optical disc

noun

variants or optical disk

plural optical discs or optical disks

: a disk with a plastic coating on which information (such as music, visual images, or computer data) is recorded digitally (as in the form of tiny pits) and which is read by using a laser

The PS5 is available in two versions. … At this point, people are happy to get their hands on either one, but if you don't have a library of optical discs—for Blu-ray movies, used games or old PS4 games—CNET recommends that you go with the $400 version.

—Dave Johnson

Examples of optical disc in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Contrast that to CDs, which digitally encode audio files onto optical discs that are translated back into sound via laser scanning. —Andrew Paul, Popular Science, 27 Mar. 2024

Now scientists in China have developed a way to encode data on 100 layers in optical discs. —IEEE Spectrum, 23 Feb. 2024

Previously, scientists investigated encoding data on optical discs in many layers in three dimensions to boost their capacity. —IEEE Spectrum, 23 Feb. 2024

When the format was being designed in the 1980s, optical discs were the obvious storage media because of their ability to store millions of bytes of data (many minutes of music) at low cost. —Ramon Padilla, USA TODAY, 18 Mar. 2023

Either way, physical games for the PS5 will use 100GB optical disks, inserted into an optical drive that doubles as a 4K Bluray player. —Wired, 8 Oct. 2019

Word History

First Known Use

1957, in the meaning defined above