audio CD is improved by
32% (49% with respect to CD-ROM).
Even though consuming a significantly
THE AUTHOR
DAT, DCC,
and, recently,
the DVD. He
holds 30 U.S.
patents, is coau-
thor of three
books, and has
written numer-
ous papers in
the field of opti-
cal and mag-
netic recorders.
Immink has received many awards
for his part in the digital audio and
video revolution. He was recognized
with the AES Silver Medal in 1992,
the lEE Sir J.J. Thomson Medal in
1993, the SMPTE Poniatoff Gold
Freq. 1/lb
lower data overhead, the error correc-
tion code can cope with longer bursts
and burst sequences, and more random
errors.
References
1. K. A. S. Immink, "EFMPlus: The Coding
Format of the MultiMedia Compact Disc,"
IEEE Trans. Consumer Electr., CE-41:491-
491, Aug. 1995.
2. - - - , Coding Techniques for Digital
Recorders, Prentice-Hall Inti. (U.K.) Ltd.,
Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1991.
3. J. Watkinson, The Art of Digital Audio,
Focal Press, London, 1988.
4. S. B. Wicker and V. K. Bhargava, eds.,
Reed-Solomon Codes and Their
Applications, IEEE Press, 1994.
Medal for Technical Excellence in
1994, and the IEEE Masaru lbuka con-
sumer electronics award in 1996.
Immink has served as program chair-
man and conference chairman in vari-
ous international conferences over the
years. A member of the SMPTE, he
currently serves on the Board of
Editors of the SMPTE Journal. He is a
Fellow of the AES, lEE, and IEEE,
and serves as a governor of the AES
and the IEEE Information Theory
Society. In 1996 he was elected to life
membership in the Royal Netherlands
Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of
the highest honors that can be accorded
a scientist or engineer.
489