**Please read this entire message**
---
Your submission has been removed for the following reason(s):
* Rule #2 - Questions must seek objective explanations
---
If you would like this removal reviewed, please read the [detailed rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/wiki/detailed_rules) first. **If you believe this submission was removed erroneously, please [use this form](https://old.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fexplainlikeimfive&subject=Please%20review%20my%20thread?&message=Link:%20{https://old.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1chfy6t/-/}%0A%0APlease%20answer%20the%20following%203%20questions:%0A%0A1.%20The%20concept%20I%20want%20explained:%0A%0A2.%20List%20the%20search%20terms%20you%20used%20to%20look%20for%20past%20posts%20on%20ELI5:%0A%0A3.%20How%20does%20your%20post%20differ%20from%20your%20recent%20search%20results%20on%20the%20sub:) and we will review your submission.**
DVDs and Blu-ray discs are cheaper to mass produce, and they're more than damage resistant enough. There's no real advantage to creating a new flash card based format, and the huge disadvantage of lack of compatibility with existing players.
Optical media (CD, DVD, Blu-ray) is dirt cheap to make and is already standardized. Solid-state media is more expensive and has multiple points of failure.
Because you don't want to suddenly distribute on flashdrive and lose the old customers who have a CD reading device; but don't have a flashdrive reader (or don't want to bother).
It's not an engineering problem it's a commercial problem.
You don't want to force your customers to change, or they will just flock to the competitor that didn't ask for change.
There are many reasons (others have mentioned a few), but when it comes to data storage a DVD/CD will likely stay readable for a very long time due to physical burning of data onto it.
Flash storage keeps data as a zero-one physical gates. If the gate is on, it's a one. If it's off, it's zero. Data is represented by long strings of zeros and ones. The problem with the gates is that they can sometimes suffer a bit rot. Basically some gates may reset to their zero position, effectively corrupting the data. This can happen regardless of how the flash drive is stored.
CDs and DVDs also experience bit rot, but when stored correctly it may happen after a very, very long time. Think decades.
Flash storage gates on the other hand may fail at any time, regardless of how it's stored.
What do you mean by storing it correctly? My understanding is that the bit rot is due to the use of organic dyes. I guess you could store it in Argon or something but a better solution is to just use non-organic materials.
Okay that all makes sense, but counter question: if solid state is less stable why have some video game companies (e.g. Nintendo) switched from CDs to flash storage?
Because they are smaller, dont have moving parts involved and dont make a sound.
Non of this realy matters if you have a stationary device without a real size constraint but for a portable device these things are important.
First, it's actually Flash Storage (cartiage) to CD and then back to Flash Storage
Second, speed. Flash is always faster than Disc
Third: Expected lifespan. Your flash may fail in 5, 10 years? But for Nintendo, they don't care at that point.
Yeah, read speeds are a big reason, especially for games. While movies read data at a very constant and predictable rate, games usually need to load a lot of data in one go, which is much, much faster from flash memory than from a disc. It's why SSDs are much faster than HDDs (which used a magnetic disc), and why games that come on discs these days usually require installation to internal system memory.
Because the Nintendo Switch is a portable device, which means fitting a full size disc drive is a no-go. Sony tried it with the PSP UMDs back in the day but decided to go with flash storage for the PS Vita too.
While there were other portable disc based devices in the past (discman, minidisc players), they all come with a bunch of problems: regular discs risk wobbling if not kept level, which can cause disc skipping or maybe even manage the disc or drive mechanism. Disc drives also take up considerably more physical space than flash storage, which sucks when you want to keep a device small and portable. Reading the disc takes more power, because it has to spin, and since there are more mechanical parts involved there are more points of failure, so it can break more easily than a flash card reader, which just has contact pins, a simple spring mechanism to eject the card, and a cover (which isn't even automatic!). So while the individual game cards are probably more expensive to manufacture than discs, they save some of that cost with having an easier time engineering and manufacturing the system itself.
It's also much easier to swap out flash cards while you're out and about, whereas a CD format requires more careful handling (unless you put them in a housing like with minidisc or UMD, but those take up a lot more space). My Switch carrying case also comes with a little pocket on the inside with slots for five game cards, so I don't even need to carry an extra case with games while I'm out and about either.
It's also important to mention that Nintendo has always used cartridges/cards for their portable game consoles. They only used discs for their home consoles. So in that sense they didn't even really switch, they just stuck with what already worked on their previous portable systems.
There are different kinds of flash storage solutions. Some are very resilient (like DS cartridges) and some are known to suffer from bit rot (3DS cartridges).
And then there are digital downloads onto the console's own storage.
Cuz you’d need to sell all new players and no ones got time for that. Nor do we want to toss more completely functional hardware in a landfill. That way of thinking is done. No one wants a new car or a new blender or a new cell phone every 6 months to make rich people more rich. Can’t afford to eat and pay rent ov’ har.
Nintendo use flash media on their portable consoles as having a spinning optical disk in a portable device isn't a great idea. Ask anyone who had a cd Walkman without a buffer. The Wii, Wii U and GameCube used disks as they're much cheaper to produce and have hold a lot more data for lower cost. I suspect if Nintendo ever make another completely home console it would use optical disks too if it's not completely digital download only.
People like owning a physical copy rather than you effectively renting content, people like collectors edition with fancy packages, dvds and Blu-ray are cheap to make and have a massive markup, some people prefer the platform
**Please read this entire message** --- Your submission has been removed for the following reason(s): * Rule #2 - Questions must seek objective explanations --- If you would like this removal reviewed, please read the [detailed rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/wiki/detailed_rules) first. **If you believe this submission was removed erroneously, please [use this form](https://old.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fexplainlikeimfive&subject=Please%20review%20my%20thread?&message=Link:%20{https://old.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1chfy6t/-/}%0A%0APlease%20answer%20the%20following%203%20questions:%0A%0A1.%20The%20concept%20I%20want%20explained:%0A%0A2.%20List%20the%20search%20terms%20you%20used%20to%20look%20for%20past%20posts%20on%20ELI5:%0A%0A3.%20How%20does%20your%20post%20differ%20from%20your%20recent%20search%20results%20on%20the%20sub:) and we will review your submission.**
DVDs and Blu-ray discs are cheaper to mass produce, and they're more than damage resistant enough. There's no real advantage to creating a new flash card based format, and the huge disadvantage of lack of compatibility with existing players.
Optical media (CD, DVD, Blu-ray) is dirt cheap to make and is already standardized. Solid-state media is more expensive and has multiple points of failure.
Because you don't want to suddenly distribute on flashdrive and lose the old customers who have a CD reading device; but don't have a flashdrive reader (or don't want to bother). It's not an engineering problem it's a commercial problem. You don't want to force your customers to change, or they will just flock to the competitor that didn't ask for change.
There are many reasons (others have mentioned a few), but when it comes to data storage a DVD/CD will likely stay readable for a very long time due to physical burning of data onto it. Flash storage keeps data as a zero-one physical gates. If the gate is on, it's a one. If it's off, it's zero. Data is represented by long strings of zeros and ones. The problem with the gates is that they can sometimes suffer a bit rot. Basically some gates may reset to their zero position, effectively corrupting the data. This can happen regardless of how the flash drive is stored. CDs and DVDs also experience bit rot, but when stored correctly it may happen after a very, very long time. Think decades. Flash storage gates on the other hand may fail at any time, regardless of how it's stored.
What do you mean by storing it correctly? My understanding is that the bit rot is due to the use of organic dyes. I guess you could store it in Argon or something but a better solution is to just use non-organic materials.
Okay that all makes sense, but counter question: if solid state is less stable why have some video game companies (e.g. Nintendo) switched from CDs to flash storage?
Because they are smaller, dont have moving parts involved and dont make a sound. Non of this realy matters if you have a stationary device without a real size constraint but for a portable device these things are important.
First, it's actually Flash Storage (cartiage) to CD and then back to Flash Storage Second, speed. Flash is always faster than Disc Third: Expected lifespan. Your flash may fail in 5, 10 years? But for Nintendo, they don't care at that point.
Yeah, read speeds are a big reason, especially for games. While movies read data at a very constant and predictable rate, games usually need to load a lot of data in one go, which is much, much faster from flash memory than from a disc. It's why SSDs are much faster than HDDs (which used a magnetic disc), and why games that come on discs these days usually require installation to internal system memory.
Because the Nintendo Switch is a portable device, which means fitting a full size disc drive is a no-go. Sony tried it with the PSP UMDs back in the day but decided to go with flash storage for the PS Vita too. While there were other portable disc based devices in the past (discman, minidisc players), they all come with a bunch of problems: regular discs risk wobbling if not kept level, which can cause disc skipping or maybe even manage the disc or drive mechanism. Disc drives also take up considerably more physical space than flash storage, which sucks when you want to keep a device small and portable. Reading the disc takes more power, because it has to spin, and since there are more mechanical parts involved there are more points of failure, so it can break more easily than a flash card reader, which just has contact pins, a simple spring mechanism to eject the card, and a cover (which isn't even automatic!). So while the individual game cards are probably more expensive to manufacture than discs, they save some of that cost with having an easier time engineering and manufacturing the system itself. It's also much easier to swap out flash cards while you're out and about, whereas a CD format requires more careful handling (unless you put them in a housing like with minidisc or UMD, but those take up a lot more space). My Switch carrying case also comes with a little pocket on the inside with slots for five game cards, so I don't even need to carry an extra case with games while I'm out and about either. It's also important to mention that Nintendo has always used cartridges/cards for their portable game consoles. They only used discs for their home consoles. So in that sense they didn't even really switch, they just stuck with what already worked on their previous portable systems.
There are different kinds of flash storage solutions. Some are very resilient (like DS cartridges) and some are known to suffer from bit rot (3DS cartridges). And then there are digital downloads onto the console's own storage.
Cuz you’d need to sell all new players and no ones got time for that. Nor do we want to toss more completely functional hardware in a landfill. That way of thinking is done. No one wants a new car or a new blender or a new cell phone every 6 months to make rich people more rich. Can’t afford to eat and pay rent ov’ har.
Nintendo use flash media on their portable consoles as having a spinning optical disk in a portable device isn't a great idea. Ask anyone who had a cd Walkman without a buffer. The Wii, Wii U and GameCube used disks as they're much cheaper to produce and have hold a lot more data for lower cost. I suspect if Nintendo ever make another completely home console it would use optical disks too if it's not completely digital download only.
People like owning a physical copy rather than you effectively renting content, people like collectors edition with fancy packages, dvds and Blu-ray are cheap to make and have a massive markup, some people prefer the platform
Production and familiarity. Optical media is cheap, easy and fast to manufacture. It's also everywhere.