For only a slight premium over existing CD-RW technology, TDK Corp. says it will deliver a 36/24/40X drive that not only works with today's CD-R and CD-RW media but adds a 2GB "super-size mode," splitting the difference between 650MB CDs and 4.7GB recordable DVDs -- at, TDK says, half the cost and with faster performance than the latter.

Priced at $199, the Windows XP-compatible internal ATAPI drive features a MultiLevel read/write chip from Calimetrics Inc. that permits storing 2GB of data on new ML-R (write-once) and ML-RW (rewritable) discs -- which TDK expects to sell for $2 and $3 apiece, respectively.

The company says retail and OEM versions of the drive, along with media, will ship in the second quarter of this year. TDK adds that the drive will maintain its rated 36X ML recording speed over the full surface of a disc, archiving 2GB of data in less than six minutes, while future 40X CD-RW drives will achieve that speed only for portions of the disc.

The company notes that recordable DVD is clearly the way to go for video storage and playback compatibility with DVD-ROM, while CD-R/CD-RW offers near-universal, floppy-disk-style data exchange with today's computers. But it hopes that 2GB ML-R and ML-RW will catch on as a fast, economical data backup and archiving solution for home and business users.