Optical media formats

i5/OS™ provides support for several optical media types and media formats.

The media format is the file system architecture that exists on the media to manage file, directory, and volume information.

Writable optical media (such as WORM, erasable, DVD-RAM) is initialized on i5/OS using the Initialize Optical (INZOPT) CL command. WORM media must use media format HPOFS. DVD-RAM media must use media format UDF. Erasable media may use either high performance optical filing system (HPOFS) or universal disk format (UDF) depending on the requirements of the user. You can specify the format by using the MEDFMT keyword on the INZOPT command. The following topic provide information about the different media formats and a comparison so users of erasable media can select the media format that best meets their requirements.

• ISO 9660
  This industry standard media format was originally designed to specify the volume and file structures of compact-disk read-only memory (CD-ROM) optical disks, and is a read-only media format.
• High Performance Optical File System
  High performance optical file system (HPOFS) is an IBM-developed media format architecture available to use when initializing optical media on the i5/OS.
• Universal disk format
  UDF (Universal Disk Format) is the OSTA (Optical Storage Technology Association) supported subset of ISO/IEC 13346.
• CL command support for media formats
  This topic provides information on using i5/OS commands to save and restore data and some of the restrictions for the ISO 9660, High Performance Optical File System (HPOFS), and universal disk format (UDF) media formats.