High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! In January 2004, Sony announced the Hi-MD media storage format as a further development of the MiniDisc format. With its release in later 2004, came the ability to use newly-developed, high-capacity 1 gigabyte Hi-MD discs, sporting the same dimensions as regular MiniDiscs. The Hi-MD format can be considered obsolescent as the last recorder/player was discontinued in 2011. The discs themselves are scheduled to be withdrawn in September 2012 (though the production of regular MiniDiscs continues for the present (as of Sept 2012)).