For months the high-definition disc standards Blu-ray and HD-DVD fought a brutal battle for supremacy, with the Sony-backed Blu-ray standard finally coming out on top. However for many consumers in the era of high-speed downloads and cheap-as-dirt DVD burners, this hasn't amounted to much of a victory. The burners, at least as far as the photographer is concerned, are still too slow, and their once-amazing-sounding 25GB capacity doesn't seem so amazing when a single shoot on a 24MP camera can easily create more images than they can hold.

Sanyo just announced that they're developing a new laser for burners that can not only move write speed from 8x to 12x but could allow for writing on four-layers of a Blu-ray disc, which would provide quadruple the capacity of today's 25GB devices.

100GB discs at significantly faster speed? Now we're talking. Even if the new 12x compatible quadruple-layer disc are obscenely priced, they'll still come in lower than a 100GB drive. It's going to make for a compelling backup and client-distribution tool.

The company is hoping to get the burners into the hands of consumers sometime in the next year or so, which is good for photographers, and good for the format that's been struggling even as it enjoys its victory dance.