Sony NEC Optiarc Europe GmbH is launching its retail business in Europe with three new burners under the Sony brand. The premium version of the new burners is the BWU-200S 4x Blu-ray Disc burner. Optiarc also presents two multi-writer DVD burners which deliver up to 20x write speed: the DRU-190A (PATA) and the DRU-190S (SATA).

The BWU-200S burns single and double-layer Blu-ray discs at up to 4x speed, and DVD media at up to 16x speed. It needs around 45 minutes to write a 50 GB BD-R ? which is only half the time required by the predecessor model, the BWU-100A. Up to 230 minutes of video film in HD quality can be recorded on a 50 GB Blu-ray disc. Optiarc has not announced pricing details for the new drive, but Sony is currently offering it at sonystyle.com for about $600.

BD-REs are processed by the BWU-200S at double speed. It processes DVD+R blanks at 16x speed and DVD+RW media at 8x speed, DVD-RAMs at 5x speed and DVD+R discs in double-layer versions at 8x write speed. The BWU-200S has a SATA interface and is supplied with CyberLink BD authoring software for Windows, which inputs video recordings in 1080i and provides editing functions. The software also supports video playback, including DVDs in AVCHD format.

In addition to the BWU-200S, Optiarc starts to distribute two new multi-write DVD burners in retail outlets. The DRU-190S and the DRU-190A achieve up to 20x write speed on single-layer DVD blanks. They burn rewritable and double-layer DVDs at up to 8x DVD speed, and DVD-RAMs at a maximum of 12x speed. The DRU-190S is connected up via a SATA interface which enables even faster data transfer. The DRU-190A has an E-IDE interface.

The BWU-200S, the DRU-190S and the DRU-190A are now available from retail outlets.