The Compact Disc – A short History

The Sony Corporation first showed an optical audio disc publicly in 1976, and two years later they demonstrated a digital audio disc with a 150 minute playing time, this was a decedent of the Laserdisc technology invented by David Gregg in 1958. This technology paved the way for the Compact Disc eventually introduced in 1982 jointly by Sony Corporation and Phillips Consumer Electronics.

The catalyst for these developments was new development in laser technology (the word comes from the acronym: Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation) using gallium arsenide (GaAs). Just like the Phillips video disc, a transparent plastic was used for the CD with a reflective metallic coating to the other side incorporating an imprinted pit pattern, which could be read by the laser through the transparent layer.

Unlike the LP record, because the payable surface was protected by this clear layer, the bits could not be obscured by dust particles and with the laser accurately focused on the metallic layer; any dust on light scratches on the plastic surfaced would not be “seen” by the laser.

The original CD concept was based on a disc of 11.5cm, allowing for a play time of one hour, slightly longer than the total play time of the two sides of an LP, but the eventual playing time was determined by the length of Beethoven’s symphonies!  After research with Phillips’ a subsidiary it was discovered that the longest performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony last 74 minutes – this became the playing time of the Audio CD, and to accommodate the extra play time, the CD became a 12cm diameter.

This was to form the basis of the first “Red Book” standard (which would eventually become part of the “Rainbow Book” of standards for optical discs), this set out the physical attributes of the Compact Disc together with parameters for the optics, deviations, error rate and error correction (CIRC: cross interleaved Reed-Solomon Coding), modulation (eight-fourteen modulation – EFM), together with sub-code channels and graphics.

The first test CD was manufactured in Hanover Germany by the Polydor Pressing Operations Plant. This was a recording of Richard Strauss’ Eine Alpeninfonie by the Berlin Philharmonic, conducted by Herbert von Karajan.  And the first commercial production at this new factory was The Visitors by ABBA, whilst Billy Joel’s 52nd Street was the first CD to be released commercially.

Sony was first to market with a CD player – the CDP-101 launched in October 1982. Other manufacturers followed and by 1985 the first million seller CD occurred – Brother In Arms by Dire Straits.

Although originally intended as a replacement for the LP record, the CD grew to include many other applications. The CD-ROM was released in 1985, a read only format for personal computer software, then in 1990 the CD-Recordable or CD-R became a reality, opening the way for easy data and audio transfer and a replacement to the audio cassette player. The CD-R has made a massive change to the music industry, along with MP3 style downloads, the CD-R  has allowed musicians to not only produce their own music, but also to act as their own distributors via internet, by passing the traditional music label entirely. The CD-R and DVD-R also created a new type of service business - CD and DVD Duplication

From the CD would come various other formats including CD-R (Orange Book), VCD, SVCD and CD-Bridge (White Book) to  mention a few and lead on to the DVD and DVD-R  formats and in recent years the Blu-ray and HD DVD formats.





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