Last-modified: 1998/12/20
Version: 2.08
Send corrections and updates to Andy McFadden (fadden@netcom.com). If you have a question you'd like to see answered in here, either post it to one of the comp.publish.cdrom newsgroups (if you don't have the answer), or send it to fadden@netcom.com (if you do).
This was originally developed as a Usenet newsgroup FAQ. If you'd like to check out the newsgroups, point your news reader at the following (or go to http://www.dejanews.com/ and read them with your web browser):
The "canonical" FAQ is available from http://www.fadden.com/cdrfaq/ in HTML format and from the MIT FAQ archives in plain text format. You can get an all-in-one-file version of the HTML in a .ZIP file.
If you're maintaining a translation, or just really want to know what has changed since the last update, you can get a set of context diffs in a .ZIP file.
Please DO NOT post copies of the HTML version on your web site. I keep getting e-mail from people reading versions that are several months old. You should include a link to the www.fadden.com site instead. Links are very much appreciated, since it can be difficult to find this site by keyword through some search engines (lots of CD-R vendor spam).
The last-modified date of each section is shown below the Subject line. The date format used is YYYY/MM/DD. The date stamps were added on 1998/04/06, so you won't find any older than that.
This version of the FAQ is generated automatically by faq2html, an application developed specifically for converting the plain ASCII version of the CD-Recordable FAQ to HTML. The program isn't generally available at this time.
You are visitor
to this page since June 1st, 1998.
This FAQ is Copyright (C) 1998 by Andy McFadden, All Rights Reserved.
Free distribution of the this FAQ is encouraged, as are conversions to HTML or other formats and translation to foreign languages, so long as no content is removed, and additions are clearly marked. The plain ASCII text and www.fadden.com HTML versions aren't restricted, but other conversions might be (the content is free, the presentation might not be). Check with the publisher.
The date and version number on the FAQ *are* considered part of the content that must not be removed. I occasionally get messages from people who don't realize that the copy they're reading is more than a year and a half old.
Caveat lector: the information here is derived from Usenet postings,
e-mail, and information on WWW sites. As such, it may well be DEAD WRONG,
and you are encouraged to verify it for yourself.
I take no responsibility for damaged hardware, CD-Rs turned into coasters or frisbees, time lost, or any other damages you incur as a result of reading this FAQ. Information on specific models of hardware and software is based on *opinions* of other users, not scientific studies. I am not an expert in this (or any other) field. Everything here could be a total malicious lie, and should be treated as such. You have been warned.
I don't get paid to plug anybody's software or equipment. The sections on "what XXX should I buy" are not here because I want to sway purchases one way or another, they're here because the questions are asked *a lot*, and the answers are pretty consistent. You are invited and encouraged to investigate the capabilities and reputations of all products.
The various product and company names are trademarks of their respective companies.
Visit http://www.clari.net/brad/copymyths.html for a mini-FAQ on copyright laws.
This document attempts to answer Frequently Asked Questions about CD-Recordable technology and related fields. It is a Usenet newsgroup FAQ, updated and posted around the middle of each month. The main foci are explaining CD-R technology, describing hardware and software solutions for creating audio CDs and CD-ROMs, and helping people find solutions to common problems.
The FAQ is heavily biased toward PCs and computer-based recorders, because that's what I'm most familiar with, but I have made an effort to include useful information for owners of other equipment. I don't anticipate the section on stand-alone audio CD recorders expanding greatly, because they're far simpler to operate than computer-based recorders, and most of the "must know" information about them is more appropriate in an FAQ on stereo systems or studio recording.
I don't usually address questions that can be phrased, "how do I make my software do this?" The answers to those should be in the manual that came with your software. In general, this is a collection of answers to specific questions, not a "how to" guide. I also don't try to track moving targets, like CD recorder firmware versions or software versions unless a specific release is especially interesting. Ditto for which recorders work with which packet-writing solutions.
This FAQ does not, and will not, cover DVD, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RAM, DVD+RW, or any of the other formats in the ever-expanding DVD morass. Recordable DVD will likely be an altogether different proposition, and will probably require its own FAQ (presumably written by somebody else!).
Another minor update. I could get used to this. ;-)
Added section (6-7-6). There were scattered changes throughout; the diffs are online if you're really interested.
There are a few translations available.
Italian, by Simone Parca: http://users.iol.it/parsi/.
There was a Chinese translation of an early version of the FAQ, but it fell out of date and has since disappeared.
French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish translations can be done through http://babelfish.altavista.digital.com/cgi-bin/translate. This is an automatic language translator that is HTML-aware. It only translates the first part of each document, so it's not entirely helpful if you just want to read a translation, but it may make doing a full translation much easier. (I'm told the translation is pretty good for an automatic translator, but is still pretty rough. I don't want to post a translation that is inaccurate or misleading, so I'm not going to run the FAQ parts through AltaVista automatically.)
If you're interested in translating this FAQ, you are welcome to do so, but please respect the amount of work that I and others have put into it. Don't strip out whole sections, remove author attributions, or hide the revision date of the document. I don't think the terms in section (0-1) are terribly restrictive. If, for whatever reason, you can't keep up with every update of the English version, that's fine; all I ask is that you include a link to the www.fadden.com version, so that the current information is easily locateable. (Some commonly updated things, like the list of recorders in section (5-1), don't need much translation.) If you don't want to translate a particular section, just leave it in English.
If you want to start with an HTML version, use the pages from http://www.fadden.com/cdrfaq/.
If you do a translation, let me know and I'll put the URL here.
This FAQ covers the three newsgroups in the comp.publish.cdrom hierarchy, one for software, one for hardware, and one for multimedia. The names of the newsgroups imply that the intended topics are related to publishing material on CD-ROMs, but the current discussions cover most everything related to CD-Recordable devices.
Here are a few guidelines. These aren't hard and fast rules -- nobody died and put me in charge of making the rules -- but if you're not sure what the appropriate subject matter is then this may be helpful.
news:comp.publish.cdrom.hardware is the most popular of the groups. Appropriate material includes questions about past, current, and future CD-R devices. Asking for installation help or advice on what to buy is appropriate, as are questions about related hardware like SCSI adapters and CD-ROM drives. Some related newsgroups are:
news:comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.cd-romnews:comp.publish.cdrom.software is for discussions about software used to prepare material for and create CDs and CD-ROMs. Questions about how to do things with a specific piece of software belong here, as do "the CD-R software from XXX won't recognize my drive", and "does a program exist that does YYY". Some related newsgroups are:
news:comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage
news:comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.systems
news:comp.periphs.scsi
news:alt.cd-rom
news:alt.comp.periphs.cdr
news:linux.apps.cdwrite
news:alt.cd-romnews:comp.publish.cdrom.multimedia is for discussions about creating multimedia products on CD-ROMs. Questions about multimedia authoring software belong here, as do most production-type questions, e.g. "where can I go to get my CD pressed with jewel cases and glossy inserts?" Related newsgroups are:
news:linux.apps.cdwrite
news:comp.multimediaPlease try to keep cross-posting to a minimum. Broadcasting questions to 3 or 4 related newsgroups will increase the noise level and probably won't get you more answers.
news:rec.video.desktop
news:rec.video.professional
news:rec.photo.digital
news:misc.education.multimedia
Some general rules apply to all of the comp.publish.cdrom.* groups:
(1) Piracy of CD-ROM software or CDs: CD recorders can be used to make copies of copyrighted material, and while backups of data are legal, making or accepting copies from others most likely isn't. Whatever your opinion of the matter, software piracy and other copyright violations are illegal in most countries in the world, so requests and/or advertisements for pirated material should be kept off the newsgroup. Also, please don't start or participate in a debate about whether or not software piracy is bad. There have been hundreds of such debates over the past several years, and the only thing that either side has managed to prove is that piracy debates are a tremendous waste of time.
(2) Personal CD-R hardware and software sales: strictly speaking, these groups aren't appropriate for selling off your old hardware or software. Such things are best left in misc.forsale.computers.*, ba.market.computers, and related groups. Since many readers are in the market for new hardware, a limited number of clearly marked articles are tolerated. The common Usenet convention is to use "FS: HP4020i $400 obo" for "For Sale" messages and "WTB: HP4020i" for "Want To Buy" messages.
(3) CD-R product advertising: these groups by their nature are somewhat commercial. Many readers are in the market for new hardware or CD-R media, and for this reason a *limited* amount of retail/wholesale advertising is tolerated but discouraged. If you *clearly* mark your postings as advertisements, you will get relatively few complaints. Posting frequent and useless followups just to broadcast your 20-line signature will get you flamed and subsequently ignored. Feel free to send mail to people who post questions about product pricing and availability, but please don't create mailing lists and broadcast to everyone who posts.
(4) Other advertising: while it's certainly the case that most or all of the readers have a CD-ROM drive on a computer, the same could be said of almost every person reading news from a home computer today. Please keep ads in newsgroups that are more appropriate. Advertising the latest educational, game, or adult CD is inappropriate for these groups, as are "hot new Cyrix 686 PC" posts. Subtle attempts to advertise web sites ("golly, this looked really neat, so I thought I'd tell everyone") are more obvious than you might think.
(5) Spam: you cannot make money fast. That's life, get used to it. If the message involves putting your name at the top of a list of 5 or 10 people, don't post it. If it has an 800 or 888 number that a reader would call to hear more about your unique business opportunity, don't post it.
(6) Job postings: looking for job candidates on these newsgroups is a tolerated but generally futile exercise. Most of the readers are looking for or offering help on CD-Rs, not searching for a job. Try one of the other groups, like misc.jobs.offered.
(7) Binaries: as with most Usenet newsgroups, posting binary files (large or small) is inappropriate. If you want to make a binary file available to Usenet readers, send it to an appropriate alt.binaries newsgroup, and just post a pointer to it in the other group(s).
One final note: bear in mind that these groups are read by people all over the world. If you're looking for local retailers, be sure to specify what "local" is for you. Posting in English is the best way to ensure that you will get a response, but the readership is diverse enough that you will likely get a reply no matter what language you use. If you want to quote prices, specify the currency to avoid confusion (e.g. US$300 or CAN$300 or Y30000 or ...).
The first thing to do is look at the web pages for the products you're using. Sometimes there will be software or firmware updates, or pages with information on common problems. Scanning through news archives on servers like www.altavista.digital.com or www.dejanews.com will often turn up relevant material.
If you don't find anything, calling or sending an e-mail message to the technical support department for the product that is giving you trouble is a good second step. If you want to contact other users, posting a message to one of the Usenet newsgroups is a reasonable thing to do.
You will get faster, more accurate responses to questions if you include enough detail in your mail message or news posting. For most problems having to do with recording, you need to specify:
These are intended to be brief (if somewhat incomplete) answers to basic questions. More detailed information can be found later in the FAQ. For example, section (1-5), "How much can they hold?", is answered in far more detail in section (7-6).
CD-R is short for "CD-Recordable". Recordable CDs are WORM (Write Once, Read Multiple) media that work just like standard CDs. The advantage of CD-R over other types of optical media is that you can use the discs with a standard CD player. The disadvantage is that you can't reuse a disc.
A related technology called CD-Rewritable (CD-RW) allows you to erase discs and reuse them, but the media doesn't work in all players.
The CDs you buy in a store are pressed from a mold. CD-Rs are burned with a laser. They may look different (often green, gold, or blue instead of silver), they're less tolerant of extreme temperatures and sunlight, and they're more susceptible to physical damage. Whether CD-Rs or pressed CDs last longer is difficult to answer.
While they're not physically identical, they work just the same. Some CD players and CD-ROM drives aren't as good at reading CD-R and CD-RW discs as they are at reading pressed CDs, but by and large they work just fine.
By the way, you can't write data onto pressed discs. Buying a bunch of old CDs in the hopes of writing new stuff onto them is a bad idea. You have to buy blank CD-R or CD-RW media.
Yes. You can create CD-ROMs from data on your hard drive, and you can create new audio CDs from anything you can record into a WAV or AIFF sound file. With an audio-only CD-Recorder, which hooks up to your stereo system instead of your computer, you can record directly from CD, cassette, DAT, or whatever.
The CD-ROMs you produce will play in ordinary CD-ROM drives, and the audio CDs you create will work in your home or car CD player.
Writing to CD-Rs and CD-RWs requires a special drive. You can't write CDs with an ordinary CD-ROM drive.
Yes, both audio and data CDs can be duplicated. You can even create audio CDs that are compilations of other audio CDs (perhaps a personal "best of" disc).
Bear in mind that most CDs are protected by copyright laws.
About 74 minutes of audio, or about 650MB of data.
Yes and no. The process can be a bit more involved than that, and requires special software that (usually) comes bundled with the drive.
With "packet writing" software, and a recorder that supports it, you can treat a CD-R or CD-RW disc like a floppy. Generally speaking, you can only write to each part of the disc once, so deleting files doesn't gain any space. There are other limitations as well.
With more traditional software -- necessary if you want the broadest possible compatibility -- you usually end up writing everything to the disc all at once. When you're doing the writing you can't interrupt the drive, and you can't reclaim the space you've used. If you want to write your files in smaller bunches, you lose a fair bit of space every time you stop and start again.
Nothing. This FAQ is about CD-R and CD-RW, and only crosses over into DVD when the two technologies rub up against each other.
To learn more about DVD, try http://www.unik.no/~robert/hifi/dvd/ (http://www.multimania.com/abela/DVD/DVDfaq.html if you prefer French).
This FAQ contains a great deal of information, but it's geared toward answering specific questions rather than providing a general education. Some of the other net resources are more like a tutorial than a Q&A list, and may provide a better starting point.
Mike Richter has a primer on CD-R at http://resource.simplenet.com/.
Octave's CD-Recordable Handbook is available in HTML from http://www.octave.com/library/ricoh/cdrhandbook.html.
Adaptec has a lot of information at http://www.adaptec.com/cdrec/.
I get a lot of questions about digital audio extraction that are answered at http://www.tardis.ed.ac.uk/~psyche/cdda/.
CD fundamentals.
From _The Compact Disc Handbook, 2nd edition_ by Ken Pohlmann, 1992 (ISBN 0-89579-300-8):
"Write-once media is manufactured similarly to conventional playback-only discs. As with regular CDs, they employ a polycarbonate substrate, a reflective layer, and a protective top layer. Sandwiched between the substrate and reflective layer, however, is a recording layer composed of an organic dye. .... Unlike regular CDs, a pre-grooved spiral track is used to guide the recording laser along the spiral track; this greatly simplifies recorder hardware design and ensures disc compatibility."
Your basic CD-R is layered like this, from top to bottom:
[optional] labelYes, it's real gold in "green" and "gold" CDs, but if you hold a CD-R up to a light source you'll notice that it's thin enough to see through (the gold layer is between 50 and 100nm thick). Something to bear in mind is that the data is closest to the label side of the CD, not the clear plastic side that the data is read from. If the CD-R doesn't have a hard top coating such as Kodak's "Infoguard", it's fairly easy to scratch the top surface and render the CD-R unusable.
[optional] scratch-resistant and/or printable coating
UV-cured lacquer
Reflective layer (24K gold or a silver-colored alloy)
Organic polymer dye
Polycarbonate substrate (the clear plastic part)
A laser in the CD recorder creates a series of holes in the disc's dye layer called "pits". The spaces between the pits are called "lands". The pattern of pits and lands on the disc encodes the information and allows it to be retrieved on an audio or computer CD player.
Discs are written from the inside of the disc outward. On a CD-R you can verify this by looking at the disc after you've written to it. The spiral track makes 22,188 revolutions around the CD, with roughly 600 track revolutions per millimeter as you move outward. If you "unwound" the spiral, it would be about 3.5 miles long.
The construction of a CD-RW is different:
[optional] labelSee the net references section for pointers to more data (especially http://www.cd-info.com/). http://www.araltd.com/whatscdr.html has some nice pictures, as do http://www.pc.be.philips.com/cdrw/general.html and http://www.nswc.navy.mil/cosip/nov97/cots1197-2.shtml.
[optional] scratch-resistant and/or printable coating
UV-cured lacquer
Reflective layer
Upper dielectric layer
Recording layer (the part that changes form)
Lower dielectric layer
Polycarbonate substrate (the clear plastic part)
See the net references section for pointers. The "CD Related Info" section on http://www.cdarchive.com/ has useful data, as does http://www.cd-info.com/ and the alt.cd-rom FAQ pages.
A quick summary of standards:
If you're not entirely put off by all this, pay a visit to http://www.emediapro.net/AprEM/parker4.html.
See http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Bibliography.html for information on where to get paper copies of the standards. You can download some of them from http://www.ecma.ch/. ECMA-119 describes ISO-9660, and ECMA-130 sounds a lot like "yellow book" if you say it slowly.
You can usually tell by looking at the packaging and/or the disc itself:
There are several possibilities; as yet no developers have come forward and announced what they're doing (for obvious reasons).
A simple and commonly seen technique is to increase the length of several files on the CD so that they appear to be hundreds of megabytes long. This is accomplished by setting the file length in the disc image to be much larger than it really is. The file actually overlaps with many other files. So long as the application knows the true file length, the software will work fine. If the user tries to copy the files onto their hard drive, or do a file-by-file disc copy, the attempt will fail because the CD will appear to hold a few GB of data. (In practice this doesn't foil pirates, because they always do image copies.)
One possible implementation, given sufficient control over the reader and mastering software, is to write faulty data into the ECC portion of a data sector. Standard CD-ROM hardware will automatically correct the "errors", writing a different set of data onto the target disc. The reader then loads the entire sector as raw data, without doing error correction. If it can't find the original uncorrected data, it knows that it's reading a "corrected" duplicate. This is really only viable on systems like game consoles, where the drive mechanism and firmware are well defined.
A less sophisticated but nonetheless effective method is to press a silver CD with data out beyond where a 74-minute CD can write. Copying the disc would then require special CD-R blanks, moving the data and hacking the disc to compensate, or pressing silver discs with the pirated data. If taken too far, though, the disc can become unreadable on some drives.
The approach PC software houses have taken lately is to use nonstandard gaps between audio tracks and leave index marks in unexpected places. These discs are uncopyable by most software, and it may be impossible to duplicate them on drives that don't support disc-at-once recording (see section (2-9)).
Another method gaining popularity is non-standard discs with a track shorter than 4 seconds. Most recording software, and in fact some recorders, will either refuse to copy a disc with such a track, or will attempt to do so and fail. A protected application would check for the presence and size of the track in question. Some recorders may succeed, however, so this isn't foolproof. (In one case, a recorder could write tracks that were slightly over three seconds, but refused to write tracks that were only one second. There may be a limit below which no recorder will write.)
Putting multiple data tracks interleaved with audio tracks on a CD will confuse some disc copiers.
Sometimes the copy of a disc will have a different volume label. This usually only happens with file-by-file copies, not disc image copies, so checking the disc name is marginally useful but not very effective.
Modifying the TOC so that the disc appears to be larger than it really is will convince some copy programs that the source disc is too large.
The Laserlok system from http://www.diskxpress.com/ claims to be able to prevent unauthorized disc duplication at a low cost. (VOB's CD-Wizard, listed in section (6-1-35), claims to be able to copy them.)
A recent innovation is TTR Technology's DiscGuard (http://www.ttr.co.il/). They claim to be able to write a signature onto pressed CDs and CD-Rs that is detectable by all CD-ROM drives but isn't reproducible without special hardware. A program could use this for copy protection by checking for the presence of the signature, and refusing to run if it's not there.
Sony DADC is promoting a simliar product called Securom. Some information is at http://www.sonydadc.com/hotnews/secu_fra.htm. Yet another variant is C-Dilla's SafeDisc[tm]; see http://www.c-dilla.com/ for more.
All of the above applies to CD-ROM discs. There is no way to copy protect an audio CD and still have it be playable in an audio CD player.
A separate but related issue is "counterfeit protection", where the
publisher wants to make it easy to detect mass-produced duplicates. An
example of this is Microsoft's placement of holograms on the hub of their
recent CD-ROMs.
A session is a recorded segment that may contain one or more tracks of any type. The CD recorder doesn't have to write the entire session at once, but the last session on a disc must be "closed" before a standard audio CD or CD-ROM player will recognize it. Additional sessions can be added until the *disc* is closed or there's no space left.
Multisession writing was first used on PhotoCD discs, to allow additional pictures to be appended. Today it's most often used with "linked" multisession discs, and occasionally for CD-Extra discs. These require a bit more explanation.
When you put a data CD into your CD-ROM drive, the OS finds the last session on the disc and reads the directory from it. (Well, that's how it's supposed to work. Depending on your operating system and CD-ROM drive, you may get different results.) If the CD is ISO-9660 format - which it almost certainly is unless it's a Macintosh CD written in HFS - the directory entries can point at any file on the CD, no matter which session it was written in.
Most of the popular CD creation programs allow you to "link" one or more earlier sessions to the session currently being burned. This allows the files from the previous sessions to appear in the last session without taking up any additional space on the CD (except for the directory entry). You can also "remove" or "replace" files, by putting the new version into the last session, and not including a link to the older version.
In contrast, when you put an audio CD into a typical CD player, it only looks at the first session. For this reason, multisession writes don't work for audio CDs, but as it happens this limitation can be turned into an advantage. See section (3-14) for details. This limitation does *not* mean you have to write an entire audio CD all at once; see section (2-9) for an overview of track-at-once writing.
Note that mixing MODE-1 (CD-ROM) and MODE-2 (CD-ROM/XA) sessions on a single disc isn't allowed. You could create such a thing, but many CD-ROM drives will have a hard time recognizing it.
See also http://www.adaptec.com/support/faqs/multisession.html, which goes into more depth.
Discs written with packets are an entirely different story. See section (6-3).
There are eight subcode channels (P,Q,R,S,T,U,V,W). The exact method of encoding is beyond the scope of this FAQ, but it should be noted that the data is distributed uniformly across the entire CD, and each channel can hold a total of about 4MB.
The P subcode channel can be controlled with the JVC/Pinnacle recorders, but apparently isn't used for much.
The Q subcode channel includes useful information, which can be read and written on many recorders. The user data area contains three types of subcode-Q data: position information, media catalog number, and ISRC code. Other forms are found in the lead-in, and are used to enable multisession and describe the TOC (table of contents).
The position information is used by audio CD players to display the current time, and has track/index information. This can be controlled when doing Disc-At-Once recording.
The ISRC (International Standard Recording Code) is used by the recording industry. It states the country of origin, owner, year of issue, and serial number of tracks, and may be different for each track. It's optional; many CDs don't use this. The media catalog number is similar, but is constant per disc. Note these are different from the UPC codes.
The R-W subcode channels are used for text and graphics in certain applications, such as CD+G (CD w/graphics, supported by SegaCD among others). A new use has been devised by Philips, called ITTS. It enables properly equipped players to display text and graphics on Red Book audio discs. The most recent result of this technology is "CD-Text", which provides a way to embed disc and track data on a standard audio CD.
The other subcode channels are generally inaccessible and unused.
For more details, see the book by Pohlmann mentioned in section (2-1); _Principles of Digital Audio_, 3rd edition, by Ken Pohlmann, McGraw-Hill, 1995 (ISBN 0-07-050469-5); or _The Art of Digital Audio_, 2nd edition, by John Watkinson, Focal Press, 1994 (ISBN 0-240-51320-7).
At present, not many manufacturers use them, and not all devices can read all of the fields.
It depends on how much data you're going to burn, and how fast your drive is. Burning 650MB of data takes about 74 minutes at 1x, 37 minutes at 2x, and 19 minutes at 4x, but you have to add a minute or two for "finalizing" the disc. Remember that single speed is 150KB/sec, double speed is 300KB/sec, and so on.
If you have half the data, it will finish in (about) half the time.
There are two basic ways of writing to a CD-R. Disc-at-once (DAO) writes the entire CD in one pass, possibly writing multiple tracks. The entire burn must complete without interruption, and no further information may be added.
Track-at-once (TAO) allows the writes to be done in multiple passes. There is a minimum track length of 300 blocks (600K for typical data CDs), and a maximum of 99 tracks per disc, as well as a slight additional overhead associated with stopping and restarting the laser.
Because the laser is turned off and on for every track, the recorder leaves a couple of blocks between tracks, called run-out and run-in blocks. If done correctly, the blocks will be silent and usually unnoticeable. CDs with tracks that run together will have a barely noticeable "hiccup". Some combinations of software and hardware may leave junk in the gap, resulting in a slight but annoying click between tracks. Some drives and/or software packages may not let you control the size of the gap between audio tracks when recording in track-at-once mode, leaving you with 2-second gaps even if the original didn't have them.
A few recorders, such as the Philips CDD2000, allow "session-at-once" recording. This gives you disc-at-once control over the gaps between tracks, and allows you to write in more than one session. This can be handy when writing CD Extra discs (see section (3-14)).
There are some cases where disc-at-once recording is required. For example, it may be difficult or impossible to make identical backup copies of some kinds of discs without using disc-at-once mode (e.g. copy-protected PC games). Also, some CD mastering plants may not accept discs recorded in track-at-once mode, because the gaps between tracks will show up as errors.
The bottom line is that disc-at-once recording gives you more control over disc creation, especially for audio CDs, but isn't always appropriate or necessary. It's a good idea to get a recorder that supports both disc-at-once and track-at-once recording.
Many CD-R creation packages will give you a choice between creating a complete image of the CD on disk and doing what's called "on-the-fly" writing. Each method has its advantages.
Disc image files are sometimes called virtual CDs or VCDs (not to be confused with VideoCD). These are complete copies of the data as it will appear on the CD, and so require that you have enough hard drive space to hold the complete CD. This could be as much as 650MB for CD-ROM or 747MB for an audio disc when using 74-minute blanks. If you have both audio and data tracks on your CD, there would be an ISO-9660 filesystem image for the data track and one or more 16-bit 44.1KHz stereo sound images for the audio tracks.
(On the Mac, you might instead use an HFS filesystem for the data track. You can create the image with Mac CD recording software, or create it as a DiskCopy image file and then burn the data fork under a different OS. The DiskCopy method doesn't seem to allow you to create bootable CD-ROMs though.)
On-the-fly recording often uses a "virtual image", in which the complete set of files is examined and laid out, but only the file characteristics are stored, not the data. The contents of the files are read while the CD is being written. This method requires less available hard drive space and may save time, but increases the risk of buffer underruns (see (4-1)). With most software this also gives greater flexibility, since it's easier to add, remove, and shuffle files in a virtual image than a physical one.
A CD created from an image file would be identical to one created with on-the-fly recording, assuming that both would put the same files in the same places. The choice of which to use depends on user preference and hardware capability.
There are subcode flags for each track:
CD-RW is short for CD-Rewritable. It used to be called CD-Erasable (CD-E), but some marketing folks changed it so it wouldn't sound like your important data gets erased on a whim. The difference between CD-RW and CD-R is that CD-RW discs can be erased and rewritten, while CD-R discs are write-once. Other than that, they are used just like CD-R discs.
CD-RW drives use phase-change technology. Instead of creating "bubbles" and deformations in the recording dye layer, the state of material in the recording layer from crystalline to amorphous form. The different states have different refractive indicies, and so can be optically distinguished.
These discs are not writable by standard CD-R drives, nor readable by most older CD readers (the reflectivity of CD-RW is far below CD and CD-R, so an Automatic Gain Control circuit is needed to compensate). All CD-RW drives can write to CD-Rs, and most new CD-ROM drives are expected to support CD-RW. (Reports have indicated that CD-RW discs don't always read at full speed on some drives, however.)
A few older audio CD players and many new ones can handle CD-RW discs, but many can't. If you want to create audio CDs on CD-RW media, make sure that your player can handle them.
Oddly enough, it may be easier for a DVD drive to read CD-RW discs than CD-R discs, because of the way the media is constructed.
CD-RW media is much more expensive than CD-R. This has been improving, but is still a factor in purchase decisions. There is a limit to the number of times an area of the disc can be rewritten, but that number is relatively high (the Orange Book requires 1000, but some manufacturers have claimed as much as 100,000).
For an *excellent* description of the technology, see http://www.onlineinc.com/cdrompro/0996CP/bennett9.html.
A technical discussion along with some handy drawings and graphs is available from http://www.pc.be.philips.com/cdrw/general.html.
Some interesting articles on CD-RW - including an editorial critical of the new technology - can be found at:
http://www.emediapro.net/JanEM/news1.html#eraseIf you're trying to decide if you want a drive that supports CD-RW, see section (5-16).
http://www.emediapro.net/FebEM/writer2.html
http://www.emediapro.net/AprEM/parker4.html#bennett
The only discs that a DVD drive is guaranteed to read are DVD discs. Support for CD-ROM, CD-R, and CD-RW may be included, but is by no means guaranteed.
CD-R was designed to be read by an infrared 780nm laser. DVD uses a visible red 635nm or 650nm laser, which aren't reflected sufficiently by the organic dye polymers used in CD-R media. Some DVD players come with two lasers so that they can read CD-R.
Some DVD drives may be unable to read multisession discs.
If the box doesn't say that something is supported, assume that the feature isn't. Look for the MultiRead logo, which indicates that the DVD player can read all existing CD formats, including CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-R and CD-RW.
[ I verified that the Sony DVP-S3000 can read CD-R media, though the manual didn't say anything about them. It plays audio CDs and VideoCDs off CD-R just fine. I'm told that the Sony models include two lasers -- Dual Discrete pickup -- but most of the others don't. I'm not planning on starting a compatibility list, so if you plan to buy a DVD player and CD-R compatibility is important, bring an audio or VideoCD CD-R with you to the store and try to play it. ]
Probably not. The recorders are still very expensive, and the format wars are ongoing.
An example: http://www.electroweb.com/product/hard.htm was, as of early February '98, selling a Pioneer CDVR-S101 DVD-Recordable Drive for $18K. As mentioned in section (0-2), this FAQ will not be expanding to cover DVD recorders.
Other formats like DVD-RAM are available for less, but may not be compatible with current DVD players.
The first thing to know is that there are two kinds of jitter that relate to audio CDs. The usual meaning of "jitter" refers to a time-base error when digital samples are converted back to an analog signal; see http://www.digido.com/jitteressay.html for a discussion. The other form of "jitter" is used in the context of digital audio extraction from CDs. This kind of "jitter" causes extracted audio samples to be doubled-up or skipped entirely. (Some people will correctly point out that the latter usage is an abuse of the term "jitter", but we seem to be stuck with it.)
"Jitter correction", in both senses of the word, is the process of compensating for jitter and restoring the audio to its intended form. This section is concerned with the (incorrect use of) "jitter" in the context of digital audio extraction.
The problem occurs because the Philips CD specification doesn't require block-accurate addressing. While the audio data is being fed into a buffer (a FIFO whose high- and low-water marks control the spindle speed), the address information for audio blocks is pulled out of the subcode channel and fed into a different part of the controller. Because the data and address information are disconnected, the CD player is unable to identify the exact start of each block. The inaccuracy is small, but if the system doing the extraction has to stop, write data to disk, and then go back to where it left off, it won't be able to seek to the exact same position. As a result, the extraction process will restart a few samples early or late, resulting in doubled or omitted samples. These glitches often sound like tiny repeating clicks during playback.
On a CD-ROM, the blocks have a 12-byte sync pattern in the header, as well as a copy of the block's address. It's possible to identify the start of a block and get the block's address by watching the data FIFO alone. This is why it's so much easier to pull single blocks off of a CD-ROM.
With most CD-ROM drives that support digital audio extraction, you can get jitter-free audio by using a program that extracts the entire track all at once. The problem with this method is that if the hard drive being written to can't keep up, some of the samples will be dropped. (This is similar to a CD-R buffer underrun, but since the output buffer used during DAE is much smaller than a CD-R's input buffer, the problem is magnified.)
Some CD-ROM drives, e.g. most of the Plextor models, include special circuitry that enables them to accurately detect the start of a block.
An approach that has produced good results is to do jitter correction in software. This involves performing overlapping reads, and then sliding the data around to find overlaps at the edges. Most DAE programs will perform jitter correction.
I don't have a favorite book or web site to recommend. Poke around on the http://www.cd-info.com/ web site, especially some of the books and links listed in the bibliography.
Actually, they do. It is true that audio CDs use all 2352 bytes per block for sound samples, while CD-ROMs use only 2048 bytes per block, with most of the rest going to ECC (Error Correcting Code) data. The error correction that keeps your CDs sounding the way they're supposed to, even when scratched or dirty, is applied at a lower level.
All of the data written to a CD uses CIRC (Cross-Interleaved Reed-Solomon Code) encoding. Every CD has two layers of error correction, called C1 and C2. C1 corrects bit errors at the lowest level, C2 applies to bytes in a frame (24 bytes per frame, 98 frames per block). In addition, the data is interleaved and spread over a large arc. (This is why you should always clean CDs from the center out, not in a circular motion.)
If there are too many errors, the CD player will interpolate samples to get a reasonable value. This way you don't get nasty clicks and pops in your music, even if the CD is dirty and the errors are uncorrectable. Interpolating adjacent data bytes on a CD-ROM wouldn't work very well, hence the need for additional ECC and EDC (Error Detection Codes).
See http://www.onlineinc.com/cdrompro/0296CP/02parkerstarrett.html if you want to know more.
MiniDiscs, or MDs, are small (64mm) discs that hold about 140MB of data or 160MB of audio. By using sophisticated compression techniques they are able to compress audio by a 5:1 ratio, allowing a capacity of 74 minutes with little or no audible difference in quality. As with CD recorders, there are MD recorders that connect to your computer and MD recorders that connect to your stereo.
There are stamped MDs that are similar to CDs in construction, and rewritable MDs that use magneto-optical technology. Audio MD recorders are generally more convenient than stand-alone audio CD recorders, because the playback mechanism allows a more flexible layout of audio data, so it's possible to delete a track from the middle of the MD and then write a longer one that is recorded in different places across the disc. The current generation of MD technology is unlikely to replace CD-R or DAT, however, because the lossy compression employed is disdained by audio purists. MD is more often positioned as a replacement for analog cassette tape, which it matches in portability and recordability, and surpasses in durability and its ability to perform random accesses.
Computer-based MD recorders can write data, but may not be able to record audio. Check the specifications carefully.
A wealth of information is available from http://www.minidisc.org/. If you want to transfer CD to MD or MD to CD-R, check the FAQ there for information about digital transfers (currently item #37).
A disc that you can add data to is "open". All data is written into the current session. When you have finished writing, you close the session. If you want to make a multisession disc, you open a new session at the same time. If you don't open a new session then, you can't open one later, which means that it's impossible to add more data to the CD-R. The entire disc is considered "closed".
The process of changing a session from "open" to "closed" is called "finalizing", "fixating", or just plain "closing" the session. When you close the last session, you have finalized, fixated, or closed the disc.
A single-session disc has three basic regions: the lead-in, which has the Table of Contents (or TOC); the program area, with the data and/or audio tracks; and the lead-out, which doesn't have anything meaningful in it. An "open" disc doesn't yet have the lead-in or lead-out written.
If you write data to a disc and leave the session open, the TOC -- which tells the CD player or CD-ROM drive where the tracks are -- is written into a separate area called the Program Memory Area, or PMA. CD recorders are the only devices that know to look at the PMA, which is why you can't see your data in an open session on a standard playback device. CD players won't find any audio tracks, and CD-ROM drives won't see a data track. When the session is finalized, the TOC is written in the lead-in area, enabling other devices to recognize the disc.
If you close the current session and open a new one, the lead-in of the closed session will include a link to the lead-in of the next. The CD player in your car or stereo system doesn't know about chasing from one lead-in to the next, so it can only see tracks in the first session. Your CD-ROM drive, unless it's broken or fairly prehistoric, will know about multisession discs and will happily return the first session, last session, or one somewhere in between, depending on what the OS tells it and what it is capable of.
Some CD-ROM drives, notably certain NEC models, are finicky about open sessions, and will gag when they try to read the lead-in from a still-open session. They follow the chain of links in the lead-ins of each session, but when they get to the last, they can't find a valid TOC and become confused. Even though these drives support multi-session, they require that the last session be closed before they will read the disc successfully. Fortunately most drives don't behave this way.
If you use disc-at-once recording, the lead-in is written at the very start of the process, because the contents of the TOC are known ahead of time. With most recorders there is no way to specify that an additional session should be added, so creating a multisession disc with DAO recording isn't generally possible.
If you're using Win95 or WinNT, the Auto Insert Notification feature will "discover" the CD-R as soon as the TOC is written. This usually causes the write process to fail. Many of the current CD recording software packages will automatically disable AIN for this reason. In track-at-once mode, it will fail during finalization; in disc-at-once mode, it will fail near the beginning of the write process. In both cases, test writes will succeed, because the TOC doesn't get written during a test pass.
Packet-written discs follow the same rules with regard to open and closed sessions, which is why they have to be finalized before they can be read on a CD-ROM drive. The "Packet Writing - Intermediate" document in the primer at http://resource.simplenet.com/primer/primer.htm goes into a little more detail on this subject.
There are gory details beyond what is written here. For example, the lead-in on a CD-R actually has a pre-recorded TOC that specifies physical parameters of the recording layer, such as required laser recording power, and information about the disc, like how many blocks can be written. You don't usually need to worry about such things though.
There is absolutely nothing special about the audio data encoded on a CD. The only difference between a "raw" 44.1KHz 16-bit stereo WAV file and CD audio is the byte ordering.
It isn't necessary to convert a WAV or AIFF file to a special format to write to a CD, unless you're using some proprietary coding (like MP3 compression) that doesn't have a system-recognized codec. Similarly, you don't have to do anything special to audio extracted from a CD. It's already in a format that just about anything can understand.
Just put your audio into the correct format -- 44.1KHz, 16-bit, stereo, uncompressed (a/k/a PCM) -- and the software you use to write CDs will do the rest. All of the fancy error correction and track indexing stuff happens at a lower level.
The MultiRead logo indicates that a CD or DVD player can read all existing CD formats, including CD-ROM, CD-DA, CD-R and CD-RW. See the press release at http://www2.osta.org/osta/html/press/pr150797.html. The presence of this logo on a CD-ROM drive does *not* mean that the drive can read DVD.
That depends on what was being recorded, how it was being recorded, and how far along in the process things were.
If it failed while writing the lead-in, before any data was written, the disc probably isn't usable. Sony drives have a "repair disc" option that forcefully closes the current session, which would allow you to add extra data in a second session on the disc, but most recorders will refuse to touch a disc that's in a partially-written state.
Failures when finalizing the disc may be correctable. Sometimes the TOC gets written before the failure, and the disc can be used as-is. Sometimes you can use a "finalize disc" option from a program menu that will do the trick. Other times the recorder will refuse to deal with a partially-finalized disc, and you're stuck.
Failures in the middle of writing result in a CD-ROM that probably isn't worth trusting. Some of the data will be there, some won't. The directory for the disc may show more files than are actually present, and you won't know which are actually there until you try to read them.
Audio CDs recorded in disc-at-once mode are a special case. Because the TOC is written up front, the disc is readable in a standard CD player even if the write process doesn't finish. You will be able to play the tracks up to the point where the recording failed.
If you were using a packet writing program like DirectCD, the experiences of people on Usenet suggest that you are either 100% okay or 100% screwed. The ScanDisk utility included with DirectCD 2.5 may help though.
This phenomenon is familiar to users who have attempted to extract digital audio from a CD-R. Very often the result of copying an audio CD is an exact copy of the original audio data, but with a few hundred zero bytes inserted at the front (and a corresponding number lost off the end). Since this represents the addition of perhaps 1/100th of a second of silence at the start of the disc, it's not really noticeable.
The actual number of bytes inserted may very slightly from disc to disc, but a given recorder usually inserts about the same number. It's usually less than one sector (2352 bytes).
According to a message from a Yamaha engineer, the cause of the problem is the lack of synchronization between the audio data and the subcode channels, much like the "jitter" described in section (2-15). The same data flow problems that make it hard to find the start of a block when reading also make it hard to write the data and identifying information in sync. According to the engineer, no changes to the firmware or drive electronics can fix the problem.
Making copies of copies of audio CDs would result in a progressively larger gap, but it's likely to be unnoticeable even after several generations.
This is general information about recommended ways to do specific tasks.
Several publishers have CD-to-CD copiers. Two low-cost versions for the PC are Adaptec EZ-SCSI, which comes with a simple CD copier called "CD Copier", and Jeff Arnold's freeware CD2CD (http://www.goldenhawk.com/). Mac users can get a product called CD-Copy from Astarte (http://www.astarte.de/).
The easiest and most reliable method to make copies of single-track data CDs is also the least expensive: CD2CD runs under DOS and works very well with a wide variety of hardware.
Software such as Arnold's and Adaptec's will allow you to make a CD image on a hard drive that can then be written to multiple CDs.
The fancier packages will usually provide a way to do this as well, but the software tends to be more complicated and harder to use. Multi- session and other complicated formats require more sophisticated software, such as Jeff Arnold's SNAPSHOT or CDRWIN.
It's important to remember that, when copying directly from one CD to another, the source MUST be faster than the target, and must be error-free. If the source pauses or spins down to read a marginal area of the disc, the target may outrun the source, and the CD-R will only be useful as a frisbee. Most programs have a "test write" feature that put the CD-R device into a mode where it goes through all the motions but doesn't actually write anything; it's a good idea to do this right before copying.
CDs don't have circular tracks. They're laid out on a spiral, with multiple sessions composed of multiple tracks composed of sectors, and the data in the sectors is interleaved and spread over a large area. The sector format is standard, but there's more than one standard.
"The nice thing about standards is that there's so many to choose from."
-- Andrew S. Tanenbaum
The ability to read certain portions of a CD depends on the CD firmware. Some CD players aren't capable of understanding multi-session discs or of reading audio tracks as digital data. Jitter, described in section (2-15), is also a problem for most drives.
Start with the CD-DA FAQ: http://www.tardis.ed.ac.uk/~psyche/cdda/.
To copy from CD to CD, the source drive needs to support digital audio extraction, which is rather rare among older drives. A copier such as Adaptec's "CD Copier" will copy the CD track-by-track, while one like Jeff Arnold's CDRWIN will use disc-at-once recording.
Some programs will only copy the CD to the hard drive and from there to CD-R, some will allow CD-to-CD directly but only if the source is a SCSI CD-ROM, and some will work with IDE or SCSI. As with copying CD-ROMs, you must be able to read data off of the source drive faster than your recorder is writing. If you can only extract audio at 1x, you're not going to be able to do a CD-to-CD copy reliably.
If you're just interested in extracting digital audio, you don't even need a CD-R unit, just a CD-ROM drive that supports DA extraction and some software. The CD-DA site shown at the top of this section lists some drives that support it, has a place to submit results for your own drive, and has links to inexpensive or free DAE software.
Different drives can extract digital audio at different speeds. For example, the Plextor 6Plex can extract audio at 6x, while the NEC 6Xi can only extract at 1x. The Plextor UltraPlex has been clocked at over 20x.
Some CD-ROM and CD-R drives have trouble extracting digital audio at high speed, so if you're getting lots of clicks and pops when extracting you should try doing it at a slower speed. You may also run into trouble if you try to extract faster than your hard drive can write. One user found that he was able to eliminate clicks and pops by defragmenting his hard drive. Another found that the Win95 "vcache" fix (section (4-1-2)) solved his problems.
It should be pointed out that, while digitally extracted audio is an exact copy of the data on the CD, it's an exact copy as your CD player perceives it. Different drives or different runs with the same drive can extract slightly different data from the same disc. The differences are usually inaudible, however.
The quality of the CD-R audio output depends mostly on how well your CD player gets along with the brand of media you're using. See the next section for some comments about avoiding clicks and pops.
Some drives have trouble starting at the exact start of audio tracks. The extraction starts a few blocks forward of where it should, and ends a few blocks later, so the track may not sound quite right and the extraction program will report errors at the end of the last track. See section (4-19).
One minor note: the data on audio CDs is stored in "Motorola" big-endian format, with the high byte of each 16-bit word first. AIFF files also use this format, but WAV files use "Intel" little-endian format. Make sure your software deals with the endian-flipping correctly. Byte-swapped CD audio sounds like noise.
If you're interested in removing noise from audio captured from an analog source, such as a record player or analog cassette tape, skip to section (3-12). This section is about unexpected noise in audio from digital sources, such as tracks extracted from a CD.
The single most important rule of noise removal is to figure out where the noise came from. Play the .WAV files off of your hard drive (if you're doing direct CD-to-CD copies, extract a track and listen to it). If you hear noise in the .WAV on your hard drive, the digital audio extraction isn't working very well. You either need to extract more slowly, extract from a different device, find a program that works better, or maybe just clean the dust and grime off the source CD. For more information, including a URL for the CD-DA FAQ, see section (3-2).
If the problem sounds like repeated or skipped samples, rather than clicks or hissing, the problem is probably jitter during extraction. See section (2-15) for an overview.
A nifty trick for comparing two .WAV files is to use the "Mix Paste" feature in Cool Edit. Extract a track twice, then use Mix Paste to copy an inverted version of one file on top of the other. The two sound files will cancel each other out wherever they are identical, and have little spikes where they are different. This can be useful for seeing if the problems are only on one channel or are happening at regular intervals. You need to make sure though that both files start at the same place though. If your CD-ROM drive doesn't always extract from the start of the block, you will need to adjust the files so they line up.
Useful things to do with this include comparing two extractions from the same drive, extractions from different drives, or extractions from the CD-R you just wrote to the original .WAV file you used to write it.
If you just want to see if the files are the same, use the DOS File Compare command, with the "binary" switch set: FC /B FILE1.WAV FILE2.WAV.
Some CD-ROM drives may put a click a few seconds into the first track being extracted. This appears to be related to the drive spinning up. Try starting the extraction, cancelling, and then immediately restarting.
The rest of this section only applies if the extracted audio sounds fine on disk, but has problems when played back from the CD-R.
If you're using track-at-once recording, you may get a short click or
silent "hiccup" at the start of each track. Hiccups are unavoidable, but
you should be able to get rid of the click by using different software.
If you're using disc-at-once recording, and are still getting a short click at the *start* of every track, then your recording software is probably writing the sound file with the headers still on it. You should either use a smarter program, or remove the header manually (see the URL for "WAVECLIP", below).
If you are getting clicks in the middle of a track, they are either being added when pulling the data off the disc or when writing it. If the .WAV (AIFF on the Mac) file plays without clicks, then your CD recorder may be failing somehow during the write process. Some people who got "static" in audio recorded on an HP 4020i found that reducing the DMA transfer rate to 2MB/sec helped.
If you are getting clicks at the end of a track, it's possible that the software used to create the .WAV file put some information at the very end, which is legal but not handled correctly by some CD-R software. See section (3-12) for tips on using CoolEdit to remove the data. If you are finding that tracks extracted from CDs don't have clicks but tracks that you have recorded or edited do, chances are the data size isn't a multiple of 2352 bytes, and the last block is being filled with junk. This is common on live recordings or when large tracks are cut into smaller ones. Jeff Arnold's DAO will fill out the last block with zeros (digital silence) if there is space left over, but most of the other programs will write garbage that is audible as a short (less than 1/75th second) click. The fix is to split the track on 2352-byte block boundaries.
A program called "WAVECLIP" will remove .WAV headers and footers, and will either pad out the last block or remove silence from the end of a WAV file to make it an exact multiple of 2352 bytes. The program is available from http://www.ptialaska.net/~syntec/waveclip.zip. Another choice is "StripWave", from http://www.lightlink.com/tjweber/.
If you must use track-at-once, make sure you're writing it all in one
session. PC-based CD players may be able to see tracks in later sessions,
but the CD player in your stereo system can't.
A distantly related problem can arise if you use "shuffle play" to play random tracks from a CD-R. If the audio of track N begins immediately, some CD players will slide from the end of track N-1 into the start of track N, playing a short burst of track N before seeking elsewhere. This can be avoided by putting a gap at the start of such tracks (e.g. with "INDEX 01 xx:yy:zz" in a DAO cue sheet).
Jeff Arnold has a utility called CDRWIN that can do this; see his web page at http://www.goldenhawk.com/.
Note that this software does NOT defeat the copy protection. (I'm told that the "copy protection" is in fact a region code -- America, Europe, Japan -- printed as a barcode on the CD hub. The "MOD chip" sold to defeat the copy protection emulates the barcode reading process, and sends all three region codes back, enabling the game console to play discs from other regions as well as copied discs.)
Instructions for copying discs and vendors who sell MOD chips can be found by searching the net. If you don't have a PC, or if your drive doesn't support disc-at-once recording, you will need to look for disc copying instructions on the net.
Sega Dreamcast discs reportedly use a proprietary format that can hold 1GB of data. This could make them difficult or impossible to copy.
Incidentally, posting requests or advertisements for pirated software on one of the Usenet groups is generally regarded as a mark of extreme stupidity. Whatever your opinion of software piracy, it is against the law in much of the world.
There are several different ways, most of which only work with some operating systems. The next few sections discuss the various methods.
See http://www.adaptec.com/tools/compatibility/cdrecfilename.html for a detailed description with some examples.
Getting mixed-case filenames onto a disc is a similar problem. Burning an ISO-9660 disc with lower-case filenames isn't recommended, because some systems aren't able to access the files even though they appear in directory listings.
"mkhybrid" and recent versions of "mkisofs" (1.12b1 or later), described in sections (6-1-32) and (6-1-10), respectively, are able to create CDs that have both Joliet and Rock Ridge extensions.
Level 1 ISO-9660 defines names to be the familiar 8+3 convention that MS-DOS users have suffered through for many years: eight characters for the name, a period ("full stop" for those of you in the U.K.), followed by three characters for the file type, all in upper case. The only allowed characters are A-Z, 0-9, '.', and '_'. There's also a file version number, separated from the name by a semicolon, but it's usually ignored.
Files must occupy a contiguous range of sectors. This allows a file to be specified with a start block and a count. (Most disk-based filesystems require index blocks that list all the blocks used by a file.) The maximum directory depth is 8.
Level 2 ISO-9660 allows far more flexibility in filenames, but isn't usable on some systems, notably MS-DOS.
Level 3 ISO-9660 allows non-contiguous files, useful if the file was written in multiple packets with packet-writing software.
Some of the CD creation programs will let you select how closely you want the CD to conform to the ISO-9660 standard. For example, Easy-CD Pro 95 can restrict filenames to be ISO-9660 compliant, or allow the full set of valid MS-DOS filenames. (Most systems can handle MS-DOS filenames.)
Incidentally, the ISO-9660 spec requires that all files be displayed in alphabetical order, with directories first, no matter how they are recorded on the CD-ROM. You can't arrange files on the disc, because the ISO-9660 reader (e.g. MSCDEX) sorts them before displaying them.
The Rock Ridge extensions to ISO-9660 define a way for UNIX-isms like long mixed-case filenames and symbolic links to be supported.
Because it's still an ISO-9660 filesystem, the files can still be read by machines that don't support Rock Ridge; they just won't see the long forms of the names.
Rock Ridge is supported by UNIX systems. DOS, Windows, and the Mac don't currently support it.
Copies of the Rock Ridge standard and System Use Sharing Protocol (SUSP) can be found at ftp://ftp.ymi.com/pub/rockridge/. Pay a visit to http://makecd.core.de/Rock_Ridge_Amiga_Specific for a description of Amiga-specific extensions.
HFS is the Hierarchical File System, used by the Macintosh. This is used in place of the ISO-9660 filesystem, making the disc unusable on systems that don't support HFS.
At present, the systems that can read HFS CD-ROMS are Macs, Amigas (with AmiCDROM, available from ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/aminet/disk/cdrom/), PCs running Linux or OS/2 (with appropriate patches), the Apple IIgs, and SGI machines running Irix (they appear as AppleDouble format).
Some authoring packages for the Mac and Windows allow the creation of "hybrid" CDs that have both an ISO-9660 filesystem and an HFS filesystem.
Apple has defined some ISO-9660 extensions that allow Macintosh files to exist with file and creator types on ISO-9660 CD-ROMs. A description of the extensions is available as tech note FL 36 from: http://developer.apple.com/technotes/fl/fl_36.html
Microsoft, being Microsoft, created their own standard called "Joliet". This is currently supported by Win95 and WinNT. It's useful when doing backups from Win95 onto a CD-R, because the disc is still readable as ISO-9660 but shows the long filenames under Win95.
The spec can be found at http://www.ms4music.com/devl/dvjoliet.htm.
Recent versions of Linux (kernel >= 2.0.34 and 2.1.60) have Joliet support. Older versions can be patched; for details, see http://www-plateau.cs.berkeley.edu/people/chaffee/joliet.html.
To patch Joliet support into OS/2, visit: http://service.software.ibm.com/os2ddpak/html/miscellb/os_2warp/updatedc/index.htm
Some Creative CD-ROM drivers have trouble with CD-ROMs that have Joliet filenames. You may need an updated copy of sbided95.exe, available from http://www.ctlsg.creaf.com/wwwnew/tech/ftp/ftp-cd.html.
Adaptec's Easy-CD Pro software allows creation of discs in "Romeo" format. This never really caught on.
These are new standards intended to replace ISO-9660. The UDF filesystem specification is based on ISO/IEC 13346 (which is closely related to ECMA-167). For more information about these standards, see the links in section (6-4).
Short answer: you don't, unless you have a CD-i add-on board. Even if you have a CD reader compatible with the CD-i (Green Book) standard, there are still a number of obstacles in your way. The filesystem used isn't ISO-9660, and CD-i players are based around a 680x0 CPU and have special hardware for video and audio.
Longer answer: it depends on what kind of disc it is, and what you mean by "use".
PhotoCD and VideoCD discs are CD-ROM/XA "Bridge Format" discs that play on CD-i players as well as dedicated players and computers. These use the ISO-9660 file system, and can be read with commonly available PhotoCD software and MPEG-1 players.
DigitalVideo discs from Philips manufactured before June, 1994 are in CD-i format, not VideoCD format. If your CD-ROM drive supports raw 2352-byte sector reads, it's possible to pull tracks off of a Green Book format disc, and extract audio or MPEG video data. VCD PowerPlayer from CyberLink (http://www.cyberlink.com.tw/) can play CD-i movies directly off of a Green Book disc.
Typical Red Book audio CDs don't have this information. Software audio CD players like those provided by Adaptec or Microsoft require you to type in the information, which is then stored in a database on your hard drive. The discs are identified by computing a signature based on track offsets and other fields. See http://www.cddb.com/ for a full explanation, as well as databases of CD info.
Some newer formats, like CD Extra, allow or even require such information to be included on the CD. See Sony's pages at http://www.cdextra.com/.
Some recent CD players are advertised as "CD-Text Ready". These use the CD-Text data embedded in the P-W subcode channels to display disc and track title data. See section (3-28) for more about CD-Text.
CD-R's have a pre-formed spiral track, and the sector addresses are hard-coded into CD-R media, so there's no flexibility. Every disc holds a predetermined amount of data.
Most discs hold slightly more than 74 minutes. How much more depends on the brand of media, batch of media, and perhaps even on the recorder used (see section (7-6) for more details on how much a CD-R can hold). In some situations you can exceed the stated capacity of the disc; see section (3-8-2) below.
Since CDs are written in a spiral, the amount of data you can get on a disc is affected by how tightly spaced the "groove" is. A standard Red Book audio CD or Yellow Book CD-ROM is designed to allow at most 74 minutes of data. By using a tighter track pitch on the spiral "groove" on the glass master, manufacturers can get more data onto the disc. In theory this could make it harder for some CD readers to use the discs.
There *are* 80-minute CD-R blanks, but they're very expensive, and may not work on all systems. Some sources say that the longest possible CD-R is 79 minutes, 59 seconds, 74 blocks long, because of the way that the last possible start time of the lead-out is encoded, but some recorders may allow even larger values. See the next sub-section for more about 80-minute media.
The easiest way to get more data onto a disc is not to try. For audio CDs, you can leave off one or two tracks that you're not overly fond of. For data CDs you may be able to drop some images or sample data. The most common problem people encounter with data CDs is trying to copy them as a collection of files rather than doing a bulk copy of the entire disc. See also section (3-24).
One user suggested using the "speed up" function of SoundForge or CoolEdit to increase the speed of extracted WAV files by 3%. This supposedly gives better results than resampling, and allows writing 77 minutes.
If you have a mono recording, you could double the length of a CD by recording half the sound on the left track and half on the right. However, the track markers apply to both tracks, so providing random access to specific sections can be tricky.
If you're trying to copy a CD-ROM or VideoCD and running out of room, you may have a different problem. See sections (3-24) and (4-25).
Here's a few personal notes on my experiments with TDK 80-minute "green" blanks. Such discs are supposedly available directly from TDK (USA sales +1 800 835 8273), and I was able to purchase a small quantity (three discs) from Microboards at http://www.microboards.com/.
The discs were part number SCWA-ETC80A-X, priced at US$40.00 per disc in October 1997. Yes, that's about 20x the cost for an extra 8% storage. The discs were unbranded. The only difference I could see between these and other TDK green discs is that on the hub it says "CD-Recordable 6129B-80". Easy CD Creator Deluxe v3 showed 359,624 blocks (702.8MB in MODE-1) on the TDK 80-minute blanks, versus 333,010 blocks (650.8MB) available on my Mitsui gold 74-minute blanks.
Relatively inexpensive 80-minute blanks are becoming more common. Examples of sites include http://www.cd-brennen.de/cdr/, http://www.transco.co.uk/, http://www.burlington-av.com/, http://www.web-access.net/~clarkent/, and http://www.esware.net/empire/hardware/cdrom/cd.htm.
The first challenge was finding software that would work correctly with the discs. Neither Easy-CD Pro 95 v1.2 nor Easy CD Creator Deluxe v3.0 would allow me to do a test recording with more than 650MB of files. I ended up using mkisofs to create an image file with 341,163 blocks (666.3MB) of data, composed of two large .AVI files, and three smaller pieces of one of the other .AVI files.
Using a Yamaha CDR-102 with v1.0 firmware, the first thing I tried was to burn the image file to a 74-minute blank. Easy-CD immediately rejected the disc, saying there wasn't enough space. I then put the 80-minute blank in and did a test run. Easy-CD Pro 95 had no problems burning the ISO image file, until the screen saver activated and McAfee anti-virus "screen scan" kicked in. Good thing it was a test burn; I got a buffer underrun. I killed the screen saver and virus checker and ran again, had a successful test run, and followed it with a successful burn.
To verify the data, I used Easy-CD Pro 95's "compare track" feature. This failed, complaining that one track was shorter than the other. My guess is that the compare feature has some sort of track length limitation. My next attempt was to use the Linux "sum" command to make sure that the disc was readable in my Plextor 8Plex. This worked fine, and the output of "sum" matched what I got on the 4x CD-ROM drive in the Sun workstation at work. I also tried the disc in a Mac 7500 and a Dell Pentium, and had no problems with either.
The next step was an 80-minute audio CD, and that's where things fell apart. Easy-CD Pro 95 v1.2 didn't work at all (!), Easy CD Creator Deluxe again refused to allow me to create a long audio CD, and with Jeff Arnold's software (both the DOS version and CDRWIN) the test write failed after a minute or so (after the lead-in had completed?). Strangely, removing the last two tracks from the cue sheet, which reduced it to 72 minutes, allowed the test write to succeed on both 74-minute and 80-minute blanks. It appears that the Yamaha CDR-102 drive is unwilling to write that much audio data.
Other people who have had experience with 80-minute CD-Rs have reported that compatibility with different CD-ROM drives was very good. However, bear in mind the following statement, which was sent by e-mail from a TDK representative:
"The CD-R80 is a special product developed by TDK to meet the application needs of software developers and music studios. To achieve its 80 minute recording time, track pitch and scanning velocity specification tolerances had to be minimized, reducing the margin of error between drive and media. This means limited compatibility between some CD-Recorders and CD-ROM Readers. If you intend to use this recording length, please check with your hardware manufacturer. Use of the CD-R80 is at one's own risk. No guarantees of performance are made by TDK."You may achieve broader compatibility using standard blanks and the over-burning "feature" described in the next section.
The capacity of a CD-R is calculated to allow enough space to hold at least 74 minutes of Red Book audio data and 90 seconds of digital silence. The silent area is called the "lead-out", and is included so that a CD player will realize that it has reached the end of the disc, especially when fast-forwarding.
When a recording program tells you the exact capacity of the disc, it's not including the area reserved for the lead-out. There's nothing magic about this reserved area though. With the right kind of setup -- and a willingness to accept write failures as a matter of course -- you can put data into the reserved area, and possibly into a few blocks past the end of it. This is often referred to as "overburning" a disc.
How much more you can fit depends almost entirely on the media. Some brands will hold as much as 78 minutes, but it varies from batch to batch. See http://cdr.mypage.org/ for a long list of "offical" capacities.
You also need the right recorder and the right software. The Teac CD-R55S, Plextor PX-R412C, Yamaha 4xx/4xxx, and Memorex/Dysan CRW-1622 units have been used to write "extra long" audio discs successfully. The recent Philips, HP, and Ricoh units don't seem to be willing to do so. Not sure about Panasonic. The firmware revision may be important.
To write such a disc, you need to use a program that won't refuse to exceed the disc capacity. For example, CDRWIN will warn you but allow you to continue, while other programs will simply refuse. Gather a large collection of audio tracks, and start writing. Eventually the recorder will attempt to write past the end of the disc, and the write process will fail. Now play the disc, preferrably in a player that shows the total elapsed time for the entire disc. When the music cuts off, make a note of the time. That's the absolute capacity of the disc.
Most (all?) CD players will display the total disc time when you first put the disc in. This value represents how much you tried to write, not how much was actually written. If you want to impress your friends, try to write 88 minutes of music. You won't get anywhere near that far, but the CD player will show it.
There isn't a reliable way to determine absolute "over capacity" without actually writing to the disc, but it's reasonable to assume that the capacity of one disc in a box of 10 is representative of the rest.
It should be possible to write a CD-ROM in the same manner as an audio CD, but the space would have to be calculated so that the write failure occurred when the lead-out was being written. Otherwise, some of the files that appeared to be on the disc wouldn't actually exist.
Recording in DAO mode may be helpful to ensure that the lead-in gets written. Without a table of contents, the disc is useless. It's very likely however that you will be able to finalize the disc even after the write fails.
Depending on the disc and your player, you may have trouble seeking out to tracks near the end of the disc. Also, your CD player may behave strangely when it walks off the end of the disc: one user said he had to open and close the player afterward to convince it that a disc was still loaded.
The disc surface past the end of the area reserved for the leadout may be unreliable. Attempting to use more than 90 seconds (about 15MB of MODE-1 data) beyond the rated capacity of a disc could be asking for trouble.
It's possible to perform similar tricks on 80-minute media. Experiments with TDK 80-minute discs resulted in a recorded length of 82:09. MMC recorders don't seem to like having the lead-out position any later than 88:29:74, but that shouldn't get in the way.
First off, you need to be aware that certain aspects of PhotoCD creation are proprietary to Kodak. Programs like Adaptec's Easy CD Creator will allow you to create CD-ROMs with PhotoCD image files, and you will be able to view the images with Mac or PC programs that understand the PhotoCD file format, but you won't be able to look at the disc with a PhotoCD player.
http://www.kodak.com/digitalImaging/aboutPhotoCD/aboutPCD.shtml has the glossy brochure information, with some Kodak contact information. The Build-It and Arrange-It software, which allow you to create "real" PhotoCDs, costs about US$450. Kodak apparently pulled the software from the market in December 1997, so it may be difficult to find.
http://www.shiresoft.com/ gives you step-by-step instructions and software for creating "real" PhotoCD discs with Kodak's software. The Build-It program will only write to Kodak CD recorders, but a translator available from this web site will allow it to work with GEAR or CDRWIN. Follow the Kodak links on that page.
Incidentally, if you're planning to convert your own pictures, you will need a way to get your images digitized in the first place. Digital cameras like the Apple QuickTake will work, as will video capture boards or frame grabbers.
There are some utilities that will convert images into PCD format, but they only support the uncompressed base resolutions. The higher resolutions are compressed with an algorithm proprietary to Kodak.
If it's just a disc full of data (like JPEG images), writing the disc in minimal ISO-9660 should work. You may have to master it without the file version number (e.g. ";1") at the end of the name.
If you need the format to be more flexible, perhaps with separate executables for Macs and PCs, you'll want to build a "hybrid" CD that has two sets of files on it. Adaptec's Toast for the Mac is widely recommended for this. See section (6) for other options.
As always, it depends.
MS-DOS lets you see the first data session. Usually. Win95 lets you see the last data session. Usally. Adaptec's Session Selector and Ahead's MultiMounter will let you choose which session you see.
Some CD creation software (e.g. Adaptec Easy-CD Writer) writes a complete table of contents in each session, some of which refers back to the files from the previous session, allowing a form of incremental backup. (This will work for ISO-9660 discs, but won't work for HFS. However, this is less painful than it seems because a properly-configured Macintosh will let you mount all the sessions as individual volumes.)
Adaptec's Easy-CD Pro will allow you to combine the contents of several previous sessions by creating a new session (use RCD's Load Contents option to read the file/directory info from more than one session, then write and close a new session with that directory structure).
Some of it depends on the SCSI or CD-ROM driver you have installed. It's unwise to expect somebody else's system to treat multisession discs the same way yours does.
The tricky part in doing this -- unless you have a stand-alone audio CD recorder -- is getting the audio transferred to your computer and modifying it to suit your tastes. The act of writing a sound file onto a CD is fairly trivial with most recorders and software. If you're considering the purchase of a computer-connected recorder for transferring tapes or LPs to CD, you should worry less about the recorder and more about the quality of the digitized audio. Few, if any, people will insist that recorder A produces better quality audio CD-Rs than recorder B, but everybody has an opinion about sound cards.
Start with http://homepages.nildram.co.uk/~abcomp/lp-cdr.htm, and read through http://www.octave.com/library/audiocd.html. These go into a lot more detail than this section does.
If you have questions or need a recommendation on a sound card, you might want to try:
news:rec.audio.techSome highly technical benchmark evaluations of cards are available at http://www.rockpark.com/soundcards/.
news:comp.sys.ibm.pc.soundcard.tech
To record on your PC, connect the output of the receiver/amplifier to the
"line in" on your sound card. If you want to go directly from a record
player, you need to run it through a pre-amp (which both pre-amplifies the
signal and equalizes it to RIAA standards). Anything labeled "preamp out"
or "tape out" can be connected directly.
You can use the A/D (analog-to-digital) converter built into a sound card like a SoundBlaster 16, but the sound quality will not be very good. The sound cards from Turtle Beach (Tropez, Tahiti) and CrystaLake are a step up, and a Digital Audio Labs CardD+ is about as good as it gets for internal A/D cards. If you're really serious, you should get an external A/D converter such as the Symetrix 620, and feed the digital output from that into the computer (another way of accomplishing the same thing is to record to an audio DAT tape and then use the digital output on the DAT recorder; see the next section for details).
A problem with some sound cards (really cheap Opti and ESS cards have been named) is that the crystal that controls the recording sample rate is off. If the card doesn't do the sampling at the correct rate, the recorded audio may end up slightly slower or faster than the original. This will become apparent when the sound is played back off of a CD or through a better sound card.
When recording, try to get as much signal as possible. Normalization will bring the signal level up, but can't replace parts of the signal that were lost. Sound editing utilities, such as GoldWave or Cool Edit, can be used to equalize, normalize, and even perform noise reduction on your recordings.
Adaptec's Easy CD Creator includes an application called "Spin Doctor" that performs most of the tasks needed to transfer LPs to CD. Depending on your needs, it may provide a simple solution for all your needs.
There are a variety of programs that can automatically remove pops, clicks, and hissing from digitized audio. Few automated tools can do as good a job cleaning up pops and other noise as an experienced person, however. If you want to perform the transfer by hand, the following method has been suggested for PC users:
Cool Edit can be found at http://www.syntrillium.com/. A similar product called "GoldWave" can be found at http://www.goldwave.com/. A fancy commercial product called Sound Forge is described on http://www.sfoundry.com/. Algorithmix, at http://www.algorithmix.com/, has a noise reduction program called SoundLaundry. DART and DART PRO are designed for audio restoration, and can be found at http://www.dartpro.com/. Another fancy (and expensive) program is at http://www.waves.com/. See also DCart at http://www.diamondcut.com/.
Don't forget that CD audio is 16-bit PCM stereo samples at 44.1KHz, and will chew up disk space at roughly 176K per second. Playing back large sound files is difficult with simple-minded applications like the standard Win95 WAV player, because they try to load the entire file into memory all at once. Cool Edit 96 is able to play files back as it reads them, and works very well even over a network. (Section (4-20) has some other suggestions on this same topic.)
See section (3-3) for some tips on avoiding clicks when committing the audio to CD.
You can find odd bits of hardware that will play or enhance playback of older recording formats (78's, LP's, 16" Radio Transcriptions) at Nauck's Vintage Records (http://www.78rpm.com/).
For those of you wondering what the deal with pre-whatever is, this little tidbit is courtesy Mike Richter:
"Preemphasis has been used since the earliest days of commercial recording. In general, the high-frequency content of the music (or whatever) being recorded is low and the noise is high. Therefore, treble was boosted and lows were cut by a preemphasis curve which was removed in playback. The standard RIAA curve for turnover and rolloff (the amount and frequency for treble and bass, respectively) was not accepted universally until the 50's, and some fine preamps offered selectable values with presets for the common curves into the early transistor era."
Buy a card that will allow you to go from DAT to hard disk digitally. Make sure you get one that can handle the same digital standard the DAT recorder uses, i.e. S/PDIF (Sony/Phillips Digital Interface Format, sometimes referred to as "domestic") or AES/EBU ("professional").
Some of the solutions for the PC are the DigiDesign AudioMedia (see http://www.digidesign.com/), the Zefiro Acoustics ZA2 (see http://www.zefiro.com/), the AdB Digital Multiwav Pro (see http://www.adbdigital.com/), the Digital Audio Labs CardD+ (see http://www.digitalaudio.com/products.htm), or the Turtle Beach Fiji (see http://www.tbeach.com/products/fiji.htm). The CardD+ comes highly recommended. There may be newer versions of these products, so be sure to check out the web sites.
Visit http://www.digitalexperience.com/cards.html for a feature comparison of many different models.
A cheap S/PDIF card available from Computer Geeks (http://www.compgeeks.com/) was evaluated by some newsgroup readers. Apparently there were some problems with the physical dimensions of the card (too wide for some PC slots), the documentation is poor, and the voltage level for both input and output was TTL instead of standard S/PDIF. You're probably better off with one of the established brands unless you're sure about what you need.
You should record from the DAT onto your hard drive, and then record the CD from there. If you try to record directly from DAT you'll likely end up with a lot of wasted CD-Rs due to buffer underruns or minor mistakes. You should use Disc-At-Once recording for best results; Jeff Arnold's DAO software is recommended for this on the PC.
One issue you need to be aware of is that some older DAT recorders can only record at 48KHz, while CDs are recorded at 44.1KHz. If this is the case with your equipment, you will have to do a sample rate conversion. The DSP on cards like the ZA2 will do this for you, or you can use an audio editing program like CoolEdit or Sound Forge.
There *are* CD-R drives that have analog inputs, and can record directly from audio sources. See section (5-12).
If you use a DAT and haven't been to the DAT-heads home page, you should definitely check out http://www.atd.ucar.edu/rdp/dat-heads/.
If you want to manipulate audio DATs directly from your computer, you need a DDS drive with special firmware. The SCSI DDS drives that are typically sold for backups don't have the firmware required to handle DAT tapes. Most SGI workstations can do this, and Mac users should check out http://www.demon.co.uk/gallery/StudioDAT.html. If you have an Archive Python DDS drive, check out ftp://ftp.informatik.uni-erlangen.de/pub/DATlib.
An interesting combination of technologies is the DAT-Link from http://www.tc.com/, which connects to the digital connectors on the DAT machine (or MD, DCC, or CD player) and the SCSI interface on a computer. The device can be controlled from other computers on a network.
If you're interested in mastering production audio CDs, you should take a look at http://www.sadie.com/.
There are two ways to do this. The first is to put the data on track 1 of the CD, and audio on the next several tracks (discs created this way are referred to as "mixed-mode" CDs). The CD-ROM drive will automatically look at track 1 and ignore all other tracks, so you'll be able to get at the data and -- depending on the operating system -- will be able to play the audio tracks. Remember that all of the tracks, both audio and data, need to be recorded in a single session. See section (3-2).
The down side of this is that audio CD players may attempt to play track 1, which can be obnoxious or downright harmful to audio equipment. Most modern CD players are smart enough to ignore data tracks, so this won't usually be a problem.
The other approach is to create a multisession disc with the audio tracks in the first session and the data track in the second. This is how CD Extra (the format formerly known as CD Plus) works. Audio CD players only look at the first session, and CD-ROM drives are (supposed to) start with the last session, so it all works out. Sony Music has some pages at http://www.cdextra.com/.
A common question is how to write the audio in the first session without gaps between tracks, because you can't use disc-at-once recording. (If you did use DAO recording, the disc would be closed, and you wouldn't be able to write the data track). With the GoldenHawk software and a Philips recorder, you can do "session-at-once" recording to write the audio without gaps, and purportedly there is a strange hack you can do with GEAR that has the same effect with certain recorders. (With GEAR, write the audio tracks in the first session using disc-at-once recording, but with "multisession" and "leave session open" set. Don't ask me for details, and don't be surprised if it doesn't work.)
What happens when you try to play one of these as audio in your CD-ROM drive? As with most things multisession, it depends on your drive. (The player that comes with Plextor CD-ROM drives does the right thing. If you're using a different drive, you're on your own.)
There's actually a third way to do this that involves putting the data
track into the extended pregap of the first audio track. Instead of the
audio starting at minute:second:block 00:02:00, the data starts there, and
the audio is written after. The pregap is adjusted accordingly. This
method never gained popularity because some drives started playing at
00:02:00 regardless.
Some CDs perversely put audio in the pregap. You can play it by starting to play track 1, then holding the "reverse" button until it seeks all the way to the start of the disc. Some digital audio extraction programs (e.g. "cdclip" from www.goldenhawk.com) allow you to specify block numbers instead of track numbers; these can be used to extract the "hidden" audio.
For example, _Factory Showroom_ by "They Might Be Giants" looks like this:
For more information (mainly aimed at Macintosh users), see http://www.musicfan.com/ecd/what.html.
On a Mac, this is reasonably straightforward. A CD can be bootable if it has a bootable system folder on it. Tell the recording software that you want to make the CD bootable; this usually involves clicking in a checkbox before burning the first session. Then, copy a bootable system folder onto the disc. An easy way to create an appropriate system folder is to launch the system installer, tell it you want to do a "Custom" install, choose the "Universal System" option, and then install it onto the CD source volume.
Holding down the 'c' key while booting will cause the Mac to boot from an internal CD-ROM drive. Alternatively, the "Startup Disk" control panel will allow you to select a CD-ROM.
For PCs, it's a bit more of a challenge. The BIOS or SCSI card on some machines support booting from CD-ROM, but on many older machines it's just not possible. Phoenix (the BIOS developer) has created the El Torito standard for doing this sort of thing. You can find specifications at http://www.ptltd.com/products/specs.html and a "how to" guide at http://www.ptltd.com/products/wp.html.
Step-by-step procedures with varying levels of detail can be found here:
http://www.ora.nsysu.edu.tw/~goldentime/bootcd.htmThe "BOOTISO" utility may come in handy, and can be found here:
http://incolor.inetnebr.com/guardian/boot-cd.shtml
http://www.fadden.com/doc/bootcd.txt
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Way/2996/index.htmlCDR Publisher can make bootable CDs for PCs and UNIX. WinOnCD 3.0, Adaptec Easy CD Creator 3, and CDRWIN can create bootable CDs for PCs.
When booting the PC, you may need to change the boot order in the BIOS from the typical "A, C" to "A, SCSI, C", and configure the SCSI interface to attempt to boot from CD.
This topic is largely outside the scope of this FAQ, so I'm not going to go into much depth. The Usenet newsgroup news:rec.desktop.video is more applicable. I'm not aware of an FAQ for that group, but the links found at http://www.videoguys.com/jump.htm will get you started.
You need a capture card to transfer the video to your hard drive. Capturing video will eat up 2MB or more per *second* of video at full resolution (640x480x24 at 60 fields per second for NTSC) with a reasonable degree of compression, so this isn't something to be undertaken lightly. The lower your quality requirements, the lower the bandwidth requirements.
If MPEG is your only interest, you might be better off with an MPEG-only card rather than a hobbyist video capture board. http://www.b-way.com/ and http://www.darvision.com/ are good places to look. The Broadway card has been given high marks for quality.
Once you've captured the video, you'll probably want to edit it (at least to clip out unwanted portions or add titles). Packages for doing this, like Adobe Premiere and Ulead MediaStudio, are usually included with the capture card. These will also let you adjust the resolution, color depth, and compression quality to output the video so that it's suitable for playback on double- or quad-speed CD-ROM drives.
You can convert AVI files to MPEG and vice-versa with a program from Ulead (see http://www.ulead.com/), Xing Technologies, or several other vendors. You should be able to create QuickTime or AVI movies using the compression codec of your choice from the video editing software.
If you want to try creating a White Book VideoCD, which can be viewed on a VideoCD playback device like a Philips CD-i or from a computer with appropriate hardware and software, CD-R software packages like CD Creator and WinOnCD can convert AVI movies into MPEG and write them to CD in the necessary format. (One warning: CD Creator was picky about the parameters used in the MPEG encoding. You may encounter difficulties unless your MPEG sources match the exact specifications.) John Schlichther's AVI2MPG1 combines standard tools into an easy-to-use program for Win95 and NT; use it with the "-v" flag to make a VideoCD-compatible stream that ECDC will accept (http://www.mnsi.net/~jschlic1/).
If you're running Linux you should take a look at Bernhard Schwall's "avi2yuv" program. It converts M-JPEG movies created with popular video capture boards into a format accepted by the Berkeley MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 encoders (ftp://bmrc.berkeley.edu/pub/mpeg/). The README for avi2yuv lists the additional software packages (all of which are free and run under Linux) needed for creating MPEG movies complete with sound. Most (all?) of the utilities can also be built to run under DOS.
"iFilmEdit", from http://www.duplexx.com/ifilmedit.html, will convert MPEG to VideoCD, and can reportedly convert a VideoCD .DAT file back into a plain MPEG file.
Easy CD Creator requires that an MPEG MCI driver be installed in the system (unlike CD Creator, it doesn't come with Xing's MPEG software). The popular VMPEG 1.7 doesn't quite work: ECDC can't see the audio, and you're not allowed to select the frame to view when shuffling streams around. If you have VMPEG installed as the MCI driver -- select "About ECDC" from the Help menu to check -- you need to *remove* VMPEG and then install ActiveMovie. (I removed it by going into the Advanced section of the Multimedia control panel, expanding "Media Control Devices", selecting vmpegdll, and clicking on "Remove", but you may be able to use Add/Remove Programs instead.)
Finally, you should be aware that MPEG playback is rather CPU intensive, and it's possible to create movies that don't play very well without hardware support. The PowerPC QuickTime MPEG extension (available from http://quicktime.apple.com/) works well, as does Microsoft ActiveMovie (http://www.microsoft.com/, available as part of MSIE 3.02 or separately in the DirectX 5.0 download area), but most of the UNIX players won't play the audio. Software MPEG playback is becoming easier as CPUs become more powerful, but it's not yet a standard component of many systems.
VideoCDs can only be read by CD-ROM drives capable of reading CD-ROM/XA discs. If your drive doesn't claim to support PhotoCD, you're probably out of luck. Microsoft's ActiveMovie and Apple's Video Player can play movies off of a VideoCD (Apple's AVP will scan the CD; with ActiveMovie you need to look for and open the ".dat" files in the "mpegav" directory).
You can if you have several CD-R drives and the right software. Two examples are CD Rep from Prassi Software (section (6-1-21)) and DiscJuggler from Padus (section (6-1-27)).
Both products are SCSI multiplexors. You use your existing CD writing application (such as Easy-CD Pro 95) like you normally would, and the program sends the same commands to each of the CD-R drives. There are a number of limitations, notably that all devices must use the same command set and may need to have the same firmware revision. There may also be limits on the number of drives you can have attached at once.
DiscJuggler bills itself as "the professional CD Duplicator", CD Rep as "the ultimate professional recording solution". If you're interested in either of these, you should read the web pages for both, and compare the features available.
There are several hardware-based solutions to this, including CD-R units that support daisy-chaining, and control units that vary from the simple (a handful of units wired together) to the complex (robotic arms to move discs around). Most cost more than a Hyundai.
See http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Technology/CD-R/duplication.html for an overview of several different hardware solutions, or visit a vendor web page like http://www.princetondiskette.com/.
The following was part of an e-mail message from Jeff Arnold back in mid-1997:
"I do not recommend making "copies of copies" with SNAPSHOT. The reason this does not always work is because many CDROM readers do not perform error correction of the data when doing raw sectors reads. As a result, you end up with errors on the copy that may or may not be correctable. When you make a second-generation copy of the same disc, you will make a disc that has all of the errors of the first copy, plus all of the new errors from the second reading of the disc. The cumulative errors from multiple copies will result in a disc that is no longer readable."Some further explanation is needed here. The heart of the problem is the way that that the data is read from the source device. When a program does "raw" sector reads, it gets the entire 2352-byte block, which includes the CD-ROM error correction data (ECC) for the sector. Instead of applying the ECC to the sector data, the drive just hands back the entire block, including any errors that couldn't be corrected by the first C1/C2 layer of error correction (see section (2-17)). When the block is written to the CD-R, the uncorrected errors are written along with it.
This problem can be avoided by using "cooked" reads and writes. Rather than create an exact duplicate of the 2352-byte source sector, cooked reads pull off the error-corrected 2048-byte sector. The CD recorder regenerates the appropriate error correction when the data is written. Ideally SNAPSHOT would be able to do the error correction in software when operating in "raw" mode, but apparently there's no readily available code that does this. It could also read each block twice, once in raw mode and once in cooked, but that would double the read time.
This begs the question, why not just use cooked writes all the time? First of all, some recorders (e.g. Philips CDD2000 and HP4020i) don't support cooked writes. (Some others will do cooked but can't do raw, e.g. the Pinnacle RCD-5040.) Second, not all discs use 2048-byte MODE-1 sectors. There is no true "cooked" mode for MODE-2 data tracks; even a block length of 2336 is considered raw, so using cooked reads won't prevent generation loss.
It is important to emphasize that the error correction included in the data sector is a *second* layer of protection. A clean original disc may well have no uncorrectable errors, and will yield an exact duplicate even when copying in "raw" mode. After a few generations, though, the duplicates are likely to suffer some generation loss.
The original version of this quote went on to comment that Plextor and Sony
CD-ROM drives were not recommended for making copies of copies. The reason
they were singled out is because they are the only drives that explicitly
warned about this problem in their programming manuals. It is possible
that *all* CD-ROM drives behave the same way. (In fact, it is arguably the
correct behavior... you want raw data, you get raw data.)
The documentation for SNAPSHOT describes whether "raw" or "cooked" writes are recommended for several different CD-R drives. See the section on "USING THE /COOKED OPTION" in "snapshot.txt", found in the documentation for the DOS utilities at http://www.goldenhawk.com/.
The final answer to this question is, you can safely make copies of copies, so long as the disc is a MODE-1 CD-ROM and you're using "cooked" writes. Copies made with "raw" writes may suffer generation loss because of uncorrected errors.
Audio tracks don't have the second layer of ECC, and will be susceptible to the same generation loss as data discs duplicated in "raw" mode. Some drives may turn off some error-correcting features, such as dropped-sample interpolation, during digital audio extraction, or may only use them when extracting at 1x. If you want to find out what your drive is capable of, try extracting the same track from a CD several times at different speeds, then do a binary comparison on the results. PC owners can use the DOS "FC" command to do this, as described in section (3-3).
The easiest way is to use your favorite compression or encryption utility and process the files before putting them on the CD. However, this isn't transparent to the end user.
CRI-X3 enables programs like DoubleSpace to work on a CD. It's intended for a publisher or for significant internal use, and the licensing is priced accordingly. See http://www.somerset.net/crix3.html.
A straightforward solution is to write all of the files onto the disc as .ZIP files, and then use ZipMagic (formerly ZipFolders) to view the contents. Visit them at http://www.zipmagic.com/.
PGP at http://www.nai.com/ (was http://www.pgp.com) has some good encryption software, but none of it seems directly applicable to software distribution. PGPdisk, available for the Mac, might be useful but it isn't clear whether it can be used to distribute CD-ROMs.
ScramDisk, from http://www.hertreg.ac.uk/ss/, writes files into encrypted "containers" on disk. It can be used with CD-ROMs, runs under Win95 and Win98, is free, and even includes source code.
http://www.c-dilla.com/ has information on CD-Secure 2, which allows publishers to distribute network-licensed or "pay for the parts you need" products, and CD-Compress 2, which provides a way to compress data transparently on production CDs. The web page didn't have pricing, so it's probably expensive.
EnCrypt-CD encrypts the blocks as they are written to CD. It's a shareware product, available from http://www.shareit.com/programs/102046.htm.
Encrypted Magic Folders from http://www.pc-magic.com/ claims to transparently encrypt data as it's being used. Whether it would work from a CD-ROM isn't stated.
Some section (6-7) for software.
Of course, it's not really necessary to use special software if you're just backing up your data files. Most CD creation programs will allow you to copy arbitrary files onto CD-ROM, and by using the Joliet standard you can preserve long Win95 filenames. Unfortunately, under DOS and Windows the individual files show up as read-only, so write permission must be re-enabled by hand when the files are restored.
Side note: the files aren't written to the disc as "read only". They're simply presented that way by Microsoft operating systems. Mac OS deals with this in a nicer way, showing unlocked files on write-protected media.
(DOS users can do "ATTRIB -R *.* /S". Linux users can su to root, mount the volume as MSDOS FAT, cd to the directory in question, and do "find . -print | xargs chmod +w" to enable write permission for all files in the current directory and in all subdirectories. If you've got the GNU utilities, use "find . -print0 | xargs -0 chmod +w" instead, especially if you're using the "vfat" fs. Of course, if you're a Linux user, you could just use mkisofs with the appropriate options and have Rock Ridge file permissions that match the originals.)
One thing to be careful of on Windows-based PCs: most programs that put files on CD don't preserve the *short* file names that are automatically generated for files with long file names. This presents a problem because the short form is often stored in the Registry and INI files instead of the long form (try searching your Registry for "~1"). When your system is restored, it may not be able to find the files anymore.
A way to work around this is to use a backup program that understands only the short filenames, and save the long ones with LFNBK. A program called DOSLFNBK at http://www8.pair.com/dmurdoch/programs/doslfnbk.htm may be more convenient than LFNBK.
When preparing a CD for Win95, put a file called "autorun.inf" in the root directory, with entries that look like this:
[autorun]When the CD is placed into a drive with auto-insert notification enabled, it will be shown with the specified icon, and the program named will be launched. (If you turned auto-insert notification off while burning the disc, you may need to reboot before the feature is re-enabled.)
open=filename.exe
icon=someicon.ico
Here's a more complicated example:
[autorun]Taking it line by line, this says:
open = setup.exe /i
icon = setup.exe, 1
shell\configure = &Configure...
shell\configure\command = setup.exe /c
shell\install = &Install...
shell\install\command = setup.exe /i
shell\readme = &Read Me
shell\readme\command = notepad help\readme.txt
shell\help = &Help
shell\help\command = winhlp32 help\helpfile.hlp
http://www.microsoft.com/win32dev/uiguide/uigui276.htmA program that will allow you to test autoplay without burning a CD:
http://www.gui.com.au/avdf/oct95/samp_autoplay.html
http://www.connect.net/gstrope/autotest.htm(Actually, if you SUBST a folder onto a drive letter, the autorun feature in Win95 will scan the new drive. For example, "SUBST J: \goodies\NewCD". This technique is also useful for testing out a CD-ROM you're preparing.)
Some simple, configurable autorun applications (launchers and menus) are available as shareware:
http://www.powerup.com.au/~calypso/index.htm
The easiest way is to compare the original with the copy. If the disc was burned from an ISO-9660 image file, programs like Easy-CD Pro 95 will do a comparison of the disc with the original. Toast for the Mac will automatically verify after writing if requested.
Another way is to do a recursive file-by-file comparison. Programs that compute CRCs on files and then compare them (meant primarily for virus-checking) will work. Another way is to use the UNIX "diff" utility, which is available for Win95 (along with many other similar utilities) from http://www.reedkotler.com/.
If you had copied the contents of C:\MyData onto a CD-R at E:\, you would use:
diff -q -r C:\MyData E:The "-q" flag tells it to report if the files differ, but not show what the differences are, and the "-r" flag says to descend into directories recursively.
There are many other options. A utility called "treediff", available from the Simtel archives (http://www.simtel.com/archive/index.htm), may be helpful. http://www.funduc.com/directory_toolkit.htm has a shareware program with some relevant features. http://www.araxis.com/ has an evaluation copy of PMdiff, available for Windows and native OS/2. You can get "FileSync" from http://www.fileware.co.uk/.
You can download Microsoft's WinDiff -- which, unlike some of the programs mentioned previously, understands long filenames -- from ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/services/technet/office95/wind.exe. It can also be found on the Win98 CD in \tools\reskit\file\.
The following is an excerpt from the http://www.goldenhawk.com/ web site. CDRWIN is one of the few available programs that can copy CD+G discs.
"To backup CD+G discs, you must have one of the following recorders...There may be other units that work as readers or writers. Check the documentation from the manufacturer to be sure.
CREATIVE CDR4210All Yamaha recorders (except the CDR100 and CDR102), the PX-R412C, and the HP8100/8110 are the only models that are capable of reading as well as writing CD+G discs. If you do not have one of these models, then you will have to purchase another CDROM device that can read CD+G discs.
HEWLETT PACKARD 8100/8110
PANASONIC CW-7501
PLASMON CDR4240
PLEXTOR PX-R412C (requires firmware 1.04 or higher)
SONY CDW-900E
YAMAHA All Models
The following CDROM drives can read CD+G discs...
PLEXTOR 4Plex Plus"
PLEXTOR 8Plex (not recommended)
PLEXTOR 12Plex
PLEXTOR 12/20Plex
PLEXTOR 14/32Plex
SONY 76S (not recommended)
SONY 415 (only works well at 1x reading speed)
Shareware software for playing back CD+G discs on the PC or Macintosh is available from http://www.karaoke.com/downcdg.html. There does not appear to be any generally available software for creating CD+G discs.
You don't. The CD doesn't actually have that much data on it. Some CD publishers use a trick where they reference the same spot on the disc several times with overlapping files. If you try to do a file-by-file copy from the disc onto your hard drive, you'll end up with several copies of the same blocks, and more data than can fit on a CD-ROM.
VideoCDs often appear to have individual files that are 700MB or more. In this case, they really *are* that big. They're written in a special format that drops error correction in favor of more space. This works fine for video data, but is definitely not recommended for ordinary data.
If you want to duplicate a CD-ROM, you should either use a program meant for the purpose (Adaptec's CD Copier, Jeff Arnold's SNAPSHOT, etc), or extract the data track as a single ISO-9660 image. Some software is more capable of dealing with complex CDs than others, so if you have a particular kind of CD in mind (such as VideoCD) you should check the capabilities of the software before making a purchase.
There are a large number of companies that will do modest production runs of pressed CDs, but listing them is beyond the scope of this FAQ.
Do a web search on "CD duplication" and "CD replication", or check out http://www.cd-webstore.com/BurningIssues.html (a licensed-access web site from the www.cd-info.com folks).
Most CD-R drives are capable of doing this. The trick is to find the right software. The utilities from Golden Hawk (CDRWIN, DAO) will let you specify the gap size for each track (down to zero) and set the location of the track and index marks, and you can put each track in a separate file or have the entire recording in a single file.
Other programs, like ECDC, are easier to use but less flexible.
Depending on your drive, you may need to use disc-at-once recording. Some drives insist on inserting a two-second gap between tracks when track-at-once recording is used.
If you want to break up a long recording into several WAV files (one per track), it's important to split tracks on precise 2352-byte boundaries. If you don't, you'll get tiny periods of silence or noise, lasting less than 1/75th of a second, that may be clearly audible depending on the context. A handy utility called "CDWAV", available from http://resource.simplenet.com/files/cdwav.zip, is good at splitting large WAV files into smaller ones, and can do so on block boundaries.
If you want to mix WAV tracks together, take a look at Multiquence, http://www.goldwave.com/multiquence/index.html.
The first step is to convert from whatever format the sound is in to WAV or AIFF. Converting directly to 44.1KHz 16-bit stereo will save you a conversion step later. Once it's in WAV or (on the Mac) AIFF format, you can record it as you would any other audio. Be sure to play it back once in its converted form to make sure that the conversion was successful.
There may or may not be a converter for the format you're interested in. Here are some links to try:
MIDI
If you *really* want to be able to play MP3-compressed songs while driving down the freeway, check out http://utter.chaos.org.uk/~altman/mp3mobile/.
You need a compatible recorder and capable software. Only the more recent recorders, such as the Sony 948S and the HP8100i, have CD-Text support.
Among the programs that support writing of CD-Text are Prassi's CD Right and CD Rep, listed in section (6-1-21); Feurio!, in section (6-1-42); and Nero, in section (6-1-28).
The currently available software supports writing of album title, artist names, and track titles, and can copy discs with CD-Text. Storing lyrics with the tracks isn't supported.
Not all CD-ROM drives can read CD-Text. If this feature is important to you, check the specifications before you buy.
You need to include the content and a browser on the CD. Some products that might be helpful are:
In general, you don't. The only reason you'd need to clean a recorder or (for that matter) a CD-ROM drive is if you went and stuck your finger on the lens. Cleaning kits and well-intentioned Q-tips are unnecessary and potentially dangerous.
If you have an overwhelming desire to clear the dust out of your recorder, and can't or don't want to send it to a service center, use gentle(!) bursts of compressed air.
[ I've never had to clean a lens in *any* CD player, including a flip-up top-loading boom box that I've had since mid-1990. I can *see* the dust inside, and I can see the lens, but it has no problem playing discs. I can't imagine how a recorder that's only a year or two old is going to collect enough dust to fail. ]
It depends on your recorder, media, and who you talk to. For example, some informal testing with the venerable Yamaha CDR-100 determined that it worked best at 4x speed with media certified for 4x writes. 1x worked almost as well, but 2x would occasionally produce discs with unrecoverable errors.
With audio CDs, the results are more subjective. Some people have asserted that you should always write at 1x, others have stated that 2x may actually be better. It depends on the recorder, media, player, and your ears. Try it both ways and listen. See section (4-18) for some notes on how you can write the same set of bits to two CDs and still have audible differences.
In general, you don't need them. Software that burns CD-Rs has the necessary drivers built in.
If you want to use your recorder as a CD-ROM drive, you may need drivers for it. See section (5-8).
(This section only applies to people in the USA. International copyright laws apply in most other countries, but there may be local variations.)
You are allowed to make an archival backup of software, but the same doesn't necessarily hold true for music. The Home Rights Recording Act will allow you to duplicate music under certain circumstances.
A discussion of the topic, including details on past and pending legislation, can be found on the Home Recording Rights Coalition web site at http://www.hrrc.org/. The text of the Home Rights Recording Act can also be found here.
The Recording Industry Association of America, which represents the music industry, has a web site at http://www.riaa.com/.
An article entitled, "Copying Music to CD: The Right, the Wrong, and the Law" is at http://www.emediapro.net/EM1998/starrett2.html.
http://www.brouhaha.com/~eric/bad_laws/dat_tax.html has some relevant information and pointers.
http://www.bmi.com/ and http://www.ascap.com/ have yet more perspectives on legislation.
Of course.
The only possible basis in fact for the, "if it was recorded at 2x, you can't read it faster than 2x" rumors is that some drives have trouble reading CD-R media. Discs that are hard to read when spinning at 12x may become easier to read when spinning at 4x. It has also been noted that some recorders will write more legible discs at certain speeds (e.g. the Yamaha CDR-100, which works better at 1x or 4x than it does at 2x). None of this should lead anyone to conclude, however, that the write speed and read speed are tied directly together. The reader, writer, and media all have a role in determining how quickly a CD-R can spin and be readable.
This is a tricky one because of issues with long filenames and file attributes. Mac CD-ROMs are typically burned with an HFS filesystem, not ISO-9660, and WinNT uses a different scheme for long filenames (Joliet) than UNIX does (Rock Ridge). Some variants of UNIX will recognize the Joliet names, but neither Windows nor the Mac understands Rock Ridge. You might be able to use an HFS CD-ROM on a platform other than the Mac, but if you're distributing software, it's not wise to assume that your customers will be able to do the same.
The easiest way to create a disc that will work on all platforms is to use plain level 1 ISO-9660, with 8+3 filenames and no special file attributes. If you need to include Mac applications as well as data, this gets harder.
There is an Apple-defined extension to ISO-9660 that allows the Mac file and creator types to be present on an ISO-9660 filesystem. This allows most of the features of the Mac filesystem on an otherwise plain ISO-9660 disc. It's not clear how many of the software products in section (6-1) take advantage of this, but "mkhybrid" (section (6-1-32)) seems to. Section (3-5-3) has a URL to an Apple tech note with implementation details.
A common way to construct a disc for the Mac and PC is as a "hybrid" disc that has both an ISO-9660 filesystem and an HFS filesystem. To save space, the data itself is shared by both sections of the disc. This is possible because the ISO-9660 directory entries use an absolute block offset on the disc, so they can point at data residing in the HFS filesystem.
There are various applications that will do HFS/ISO-9660 hybrids. Adaptec's Toast for the Mac and "mkhybrid" for the PC are two examples. Search for "hybrid" in the list of software in section (6-1) for more examples.
The issue of Joliet vs. Rock Ridge can also be solved, by including both kinds of extensions on the same disc. The "mkhybrid" program should be able to do this.
With a little searching you can find an audio CD that will cause your CD player to show a negative track time when one track finishes and the next begins. The negative sections are usually filled with silence, but some rare discs will have material in them. If you seek directly to the track, you don't see (or hear) the negative-time section.
The trick here is also described in section (3-14). The start position of an audio track listed in the TOC (Table of Contents) doesn't have to point to the actual start of the track. When using CDRWIN-style cue sheets, the actual start of the track is at "index 00", and the place where the player seeks to is "index 01".
The distance between the actual start of the track and the TOC-specified start is called the pre-gap. The Red Book standard requires that index 01 be at least two seconds (150 sectors) from the start of the CD.
You can specify additional index markers, but most CD players will simply ignore them. Index 01 is the only value written into the TOC. Some CD-ROM games have tried to use the index markers as a form of copy protection, because they won't get copied automatically by many programs.
Absolutely. Infected CD-ROMs are every bit as nasty as infected floppies, if not worse: you can't disinfect the source media. It is prudent to scan your files before creating a CD-ROM for distribution, and it's not a bad idea to scan the CD-ROM afterward (in case somebody has cleverly infected your CD writing software).
The dangers of boot sector viruses on bootable CD-ROMs are probably low. Because the boot sector is created directly by the recording software, and can't be modified after it has been written, the opportunity for infection is small.
You don't. With a CD-ROM you could use multisession writes to hide unwanted data, but you can't create multisession audio CDs. (Well, you can create them, but nothing outside of a CD-ROM drive will be able to play the tracks outside the first session.)
On CD-RW media, it might be possible to overwrite an individual track. You would need software that supported this capability. Erasing the disc and starting over is probably easier.
Requests for information on how to copy games like "Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines" occasionally sprout up on the newsgroups. Generally the publisher has employed some form of copy protection that prevents the disc from being duplicated easily.
Most publishers are well aware that there is no such thing is an unbreakable copy protection scheme. It is possible though to implement a method effective enough to slow the tide. If you don't believe that, start counting posts the next time a popular game with decent protection is released.
If you're looking for information, the most appropriate places to search are "warez" newsgroups and web sites. Searching the net for tips is a good way to get started. Be forewarned that any "cracks" you download will very likely also be viruses, and that if you give away or accept a copy of the disc from someone else you are probably breaking the law (and a virus is what you deserve).
The point of this FAQ is not to aid and abet the illegal distribution of copyrighted works. There are plenty of news groups and web sites devoted to the subject, so please don't waste bandwidth in "legitimate" forums asking for cracks.
Problems that arise when burning a CD-R.
It means you have an attractive new coaster for your table.
The CD writing process can't be interrupted in mid-session. To prevent this from happening, the makers of CD recorders put a write buffer in the drive, usually 512K or 1MB. Data read from the hard drive, tape, or another CD is stored in the buffer, and pulled out as needed by the recorder.
If the recorder requests data from the write buffer, but there's none there, it's called a buffer underrun. The disc is still spinning, but there's no data to write, so the recording process aborts.
You can still use the disc with multisession CD-ROM drives by closing the session and starting another, assuming there's enough space left on the CD, and assuming your pre-mastering software didn't choose to finalize the disc for you.
Advice for preventing buffer underruns is scattered throughout this FAQ. A brief summary:
A utility included with Microsoft Office, called "FindFast", will occasionally start up and scan your hard drives. Disabling this by deleting the shortcut in the Windows\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp folder may be necessary.
If you're using Windows, see the sub-sections on Auto-Insert Notification and VCACHE settings, below.
http://www.adaptec.com/support/faqs/bufunder.html has a comprehensive
collection of buffer underrun info.
http://www.adaptec.com/support/configuration/cdrec.html is interesting reading for users with CD-Rs attached to Adaptec SCSI cards. They're pretty far on the conservative side, but if you're having trouble this may help you.
An article by Dana Parker entitled "CD-R on the Safe Side: Seven Rules of Successful CD Recording" in the April 1997 issue of Emedia Professional (http://www.emediapro.net/EMtocs/emtocapr.html) listed the Seven Habits of Successful CD-R Users:
Most Windows-based recording software recommend turning off Auto-Insert Notification. Having this on can interfere with closing sessions or even just inserting discs into the drive. You can disable it by opening the "System" icon in the Control Panel, and selecting "Device Manager". For each item under CD-ROM, select the device, click on the "Settings" tab, and make sure the "Auto Insert Notification" checkbox is unchecked. [With my vanilla Win95 setup I got SCSI errors when AIN was off for my CD-R but on for my CD-ROM, even if the CD-ROM drive wasn't in use at the time.]
If you're using WinNT, you can turn it off with the "TweakUI" program available in PowerToys (available from the Microsoft web site at http://www.microsoft.com/), or by modifying a registry key with Regedit32 (0=disabled, 1=enabled):
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SYSTEM \ CurrentControlSet \ Services \ Cdrom \ AutorunIf your software automatically turns AIN off, and you can't figure out how to turn it back on, the TweakUI program may be able to help. Check the "Paranoia" settings. (Incidentally, if installing the Power Toys screws up your icons, select "Rebuild Icons" from the "Repair" menu.)
Sidebar: the trouble with Auto Insert Notification is that it periodically attempts to find a valid disc in the CD recorder. A blank disc isn't very interesting to Windows, so nothing happens. When the table of contents is written to the disc, it suddenly becomes interesting; and if Autorun or Autoplay are enabled, enough activity is generated by Windows' attempts to read the disc that the write fails.
Because it only affects CDs with actual data being written to them, a test write won't end in failure. It can be very frustrating to have 100% success with test writes and 100% failures with actual writes! With disc-at-once recording, the process will abort very near the start of recording, probably leaving an empty but useless disc. With track-at-once recording, it will fail at the end, and you may still be able to finalize the disc. Audio CDs will most likely work fine even if interrupted at the end of the write process.
IMPORTANT: if you are using DirectCD for Windows, you must have AIN turned *on*, or some things won't work quite right. The most obvious failure mode is that long filenames aren't shown, but some reports indicate that data on the disc can get trashed as well. This can make life interesting if you're also using a conventional writing application, unless the application is good about turning AIN off before writing. The other Windows applications currently sold by Adaptec (notably Easy CD Creator) will automatically disable Auto-Insert Notification when appropriate and re-enable it afterward.
One problem with Win95 is that by default the size of the file cache is unrestricted. This means that all available memory will eventually get filled up with file data, which will cause the virtual memory system to start swapping out pages from executing applications. When something needs to be executed from a page that has been swapped out, it takes time to pull it back in off the disk. While this is happening, the CD recorder's buffer could drain completely.
The procedure is simple:
A common rule of thumb is to set maxfilecache to 25% of your RAM, up to a maximum of 16MB. Because of (actual or perceived) bugs in Win95, some people recommend setting minfilecache to the same value.
Typical symptoms can be described like this:
The SCSI driver needs to believe that the CD-ROM drive can handle multisession discs. Most likely you will need to update your SCSI drivers before this will work.
(This problem was reported with an HP4020i and a Buslogic BT946C controller; if you have an HP drive you should get the c4324hlp.vxd driver from the HP web site. See section 6 for the address.)
One possible cause of this problem is writing a multisession disc in MODE-1 format. Some older CD-ROM drives incorrectly assume that a MODE-1 disc can't be multisession, so they don't look for additional sessions unless it's written in MODE-2 (CD-ROM/XA) format.
Also, if the final session on the CD isn't closed, standard CD players may become confused (the NEC 6Xi certainly does under Win95). This doesn't mean that the *disc* must be closed, just that the *session* must be closed. (Actually, the NEC 6Xi doesn't like open discs either... sigh.)
A note on one of the Ricoh pages indicates that the Ricoh 1420C is unable to read sessions smaller than 3 minutes (about 26MB) until firmware 1.6x.
There's a couple of possibilities. One is that your data source can't keep up with the CD-R; try using disc-at-once writing from an ISO image with the speed set to 1x. If it seems to be getting worse over time, you may just need to defragment your hard drive.
If that fails, a number of people have discovered that the problem is a faulty CD-R unit (similar behavior has been reported on Sony and HP units, which have different mechanisms). You should try 1x writing from a fast source and with different sets of data before contacting the manufacturer, since they will likely tell you to do exactly that anyway.
Be sure that there aren't environmental factors creating difficulties. CD-R units are usually built to handle small shocks, but having a set of speakers playing loud music on the same table as a CD-R may cause it to skip, resulting in a failed write. Sonic booms, heavy construction equipment, and nuclear detonations may have similar effects.
It's also possible that you simply have a bad batch of media. Try a different type and brand of disc. Some distributors (e.g. dataDisc) will exchange media that's provably defective.
Be careful with Advanced Power Management functions on some PCs. If the keyboard and IDE devices are completely idle, the system may decide that nothing is going on and switch to a low-power mode. Ditto for screen savers that kick in after the system has been idle for a certain period.
Most CD recorders need to clear their memory between the "test" pass and the "write" pass. For some recorders, the only command that does this is "eject". If the recorder has a tray it just goes out and back in, but if it uses a caddy manual intervention is needed.
Some CD-R packages allow you to start the real write pass a few seconds after the test pass has succeeded. They may not disable this even though they know that the disc will have to be ejected. Make sure the option is set to "wait until told to continue."
A very simple test is to take a CD that DOES work, copy it, and try both (this ensures that your problems aren't being caused by, for example, a drive that doesn't support multisession CDs).
Sometimes the firmware can be at issue. In one specific case, a Goldstar GCD580B CD-ROM drive was able to read CD-Rs under Win95 but not MS-DOS 6.22. Upgrading the firmware from v1.01 to v1.24 solved the problem.
If it fails with different kinds of media, the CD-ROM drive either doesn't like discs written with your recorder, or doesn't like CD-R media at all. In one case, returning the CD-ROM for an identical unit resolved the problems.
While there are stringent specifications for discs, there are no such specifications for CD players and CD-ROM drives. They just have to play the discs. If the disc and the drive are both marginal, you lose.
The ISO-9660 standard says the version number (a semicolon followed by a number at the end of every filename) has to be there. Most operating systems simply ignore it, but until recently the Mac didn't, causing some problems.
(For the Mac, look at "ISO 9660 File Access" in the System:Extensions folder with Command-I. If the version shown is 5.0 or greater, your system should handle the version numbers just fine. If not, you should update your system software.)
If you can't find a way to work around it, "mkisofs" has an option to omit the version number when constructing an ISO-9660 image.
http://www.adaptec.com/support/configuration/cdrec.html has some advice on SCSI configuration. Basically, check your cabling and termination (see section (4-17) for more advice there), turn off features you don't need, and make sure Auto Insert Notification is off (see section (4-1-1)).
(This is for failures other than buffer underruns. For those, see section (4-1) and perhaps section (4-4).)
If it's failing right as the disc is being finalized, and you're recording in track-at-once mode, try recording in disc-at-once mode instead. It has been suggested that some recorder+media combinations have trouble reading the PMA (Program Memory Area, where a copy of the TOC is kept until the disc is finalized) at the end of a write. See section (2-19) for the low-down on disc finalization.
When in doubt, check your ASPI layer. Find out why at http://resource.simplenet.com/primer/aspi.htm.
This was happening frequently with the HP4020i running off an AdvanSys SCSI
card under Win311 (i.e. WfWG). The solution here was to remove IFSHLP.SYS
from the CONFIG.SYS. (IFSHLP.SYS is somehow involved with 32-bit file
access and network support, so you may have to disable both of these before
disabling IFSHLP. You may have better luck under Win95.)
Another user with the same setup found that doing power-up diagnostics and device reset right before burning the CD helped.
This seems to happen on Philips CDD2000-based units, such as the HP4020i, usually a short while after the warranty runs out. The most common cause is a spring that weakens with age, but it might also be due to lubrication breakdown. After a while, the recorder starts failing when trying to write beyond a certain point on the disc.
The ways of dealing with this range from minor system changes to the placement of chicken entrails on selected components. Reducing the DMA rate on the AdvanSys SCSI card (for the HP4020i) may help, buying better SCSI cables and checking for proper termination may make a difference, or even powering off and on again right before the burn. For some users, however, the problem is mechanical rather than spiritual.
One user was told by Philips tech support that if error 50h (write append) occurs, it means the drive has to be returned to the repair center. Other users have been told that the error can occur when attempting to write an empty directory or zero-length file. Under Easy-CD Pro '95, this is reported as error 171-00-50-00 (see the Adaptec web site for a complete list of error codes).
If the fault is caused by the worn spring, it may be possible to fix the problem by replacing the spring. This will definitely void your warranty, and you shouldn't even think about trying this unless the only alternative is to throw the drive away. Jonathan Oei posted some details about the process (search for comp.publish.cdrom.hardware, subject "CDD2000 & Spring Fix", on http://www.dejanews.com/), and a detailed description of the procedure can be found on http://www.fadden.com/doc/fix-hp4020i.txt.
This procedure requires some special tools (mini torx drivers and really fine jeweller's pliers), and involves disassembling much of the drive. If you open up the drive and remove the circuit boards, you will see that the laser writing assembly is moved by a DC stepper motor. The motor has a plastic drive gear that is meshed with a plastic "rack" on the laser. The spring in question is a piece of wire that pushes the rack against the drive gear, so when it weakens the gear slips and the write fails. Replacing the 0.012" wire with a 0.02" diameter wire solves the problem.
The high temperature in the drive may contribute to the breakdown of the lubricants that allow the laser head to travel. You may be able to prevent the situation by installing a fan. If you do find yourself with the case open, the discussion on lubricating the JVC XR-W2010 at http://www.noord.bart.nl/~januzz/howtoget.htm may apply to the CDD2000 as well.
This question is also covered in the HP4020i FAQ, available at http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Technology/CD-R/HP-FAQ.html.
There's a 150-sector postgap at the end of the data track. Most programs deal with this automatically, some older ones don't. If you're getting errors, try subtracting 150 from the total number of sectors to read for that track.
There are a few of possibilities, some software and some hardware.
It may be that the system is looking at the disc, not finding a TOC (table of contents), and ejecting it as useless. One way to tell the difference between the operating system rejecting the CD and the drive rejecting the CD is to unplug the SCSI or IDE cable from the back of the CD recorder before inserting the disc.
If the problem is the operating system, you probably need to disable certain features. Under Win95, disable auto insertion for all CD-ROM devices (see section (4-1)). One user found that reinstalling Win95 helped. On the Mac, you may just need more recent drivers. On a Solaris system, remove the recorder (probably the "cdrom" entry) from /etc/vold.conf.
If that doesn't work, make sure the CD-R drive is perfectly level. Apparently some units are sensitive to being tilted at an angle. Some users have had trouble when a CD-R has been on for a while and has overheated, so if you only have trouble when the machine has been powered on for a while, try putting a small fan above the unit to blow air over it.
With some drives, improper SCSI termination can cause this behavior.
For the Yamaha CDR-200/CDR-400, this may be a sign that the drive has broken down and needs to be replaced. See section (5-1-1).
If nothing helps, there's a strong possibility that the drive is mis- aligned and needs to be serviced. This has been known to happen to drives during shipping.
One user reported problems when using the wrong type of caddy. It has to be a Sony-type caddy, which is the kind most commonly found in stores.
The power range of the laser in a CD-R is between 4 and 8 milliwatts. CD-R discs have a section outside the standard recording area called the Program Calibration Area (PCA), which is used to adjust the laser for the brand of media you're using.
The error indicates that the CD-R drive is having trouble calibrating the power setting. Try different brands of media, and if that doesn't work you should have the drive checked.
Some versions of the firmware for the Philips CDD2000 (and HP 4020i) will report a power calibration error if you try to do a 1x write after a 4x read.
This was observed with a Yamaha CDR-100. The solution is to go into the Adaptec BIOS (hit Ctrl-A during boot), and disable the "support removable disks under BIOS as fixed disks" option and the "boot from CD-ROM" option.
There's a couple of possibilities: either they aren't there, or they're there but you can't see them. Looking at the disc from different machines (e.g. Mac and PC) should give you some idea.
Out-of-date versions of MSCDEX have been known to "forget" certain files when browsing a disc. If you're using DOS or are using the "real mode" drivers from within Win95, make sure you're using the most recent version of MSCDEX.
Old versions of certain CD creation programs would occasionally omit things when asked to burn a large number of files. These problems haven't been reported for some time, however.
If you were burning a multi-session CD, read the next section.
A common mistake when burning a multisession CD is to forget to link the files from the previous session into the current one. This results in a CD where you can see the new files but none of the old, unless you have a program that lets you choose which session you look at.
If you're using Easy-CD Pro for Win31, CD Creator, or Adaptec Easy CD Creator 3, you can load the contents of all the previous sessions, and burn a new session that has all the files you want. This feature isn't available in Easy-CD Pro 95, which only allows you to link to one previous session.
The files themselves aren't lost forever though: most packages will allow you to extract a track as an ISO-9660 image, and you can use WinImage to pull individual files out of it. If all else fails, CD-R Diagnostic (section (6-2-6)) claims to be able to recover data from "lost" sessions.
One caution: without something like Adaptec's Session Selector, you may not see the last session on the disc anyway. Some CD-ROM drives stop looking for sessions after a certain point.
Good SCSI cables and correct termination are absolutely essential. SCSI bus errors can cause buffer underruns or corrupted data (especially since some vendors ship drives with parity checking disabled).
Bertel Schmitt wrote an excellent article on the ins and outs of proper cabling and termination. The article can be found in text form at http://www.fadden.com/doc/scsi-trm.txt. Granite Digital, a company that makes high-quality cables and terminators, can be found at http://www.scsipro.com/.
If you're using an HP 4020i with the AdvanSys SCSI card, reducing the DMA transfer rate may help.
There are actually two questions here, so I've split them into separate sections. The most common problem is that the audio extracted to the hard drive doesn't quite match the original.
Most problems are due to poor digital audio extraction from the source media. Some CD-ROM drives will return slightly different data every time an audio track is read. Others, like the Plextor line (e.g. 4Plex, 8Plex, and 12Plex, but not 6Plex) will return the same data every time so long as the source media is clean.
The most fundamental problem is that, if the CD is dirty, the error correction may not be able to correct all of the errors. Some drives will interpolate the missing samples, some won't.
Another problem most CD-ROM drives face is "jitter". See section (2-15) for details.
See also section (3-3) on avoiding clicks in extracted audio, and section (5-5) on which CD-ROM drives are recommended.
[ I have yet to see an authoritative answer to this. ]
Suppose you extract the audio track from the copy, and it's an exact binary match of the track you wrote from your hard drive, but the CDs don't sound quite the same. What then?
Most people don't notice any difference between originals and duplicates. Some people notice subtle differences, some people notice huge differences. Some say CD-R is better, some say worse. While it's true that "bits are bits", there *are* reasons why CD-Rs may sound different even when the data matches exactly.
The manual for the CDD-2000 reportedly states that the drive uses 4x oversampling when playing back pressed CDs, but switches to 1x for CD-R. This affects the quality of the D/A conversion, and can make an audible difference.
It has been suggested that the D/A conversion process in the CD player is more susceptible to "jitter" when reading CD-Rs, because the clocking of the bits isn't as precise. A quality CD player will compensate for this automatically. (Note: this kind of jitter is different from the DAE kind of jitter described in section (2-15).) About halfway down on the page at http://www.digido.com/jitteressay.html are some comments about the quality of playback being dependent on how a CD-R is recorded.
Others have asserted that *any* two CDs, pressed or otherwise, will sound slightly different.
Some people believe that audio CDs should be recorded at 1x, while others have asserted that, for various technical reasons, 2x is better. Certain kinds of media may work best at specific speeds.
An extremely technical introduction to CD reading is available at http://www.tc.umn.edu/nlhome/g496/eric0139/Papers/paper.html. This may shed some light on why reading audio CDs is difficult.
If you are finding noticeable differences, try different media, a different player, and a different recorder. There is some evidence that different brands of media and recorders may work better for audio, but in the end it's a highly subjective matter. Some people say CD-Rs sound worse, some people say they sound better.
Some recorders don't correctly extract digital audio if the pregap of the first track isn't exactly two seconds. A bug in the firmware causes the drive to start extracting slightly past the start of the track, and stop extracting slightly past the end. This can result in an audible glitch if the music starts at the exact start of the track, and can cause the drive to fail with an error when extracting the last track on the CD.
CDs that start at 00:02:32 (0 minutes, 2 seconds, and 32 blocks) are surprisingly common. The problem can be worked around manually, by looking at the output of the Jeff Arnold's (freeware) TOC program (available from http://www.goldenhawk.com/) and supplying "/start=" and "/end=" parameters that adjust backward by the number of blocks in excess of two seconds.
For example, if the first track started at 00:02:32, you would subtract 32 from the starting and ending Logical Block Addresses.
A better solution is to use a CD-ROM drive that doesn't have this problem (and most likely can extract audio more quickly than the CD-R can).
The Yamaha CDR-100/102 and the Philips CDD2600 are known to have this problem, though it may get fixed by a firmware update. The Ricoh 6200S reportedly does not return the disc's table of contents correctly for these sorts of discs.
The default audio player in Win95 tries to load the entire file into memory. When an extracted track is 40 or 50MB, and you don't have that much RAM, Win95's virtual memory system starts writing pieces out to disk. The disk thrashes, and you get nowhere.
There are several ways around this. If you right-click on the file and select "properties", you will see a "preview" tab. This will play it directly from disk. Another way is to use a different program. One possibility is the Media Player, which is optionally installed with Win95. You can make it the default WAV file player by selecting View/Options from Win95 explorer, clicking on the "File Types" tab, and choosing "Wave Sound". Double-click on Play and change the program name from "sndrec32.exe" to "mplayer.exe", leaving the "/play" and "/close" flags intact.
You can also use a program like CoolEdit, which will let you preview WAV files from the Open File dialog.
This problem is often experienced by HP7100/7110 users. HP chose to ship packet-writing software with their drives rather than conventional premastering software, leaving users with discs that couldn't be read on a fair number of systems. (The HP7200 is the same drive, shipped with updated firmware and a more complete set of software.)
The following is an excerpt from an Adaptec readme.txt file. It talks about DirectCD, but the problem is inherent in all packet writing solutions:
"When the disc is in the native format used by DirectCD, you will only be able to read the disc on a CD-R device running DirectCD. This is a direct result of the technology used when writing to a CD-R disc. In order to make the disc readable on a standard CD-ROM DirectCD must write certain data to the disc. This provides compatibility with many of the current drives on the market today. Unfortunately, there are still a number of CD-ROM drives that cannot read the packet written media that DirectCD produces. If you experience problems in this area, you should go to System in Control Panel, select Performance, File System, CD-ROM and set the Access Pattern to "No Read-Ahead". If you still experience problems after making this adjustment, it is likely that the CD- ROM drive itself is having problems reading packet written media.If you want to share data between systems, and the remote system isn't guaranteed to have a MultiRead CD-ROM drive, you should write the disc with conventional software.It should also be noted that there is an industry initiative called MultiRead that addresses these issues and has the support of all the major vendors of CD-ROM and CD-R/RW devices. This initiative will eliminate the above problems and should be available on all new drives."
There have been a fair number of people who have burned a CD-ROM only to discover that, while they can read text files, run applications, and look at graphics, they can't extract from .ZIP archives or run compressed applications (e.g. some "Setup.EXE"s under Win95).
The problem they're seeing isn't just corruption of .ZIP files though. Most kinds of files have a lot of redundancy in them. If a single bit is lost out of a long text file, the chances of it being noticed are very slight. For an application, the chances of it causing a failure depend on where in the file the error falls. For a compressed file, though, every bit is significant, and in a .ZIP archive the CRC has a very high probability of detecting errors. (CRC is cyclic redudancy check. Most file archivers compute a 32-bit CRC on the uncompressed input and store it in the archive. When you extract the files, the CRC is checked to ensure that nothing has been damaged.)
Eliminating these errors could be as simple as replacing a bad SCSI cable. One way to narrow the possibilities down is to try the disc in different readers on different machines. If the same error shows up in the same place, the error was introduced during writing rather than while reading the data back. Another thing to try is to burn the same disc twice. If the data written to the CD-Rs doesn't match the original, but they do match each other, then the errors are happening in the same place every time, rather than at random, so the trouble might be with a driver or firmware instead of a flaky cable or bad RAM.
If a file appears to be getting corrupted on the CD-R, try copying it back to the hard drive and then comparing it to the original. If possible, see if the file is missing large chunks or just has sporadic damage throughout.
If you can identify the problem as being with the reader or the writer you may be able to focus on just one part of your system. If the trouble appears to be with your writer, and you can't get it to work, try to move it to somebody else's system and see if it works from there. It's possible, though unlikely, that the CD recorder is flaky.
Whatever the case, the place to start is to check all cables, connections, SCSI termination, L2 cache, and RAM. One user with an otherwise properly functioning system was able to fix the CD-R corruption problems by correcting the RAM timings in the BIOS setup. A couple of others found that their problems went away when they disabled the L2 cache on the motherboard. Sometimes adding a new device will make cables (especially longer ones) turn flaky. Sometimes the flakiness only affects one device. Swapping the cables is inexpensive, easy, and very likely to root out the cause of your problems. Section (4-17) has some tips on SCSI stuff.
One last thing: make sure the original files are valid before you go on a wild goose chase!
There are a few possibilities. First and foremost is media compatibility. Not all players get along with all brands of CD-R media. You need to find a combination of recorder, media, and player that get along. Read section (7-2) to learn more.
Another common problem is failing to close the disc at the end of writing. You can't play an audio CD on a common CD player until the session has been closed. You may be able to play it back with the CD recorder though. Also, don't forget that you have to write all of the audio data into the first session of a multisession CD. CD players don't know how to find the later sessions, so tracks written there won't get played.
Sometimes the CD player will have no problem playing the tracks, but will have a great deal of difficulty seeking between tracks or moving fast-forward. Using a different brand of media or a different CD player may produce better results.
Some media works better at 1x, 2x, or 4x than it does at other speeds. You may find that slowing down or speeding up the recorder helps.
Finally, remember that you have to write the disc in CD-DA format! If you just write a bunch of WAV files to a disc in CD-ROM format, it's not going to work in your home stereo.
As with audio CDs, discussed in the previous section, there are several possibilities. The media compatibility issues mentioned above apply to CD-ROM as well.
If you're using CD-RW media rather than CD-R media, you have to be sure that the CD-ROM drive in question is MultiRead compliant. Some older drives are able to read CD-RW media, but most are not.
If the disc was written using a packet writing application like DirectCD, some CD-ROMs will stumble on packet boundaries. Refer to section (4-21) for information and a possible workaround.
If you put a VideoCD (White Book) into your CD-ROM drive, you will see a bunch of files and directories like you would on any other CD-ROM. In fact, with the appropriate software installed, on some platforms you can double-click on a file to play the video.
In practice, however, the video files are stored on separate tracks, using CD-ROM/XA MODE-2 FORM-2. This allows more data to be stored on a VideoCD, at the price of less error correction. If the video is short enough, you may be able to copy the disc as a collection of files, but some players may be unable to play back selections if the original disc had more than one track.
You need to use a program like Adaptec's CD Copier or GoldenHawk's CDRWIN to copy the disc track-by-track, preserving the mode of the original.
If your drive only supports track-at-once recording, you may have trouble copying VideoCDs because the starting address gets shifted when the drive writes a gap between tracks. NTI's CD-Copy (section 6-1-12) gives you the option of dropping the last part of the previous track to preserve the start position of the next track.
Note that MODE-2 FORM-2 holds 2324 bytes of data per sector, so instead of a total capacity of around 650MB, you can put closer to 740MB on a disc. If you don't record the VideoCD data files in the correct format, you will find yourself running out of room. (The extra space is gained by throwing out error correction codes that aren't necessary for video data. Writing ordinary data in this format is not recommended.)
Most often this is a problem with auto-insert notification being enabled when it shouldn't be. See the discussion in section (4-1).
One person supposedly fixed a similar problem by replacing the power supply in their computer. Apparently the 200W supply wasn't enough to handle everything that was connected to it, and the extra power drain from the write laser was causing failures.
If you're using track-at-once recording, and the actual write is failing when the disc is 100% complete and the TOC is being written, you may be able to solve your problems by using a different brand of media. See the notes in section (4-9).
It's possible that the disc has developed a region that can't be erased. More likely is that the software or firmware is acting up. If you're using Easy CD Creator, insert a good blank CD-RW disc, and start the Erase process. Just before you hit the final "OK" button to start the erase, swap the good blank disc for the troubled one.
If this succeeds, you probably ought to run it through the erase procedure one additional time before using it.
This was sent to me by Jac Goudsmit:
"When Adaptec DirectCD refuses to format a CD-RW for packet-writing, it's possible that the disc is not completely blank. This may happen because you chose the "quick" option when you last erased it. The quick-erase option only erases the lead-in area to make the hardware and software think the disc is empty. This is fine if you're going to use the disc for "normal" writing as a CD-ROM, audio disc or whatever.
The packet-writing formatter in DirectCD 2.0a however (apparently) requires the disc to be totally empty, so you really have to do a full erase if the disc contained data previously.
BUT: there's another problem: after you do a full erase and shut down the program you erase with (e.g. EasyCD Pro or Easy CD Creator) it's possible that the DirectCD program won't recognize the disc as valid media, and you still won't be able to format it, until you restart the computer.
Unfortunately this means that if you want to start using a previously recorded CD-RW for packet writing, you'll have to wait a total time of at least an hour and a half for the erase and format to complete..."
There are people successfully writing discs with Windows 98, so it *can* be done.
If you're using Easy CD Creator 3, try uninstalling it, rebooting, and then reinstalling it. This seems to fix the problems for the people reporting them. Doing the same for other software may have similar beneficial effects. Apparently ECDC3 installs its own versions of some system drivers, which get overwritten when Win98 is installed. Uninstalling and reinstalling the drivers puts the ECDC3-friendly versions back.
Make sure your ASPI (Advanced SCSI Programmer's Interface) layer is up to date, even if you have an IDE recorder. You can find the "ASPICHK" utility and some notes about how to examine your system on http://www.adaptec.com/support/faqs/aspilayer.html. You should be at v4.57 or later.
This problem has been recognized by Microsoft. The resolution is posted on http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q186/2/97.asp.
The basic problem is that, after upgrading to Windows 98, copies of some CD-ROMs (usually copy-protected games) will refuse to run, insisting that you insert the original disc. Microsoft has recommended two methods for resolving this issue. The first is to simply use the original disc.
The second recommendation is to make a new copy of the disc under Win98. Why this works is unclear, and the Microsoft support pages aren't much help. They only say that the behavior is not caused by a bug, but rather "design changes in Windows 98". (It appears that using Win98 to write a new session onto an existing disc will also cure the problem, but if you aren't in the habit of leaving the session open on copies of game discs, this won't help you much.)
One possibility is that Win98 returns a value for the volume label that is closer to what is actually stored (perhaps there was some sort of character set conversion or truncation going on in Win95). Copy protected games often check the volume label as a way of obstructing inexperienced software pirates.
The numbers after the model name (e.g. "CDR-102 (2x4/512K)") refer to the read and write speeds of the unit and the size of the write buffer. "2x4" would be a double-speed writer that's also a quad-speed reader. If it just says "2x", the write speed is double-speed and the read speed isn't known (but presumably is at least 2x). Buffer sizes written with a '+', e.g. "2MB+", indicate that the buffer can be expanded further.
If the recorder can write to CD-RW media, the specification will include "RW", e.g. "2x6/1MB;RW". If the CD-R write speed and the CD-RW write speed differ, it will be noted like "4x6/2MB;RW@2x". This notation may differ from what you find on retailer web pages; some sites will write "6-4-2" or "8-2-2", usually meaning read/write/rewrite speeds.
Many units are repackaged versions of other manufacturer's devices, sometimes with slight changes in the firmware. Value-added retailers have been known to switch to a different manufacturer's drive without notice, so don't assume that everything here is accurate.
All CD-R drives are SCSI unless labeled as IDE or parallel-port.
Many of the models listed have been discontinued in favor of newer models, and some of them have yet to be released, so you will probably not be able to find all of the models listed here for sale.
An excellent summary of CD-R features can be found on http://makecd.core.de/auto/Compatibility_toc.html.
If you're new to SCSI, take a look at the comp.periphs.scsi FAQ, http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/scsi-faq/. It covers both novice and advanced questions.
A wealth of information on Enhanced IDE and other storage technologies is available from http://thef-nym.sci.kun.nl/~pieterh/storage.html and http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/pc-hardware-faq/enhanced-IDE/top.html.
There are no absolutely perfect recorders, but some drives are better than others. The best are listed below, and the risky propositions are identified with "CAVEAT EMPTOR" warnings in the individual sections. In cases where a unit is built by company A and repackaged by company B, the warnings are listed with the original manufacturer (company A).
Based on the experience of users posting to the comp.publish.cdrom.hardware Usenet newsgroup, the currently-selling models worth buying are:
See also the (somewhat Adaptec-specific but still useful) "CD RECORDABLE SUPPORT" section from "ftp://ftp.adaptec.com/pub/BBS/dos/ezlist.txt". See "http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Industry/Mfgrs/RecorderManufacturers.html" for company contact information.
The model numbers are important! Sometimes the older or newer models from the same manufacturer aren't as good. The units listed were considered independently from the software that they were bundled with, and it may be necessary to buy additional software to get the full value from the drive.
If you have specific needs, you should verify with the manufacturer that the drive will do what you want.
Many of the devices are simply OEM versions of another company's recorder. It's unwise to assume that the units are equivalent, however: in many cases the firmware has been changed, and may not work as well as related models.
External drives are preferred to internal drives because of heat problems, though this is less of a concern for newer models. External models can also be moved between machines, and even between platforms. Most if not all SCSI models will work on both Macs and PCs.
I'm not currently listing stand-alone recorders like the "CD Blaster" or "CD Dupe-It", which are boxes with a CPU, CD-R, and hard drive that can duplicate CDs without tying up a full machine. Most of these low-end CD production boxes are off-the-shelf hardware and software packaged into a single unit, so listing them separately doesn't make much sense. Besides, they're not of much interest to the average user.
Models are the CDR-100 (4x4/512K), CDR-102 (2x4/512K), CDR-200 (2x6/1MB), CDR-400 (4x6/2MB; 'c' is caddy, 't' is tray, 'x' is external), CDR-401 (4x6/2MB;IDE), CRW-4001 (4x6/2MB;RW@2x;IDE), CRW-2260 (2x6/1MB;RW), CRW-4260 (4x6/2MB;RW@2x), and CRW-4416S (4x16/2MB;RW).
It has been reported that the CDR-102 is the same mechanism as the CDR-100, but with the 4x writing feature disabled. There is no known way to convert it into a 4x writer. Similar speculation has been made about the CDR-200 and CDR-400, and in fact some people have claimed success. Learn all about R621 at http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Bay/7023/index.html (or http://home.t-online.de/home/christoph.dittenberger if you prefer German). It may also be possible to convert a 2260 into a 4260 with the same method.
Yamaha CDR-100 and CDR-102 units have problems doing digital audio extraction on some discs. See section (4-19).
Yamaha CDR-100s with firmware version 1.08 may experience problems when recording audio (e.g. a click at the end of tracks recorded with the "copy prohibit" flag set to "off"). Upgrading to version 1.10 is recommended. Since the CDR-100 and CDR-102 units don't have flash ROM (and apparently the upgrade involves more than just changing a ROM chip), the drive needs to be sent back to the dealer for the upgrade.
The CDR-100 reportedly works best when writing in 4x mode, and may produce poor results when used to write at 2x or 1x.
The current firmware versions for the older Yamaha drives is v1.12 for the CDR-100 and v1.01 for the CDR-102. The change was to "allow mastering in Blue Book specs". If you aren't having problems, don't get the upgrade. The Yamaha CDR-400 is somewhere around 1.0g.
The CDR-400 is flash upgradeable, and supports packet writing. The tray on the CDR-400 has been described as "flimsy". The tray eject moves quickly for the first half and then slows considerably; this is normal.
The CRW-4001/CRW-4260 runs rather hot. External units or extra cooling fans are recommended.
Upgrades for the CDR-200/CDR-400 and some .PDF documentation for all drives are available from ftp://ftp.yamahayst.com/pub/. Technical support info can be found on http://www.yamahayst.com/techsup/.
CAVEAT EMPTOR - Yamaha CDR-200/CDR-400. Reports of units breaking down after a few months have been persistent. It appears that, unless the units are kept well-cooled, they will start rejecting discs after a month or two of use. The drives work very well otherwise, and one customer was told that the CDR-400AT model was a sturdier version.
See http://www.ita.sel.sony.com/products/storage/
See http://www.sony-cp.com/_E/Products/Storage/CD-R/Index.html
Models are the CDW-900E (2x2/3MB), Spressa CDU920S (2x2/1MB), Spressa CDU940S (2x4/1MB), CDU926S (2x6/512K), CDU928E (2x8/512K;IDE), CDU948S (4x8/2MB), and CRX100E/CH (4x24/1MB;IDE;RW@2x).
The CDW-900E has a separate connector that allows multiple "slave" drives to be daisy-chained, allowing multiple CD-Rs to be written in parallel.
The Spressa 9211 is a 920 in an external case, the 9411 is a 940 in an external case, and the 9611 is a 926. The 940S drive is actually a 924S; the 940S designation refers to the complete bundle (software, cables, etc). Looks like each unit can be referenced by three different numbers.
Sony drives have a special "recover" feature, accessible from programs like Easy-CD Pro '95. This allows recovery of the CD-R media after certain classes of failed writes.
All Sony drives can do packet writing.
Firmware for some models can be hard to find. A good place to start searching is http://www.ahead.de/firmware.htm.
CAVEAT EMPTOR - CDU926 and CDU928. Believe it or not, the CDU926 and CDU928 don't support disc-at-once recording (see section (2-9) for a description). Instead they use "variable-gap track-at-once", which allows TAO audio recordings with barely perceptible gaps between tracks. Some popular software packages aren't as useful when disc-at-once isn't available, so people considering these drives should carefully consider how they plan to use them.
(The older 920 and 924, and newer 948 units DO support DAO.)
See http://www.smartandfriendly.com/
Models are the CDR1002 (2x2/1MB, based on the Sony CDU920S), CDR1004 (2x4/512K, based on the Yamaha CDR-102), CDR2004 (2x4/1MB, based on the Sony 940S), CDR2006 "Pro" (2x6/512K, based on the Sony 926S), CDR2006 "Plus" (2x6/1MB, based on the JVC XR-W2020), CDR4000 (4x4/512K, based on the Yamaha CDR-100), CDR4006 (4x6/2MB, based on the Yamaha CDR-400), CD-RW226 "Plus" (2x6/1MB;RW, based on the JVC XR-W2042), CD-RW426 (4x6/2MB;RW@2x;IDE, based on the Yamaha CRW-4001/4260), SpeedWriter 4012 (4x12/1MB, based on the Teac CD-R55S), CD Rocket 8x20 (8x20/2MB, based on a Panasonic drive?).
The CDR2004 has replaced the CDR1002, and the CDR4006 has replaced the CDR4000.
See http://www.km.philips.com/osc/cd-rw/index.html
See http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Bay/6893/
Models are the CDD522 (2x2/2MB), CDD2000 (2x4/1MB), CDD2600 (2x6/1MB), and CDD3600 (2x6/1MB;RW). The CDD3610 is a 3600 with an IDE interface. The CDD521 (2x2/256K) is an ancient model; if you use one, the firmware upgrade is strongly recommended (but nearly impossible to find). The Omniwriter/26 and /26A appear to be repackaged Ricoh 6200 and 6200I OEMs. In Europe, the 3600 is packaged in a kit as the PCA350RW, the 3610 as the PCA362RW, and the 3610 with a parallel-port interface comes as the PCA363RW.
The CDD522 does not support reading of subcode-Q data. The CDD521, CDD522, and Kodak-labeled PCD225 have a sensor that can read the barcode data from the inner ring on a CD.
See the HP section for comments about the CDD2000 firmware. The firmware is kept in flash ROM, so it can be updated with software obtainable over the net. You should be at version 1.25 or later for best results.
Digital audio extraction may not work correctly at higher than 2x on the CDD2600, especially near the end of the disc. Philips has acknowledged that audio CDs and packet-written CDs may not read correctly at 6x, but many users have had problems at 4x as well. It may also suffer from the block offset problem described in section (4-19). The CDD2600 supports packet writing, but is NOT flash upgradeable.
The CDD2600 may share the HP 6020i's difficulties with pressed CD-ROMs that have a small amount of data on them.
The initial release (firmware v1.0) of the 3610 was unable to create audio discs reliably using disc-at-once recording. Firmware v2.02 fixed this and some other problems.
Philips' drives, notably the CDD2600, have been shown to hang on some Amigas if SCSI disconnect is enabled and you try to read the session information from a multisession CD. Philips does not believe this problem happens on PCs, and consequently has declined to investigate further. If you are experiencing hangs when examining multisession CDs, try turning SCSI disconnect off for the CD recorder.
Drivers are available for the CDD2000 from: http://www.philips.com/sv/pcaddon/cdr/
Firmware updates are available here: http://www.km.philips.com/osc/cd-rw/download/index.html
CAVEAT EMPTOR - CDD2000. Some users of Philips CDD2000 and derivative units (like the HP4020i) have reported that the drives went bad over a short period of time, often 1 to 3 months. While these cases represent the minority of users, reports have been persistent. People with the technical skills (and bravery) required to replace a spring and/or lubricate inside the unit have reported good results (see section (4-10) for details). If you buy a CDD2000-based unit -- of which there are many -- be sure the dealer or manufacturer is aware of this problem and is willing to fix or exchange the drive should it arise.
A class-action lawsuit has been filed against Philips. Information is available at http://www.shortbusters.com/. A copy of the complaint is at http://www.shortbusters.com/lawsuits/philips/complain.html.
See http://www.hp.com/storage/cdwriter/index.html
See http://www.hp.com/isgsupport/cdr/
Models are the SureStore 4020i (2x4/1MB, based on the Philips CDD2000, sometimes identified as part number C4324), 6020 (2x6/1MB, based on the Philips CDD2600; 'i' is internal, 'e' is external, 'p' is parallel; also known as part number C4325), 7100i/e (2x6/1MB;RW, based on the Philips CDD3610; 'i' is IDE C4353A, 'e' is parallel C4358A), and 8100 (4x24/1MB;RW@2x;IDE, based on the Sony CRX100E?). The 7110 is identical to the 7100, but comes with an extra piece of software and is only available in the USA. The 7200 is a 7100 with updated firmware (2.x) and Easy CD Creator included. The 8110 is the same as the 8100 but with a bunch of extra software.
The 6020ep appears to be the external SCSI drive with a parallel-to-SCSI converter. It's usable as a SCSI device as well. The 71XXe drives are 71XXi drives with a parallel-to-IDE converter.
The initial release of the 7100/7110 was unable to create audio discs reliably with disc-at-once recording. The 2.02 firmware upgrade fixes the problem.
If you are having trouble getting the 7100e to work with your parallel port, see http://www.hp.com/isgsupport/cdr/tech/7100/par95.html for some important configuration advice. If your BIOS is configured to use address 03BCh, you should change it to 0378h or 0278h.
It appears that discs written with a 7110 can't be read on a Toshiba XM6002B. Other models of CD-ROM drives, including other Toshiba models, work fine. CD-Rs written on other CD recorders work fine with the Toshiba. The 3.01 firmware upgrade fixes this.
The HP 4020i got off to a rough start because of buggy firmware and problems with the AdvanSys SCSI controller shipped with the drive. Four firmware upgrades have been made available so far (v1.20, v1.25, v1.26, and v1.27), and most but not all problems with the firmware have been eliminated. HP recommends that users with the v1.20 or later firmware who aren't having problems should NOT get the upgrade. Contact HP tech support for more information.
The comments about digital audio extraction problems and the CDD2600 apply to the 6020i as well. Unlike the CDD2600, the 6020 apparently does not support packet writing. The firmware is not flash upgradeable. (As it happens, the SCSI ID string *can* be changed, and it *is* possible to make the unit think it's a CDD2600. A representative from Adaptec has warned that the procedure could cause problems later on, however.)
The 6020 with v1.07 firmware also has trouble reading some pressed CD-ROM discs, notably single-track CD-ROMs with less than 27MB of data.
An unofficial HP 4020i FAQ maintained by Greg Volk can be found at http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Technology/CD-R/HP-FAQ.html.
Drivers, software, and firmware upgrades are available from ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/information_storage/surestore/cd-writer/.
The 7100/7110 firmware upgrade is available here: http://www.hp.com/isgsupport/cdr/70index.html
IMPORTANT - 7100/7110. The 7100/7110 has drawn a lot of fire because it ships with DirectCD (packet-writing software), a CD Copier, and an audio CD creator. It doesn't include premastering software for data CDs. Because packet-written CDs can't be read on all operating systems or all CD-ROM drives, the inability to create plain Level 1 ISO-9660 discs is a problem for some. People who buy this drive should expect to buy additional software. The software bundled with the 7200 was more wisely chosen.
CAVEAT EMPTOR - 4020i. See the notes on the CDD2000 in the previous section. Also, the AdvanSys controller continues to cause problems for some users, which is made worse by HP's refusal to support people who try to use a different card. The best approach seems to be to try the card and stick with it if it works, otherwise buy an Adaptec board (e.g. the 1522A) and use it with that. There may be a newer rev of the AdvanSys board.
A few 4020 users have reported that, after getting lots of "-24 - Target aborted" errors with jarnold's software, they successfully resolved their problems by getting a new drive from HP.
A class-action lawsuit has been filed against HP (for the HP4020i and HP6020i) by the same people who filed the suit against Philips. See the end of section (5-1-4) for links.
See http://www.plasmon.com/products/cdformat.htm
See http://tech.plasmon.co.uk/
Models are the RF4100 (2x2/1MB+, based on the Philips CDD522 but with different firmware), CDR4220 (2x4/1MB, based on the Philips CDD2000), CDR4240 (2x4/1MB, based on the Panasonic CW-7501), CDR-4400 (2x4/512K, based on the Yamaha CDR-100), and CDR480 (4x8/1MB, based on the Panasonic CW-7502). The RF4102 is an RF4100 with more memory.
The RF4100 does not support disc-at-once recording.
See http://www.kodak.com/ [ no CD recorder info? ]
Models are the PCD200 (2x/256K), PCD225 (2x2/2MB, based on the Philips CDD522), PCD240 (2x4/1MB, based on the Philips CDD2000), and PCD600 (6x?/2MB+). All models have been discontinued (except for a recent 2x6 model??).
The Philips CDD522, Kodak PCD225, and Kodak PCD600 will interface with the Kodak Disc Transporter, which supports unattended duplication of up to 75 CD-Rs, making it a useful combo for CD-R production.
See http://www.jvcinfo.com/jvc200.html
See http://www.smartstorage.com/
See http://www.noord.bart.nl/~januzz/
See http://www.interscape.net/cdr/xrw2010.htm
Models are the XR-W1001 (1x?/64K), XR-W2001 (2x?/1MB), XR-W2010 (2x4/1MB), XRS-201 (2x2/1MB), XR-W2020 (2x6/1MB), and XR-W2042 (2x6/1MB;RW). The XR-W2010 is sometimes bundled as an XR-W2012, and the XR-W2020 sometimes appears as XR-W2022 or XR-W2626.
The drives come bundled with JVC "Personal Archiver" or "RomMaker" software. The XR-W2010 and XR-W2020 also come with "FloppyCD" packet-writing software.
JVC only provides support for drives purchased directly from them, but firmware updates can be found at ftp://ftp.jvcinfo.com/, in the directory /Pub/Firmware/XR-W2010.
If you are getting "servo tracking error", "seek error", or "track following error" messages with an XR-W2010 or XR-W2020, your drive may need to be opened up and lubricated. Step-by-step instructions for doing so are at http://www.noord.bart.nl/~januzz/howtoget.htm. If you're not quite up to that, try turning the drive off and leaving it off until right before you're ready to burn. Some units have trouble when they get warm.
Several users have reported difficulty installing the XR-W2020, but the troubles appear to stem from the SCSI card bundled with the drive rather than the drive itself.
CAVEAT EMPTOR - XR-W2010. Firmware version 1.51 has some serious flaws that can cause problems when using the drive as either a writer or a reader. The v2.05 update fixed most of the problems, but some conflicts with 3rd-party software remained, so the update was withdrawn. Until these problems are fixed, this drive should only be used with the JVC software, and should not be used as a reader. Power-cycling the unit (i.e. powering it off and back on) immediately before a write may cure some problems. For examples and some tests, see http://www.fadden.com/doc/jvc-prob.txt.
While there are a large number of people who are using these drives without problems, one person affiliated with a CD-R software company referred to the XR-W2010 as their "#1 tech support nightmare".
CAVEAT EMPTOR - XR-W2020. The mechanism appears to have the same problems with lubrication as the XR-W2010. After several months of successful use, the unit will start returning "tracking error" messages.
See http://www.pinnaclemicro.com/producta1.htm
Models are the RCD-202 (1x/64K, based on the JVC XR-W1001), RCD-1000 (2x?/1MB, based on the JVC XR-W2001), RCD-5020 (2x2/1MB), RCD-5040 (2x4/1MB, based on the JVC XR-W2010), RCD-4X4 (4x4/1MB, based on the Teac CD-R50S), and RCDW226 (2x6/1MB;RW).
The -1000, -5020, and -5040 models are flash ROM upgradeable.
RCD-1000 units shipped after Sept 1995 can do audio extraction if they have firmware v2.35 or later. An upgrade is available from their BBS.
If you are getting "servo tracking error", "seek error", or "track following error" with a 5040, see the notes in the JVC XR-W2010 section.
CAVEAT EMPTOR - all drives. Pinnacle customer support is reported to be almost nonexistent, except for some recent tech support via e-mail. Many owners of the RCD-5040 are perfectly happy with their drives (see the caveat on the JVC XR-W2010), but most of the stories about Pinnacle's product support are negative.
Pinnacle earned a bad reputation after shipping drives with buggy firmware, a poorly ventilated enclosure, and bad customer support. Some owners of the RCD-1000 have gotten the unit to work, others have given up in despair.
See http://www.ricoh.com/1cdrc.htm
See http://www.ricohcorp.com/
See http://www.ricohcpg.com/cddrive.html
See http://www.ctours.com/ricoh [ was www.microse.com then www.dataweb.nl ]
See http://mp6200.home.ml.org/ or http://www.arrakis-ttm.com/cdr/
Models are the RS-9200CD (1x/1.2MB), RO-1060C (2x2/512K), RS-1060C (2x2/512K), RS-1420C (2x4/512K+), and MP-6200 (2x6/1MB;RW; 'S' is SCSI, 'A' or 'I' is ATAPI/IDE). The MP-6200 uses a tray, the MP-6201 uses caddies and has a 2MB buffer.
The RS1060C does not support disc-at-once recording, reading of digital audio, or subcode-Q data. (One user reported that his RO1060C *could* read digital audio, but the drive took a little convincing. Another user says that it has always been supported, but not documented, so it can be done with the right software, e.g. CDDA v1.5.)
The RS-1420C is flash upgradeable (though it can be a little tricky since there are different variants of the drive, and each requires a different ROM image). It does not support packet writing. Most of the commercial versions come with a 2MB buffer (the last digit of the firmware version will be 0, 1, or 2, indicating 512K, 1MB, and 2MB, respectively).
The firmware on the flash-upgradeable MP-6200 should either be at v2.20 or later. Version 1.0 had assorted problems, version 2.0 didn't get along so well with DirectCD 2.0, and version 2.03 had some DAE issues.
Firmware upgrades are available from Tom Varghese's page listed above (arrakis-ttm.com) and http://www.ricoh.co.jp/cd-r/cgi/e-/version.html.
See http://www.pioneerusa.com/cds.html [ mass replication ]
See http://www.pioneerproduct.com/prdsoft/cdr/index.html [ PDR-05 ]
See http://www.pioneer.co.jp/ [ if you can read Japanese ]
Model is the DW-S114X (4x4/1MB). The PDR-05 is an audio CD-R recorder, described in section (5-12).
Does not support disc-at-once recording. Mainly sold in large jukebox systems.
See http://www.olympusamerica.com/digital/products/CDR2x4/CDR2x4.html
See http://www.olympusamerica.com/digital/products/cdr2x6/cdr2x6.html
Models are the CDS615E (2x2/1MB, based on the Sony CDU920S), CDS620E (2x4/1MB, based on the Sony CDU924S), and CD-R2x6 (2x6/512K, based on the Sony CDU926S??). The CD-R2 is the CDS615E in an external case. The CD-R2x4 might be the external version of the CDS620E. The CD-R2x6 probably has a name like CDS640E, but it's not listed as such on their web site.
See http://www.optimatech.com/CDR.html
See http://www.optimatech.com/CDRW.html
Models are the DisKovery 650 CD-R (2x2/1MB, based on the Sony CDU920S) the DisKovery 1300 CD-R (2x6/512K, based on the Sony CDU960S?), and the Optima CDWriter (4x6/2MB;RW@2x, based on ??).
Models are the CR-2200CS (2x4/4MB, based on the Philips CDD2000 but with different firmware), CD-2201CS (same as CR-2200CS but with 2x4/1MB), CR-2401TS (*also* based on the Philips CDD2000), CR-2600TE (2x6/1MB;IDE), CR-2801TE (2x8/512K;IDE), and CR-4801TE (4x8/2MB;IDE).
The CR-2401TS is flash upgradeable (just use Philips CDD2000 images).
CAVEAT EMPTOR - CR-2600TE and CR-2801TE. These drives do not support disc-at-once recording. Like the Sony 926 and 928 units, they claim to support track-at-once with nearly imperceptible gaps instead. Ahead's Nero can reportedly do this with the CR-2801TE.
According to the Mitsumi web site, the CR-4801TE with firmware 2.01 and later supports DAO recording.
[ DynaTek has reportedly gone out of business ]
See http://raider.dynatek.ca/optcstor/cdm.htm See http://www.dynatek.co.uk/
Models are the CDM200 (2x2/1MB), CDM240J (2x4/512K, based on the JVC XR-W2010), CDM400 (4x4/512K, based on the Yamaha CDR-100), and CDE260R (2x6/1MB;RW, based on the Ricoh 6200S). Older CDM240 units were based on the Yamaha CDR-102. Since the Yamaha CDR-100 is no longer being made, chances are the CDM400 is now a different unit as well.
They also sell the CDM4000, which is a stand-alone CD burner.
See http://www.microboards.com/
Models are the PlayWrite 2000 (2x2/1MB, based on the Sony CDU920S), PlayWrite 2040 (2x4/512K+), PlayWrite 4000 (4x4/512K, based on the Yamaha CDR-100), PlayWrite 4001RW (4x6/2MB;RW@2x;IDE, based on the Yamaha CDR4001t), and PlayWrite 2060R (2x6/1MB;RW, based on the Ricoh 6200S).
See http://www.mdi.com/mdinofr/products/cdwriter.htm
Model is the Express Writer. There's no apparent model numbers. They used to sell the "old one" (2x2/1MB, based on a Pinnacle (i.e. JVC) drive), now they sell the "new one" (2x4/?).
See http://www.micronet.com/HTDOCS/products.html#cdr
Models are the MasterCD Plus 4x4 (4x4/512K, based on the Yamaha CDR-100), MasterCD Plus 4x6 (4x6/2MB, based on the Yamaha CDR-400), and MasterCD Plus 4x12 (4x12/1MB, based on the Teac CD-R55S).
See http://www.procom.com/homepage/wbhrcdrs.html
Model is the PCDR-4X (4x4/512K, based on the Yamaha CDR-100).
See http://www.grundig.com/ [mostly in German]
Model is the CDR100IPW (2x4/1MB, based on the Philips CDD2000).
See http://www.plextor.com/cdr.htm
See http://www.plextor.com/cdr412.htm
Models are the PlexWriter PX-R24CS (2x4/512K, a cousin of the Ricoh 1420C) and PlexWriter "4/12max" PX-R412C (4x12/2MB; 'i' is internal, 'e' is external).
The PX-R24CS is flash upgradeable. The PX-R412C supports packet writing.
Users having trouble with the PX-R412C should try turning synchronous transfer off for that drive.
See http://www.panasonic.com/ [ no CD-R info? ]
See http://www.acscdr.com/4x8x.htm
See http://cw-7502.home.ml.org/
Models are the CW-7501 (2x4/1MB) and CW-7502 (4x8/1MB). Panasonic is part of Matsushita, so the units may also be sold under the Matsushita label.
The CW-7501 and CW-7502 are flash-upgradeable. The CW-7501 should be at 2.0 or greater, and the CW-7502 should be at v3.05 or later. Upgrades are available from http://www.acscompro.com/ (click on "Support").
NOTE: there is a known conflict with the Diamond FirePort 40 and the Panasonic CW-7502 CD-R drive. You should upgrade the 7502 firmware to the latest (http://www.acscompro.com/support/cdr.htm), upgrade your FirePort 40 drivers (http://www.diamondmm.com/products/drivers/fireport.html), and add "DisableAutoReqSense=1;do_SCAM=0;" to the FirePort driver (go into the Win95 device settings, select the host adapter, click on Properties, and select the Settings tab).
This problem may affect other NCR/Symbios Logic-based SCSI cards as well. Falling back to the original (1.01) NCR SCSI drivers that come with Win95 should fix the problem.
See http://www.teac.com/dsp/cdrec/cdrec.html
See http://www.teac.co.jp/dspd/product/cdr.htm
Models are the CD-R50S (4x4/1MB) and CD-R55S (4x12/1MB).
Apparently the CD-R50S needs to be at firmware 1.0E or later to do quad-speed writing reliably. Power calibration is done via a lookup table rather than adjusted dynamically, so a flash upgrade may be required before some brands of media will work.
The CD-R50S and CD-R55S appear to use the same command set as the JVC XR-W2010.
Upgrades for the CD-R50S and CD-R55S are at ftp://nemus.teac.de/. You can also go to http://www.teac.co.jp/dspd/product/cdr/updater.htm for a nice HTML page about the CD-R55S upgrade.
See http://www.wpinet.com.sg/
See http://mars.asiabiz.com.sg/~whwang/
Models are the CDR-432 (2x4/1MB, based on the Philips CDD2000), CD-R 622 (2x6/1MB;IDE), CD-R 632P (2x6/1MB, based on the Philips CDD2600), and CDRW-622 (2x6/1MB;RW;IDE).
The CDRW-622 supports packet writing, and is flash upgradeable.
See http://www.tbeach.com/products/tbs2040r.htm
Model is the 2040R (2x4/512K, based on the Ricoh RS-1420C).
Many users have had trouble installing the AdvanSys SCSI card that is bundled with this unit. Most of the problems can be corrected by enabling PnP installation, which is disabled by default.
See http://www.creaf.com/wwwnew/tech/spec/cdrom/2000.html
Models are the CDR2000 (2x2/512K, based on the Ricoh RS1060C) and CDR4210 (2x4/1MB, based on the Panasonic CW-7501).
See ?
Model is the EW-50 (2x4/?).
See http://www.memorex.com/html/mp_peripherals.html
Models are the CR-622 (2x6/1MB;IDE, based on the Wearnes CD-R 622), CRW-1622 (2x6/1MB;RW;IDE, based on the Wearnes CDRW-622), and CRW-2642 (4x6;RW@2x;IDE).
The CRW-1622 supports packet writing, and is flash upgradeable.
Assorted models, based on different units depending on which box you get (Wearnes, Ricoh, Philips, JVC, Mitsumi, and possibly others have been found inside).
See http://www.hanny-magnetics-europe.com/products/
Models are the CR-622 (2x6/1MB;IDE, based on the Wearnes CD-R 622), CRW-1420C (2x6/512K, based on the Ricoh 1420C??), and CRW-1622 (2x6/1MB;RW;IDE, based on the Wearnes CDRW-622).
The CR-622 does not support disc-at-once recording.
The CRW-1622 often comes bundled with NTI's software. Upgrading to the current version (http://www.ntius.com/) is an important first step.
Models are the CDR4120 (4x12/1MB, based on the Teac CD-R55S), CDRW2260 "Pro" (2x6/1MB;RW, based on the Yamaha CRW-2260), CDRW2260 "Plus" (2x6/1MB;RW;IDE, based on the Philips CDD-3610?), and CDRW-4260 "Pro" (4x6/2MB;RW@2x, based on the Yamaha CRW-4260).
See http://www.acerperipherals.com/ps_storage/ps_st_6206a.htm
Model is the CDW 6206A (2x6/512K;RW;IDE).
The 6206A is flash upgradeable.
Models are the WT4046 (6x4/2MB;RW@2x;"EI" model is IDE), WT2036 (6x2/1MB;RW;"EI" model is IDE), WT412 (4x12/1MB), and WT48 (4x8/1MB).
Model is the BCE62IE (6x2/1MB;RW;IDE, based on the Philips CDD3610??). The BCE62IPE is the BCE62IE with a parallel-port IDE converter.
The MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures) on these drives is typically 25,000 to 50,000 hours, and they come with a 1 year warranty. Compare that to hard drives rated at between 500,000 and 1,000,000 hours with a 3 or 5 year warranty and that should give you some idea.
Most of the drives available weren't meant for mass production; notable exceptions are the venerable Philips CDD 522, Kodak PCD 600, and Sony CDW-900E.
Incidentally, MTBF is not an estimate of how long the drive will last. Rather, it's an estimate of the failure rate of the drives during the expected lifetime of the device. Once you exceed the expected lifetime, which is often on the order of a couple of years, the anticipated failure rate increases. If you have new drives with an MTBF of 25,000 hours, and you run 1000 units for 100 hours, you can expect to see four of them fail. It does NOT mean you can expect them to run for 2.8 years and then all fail at once.
If you're about to buy a computer system and are seriously thinking about buying a CD-R, here are some things to keep in mind. (See the next section if you're interested in Mac hardware instead of an IBM PC.)
CPU: buy a Pentium, the faster the better. This is true in general, since systems tend to be outdated after a year and obsolete after three or four. A '486 is a *minimum* configuration for a CD-R system; a Pentium gives you some breathing room. PentiumPro or Pentium II is overdoing it, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.
Motherboard: get one with PCI slots. Not only can PCI cards move data more quickly, they're much easier to configure.
IDE: whatever comes on your motherboard will work. See section (5-15) for configuration notes and a warning about certain bus-mastering drivers.
SCSI: the SCSI interface remains a popular choice for CD recorders and CD-ROM drives. Whether it's built into the motherboard or on a separate card, make sure the host adapter supports ASPI and ASPI for Windows (see section (5-7)). Don't bother with Wide SCSI unless you're planning to buy a disk array or fancy devices - most 7200rpm drives don't exceed the limits of 8-bit Fast SCSI anyway. Bus mastering SCSI cards are preferred over non-bus-mastering cards (they can move data to and from system memory directly, without the CPU's involvement, making things faster).
Parallel: some vendors are selling parallel-port CD-R drives. You should have an EPP-enabled parallel port (if you have a Pentium or better, chances are you have one).
Sound: the Creative Labs SB16 and AWE32 boards are widely supported and very popular, but if you're thinking seriously about recording sound through it, you'll want to consider alternatives. See sections (3-12) and (3-13) for other options.
Hard drive: needs to be reasonably fast, and large enough to hold whatever data you plan to put on a CD. IDE hard drives work fine. See section (5-6) for more details.
Video card and monitor: depends on what you want to do. A PCI-based video card is a good idea (though more expensive than an ISA-based card), and a 15" or 17" monitor will work fine for most applications. If you're planning on creating multimedia products, you'll want a PCI video card with 4MB of {D,V,W,SD,SG}RAM and a good 17" or 20" monitor.
CD-ROM: you may want a SCSI CD-ROM rather than an IDE one. See section (5-5).
Any Mac of Quadra 700 or higher capability with a reasonably fast disk should be suitable for 2x writing. All PowerMac-class machines, and probably most Mac clones, should work fine. PowerBook users should proceed with caution on machines earlier than the 3400 and G3 models.
Any of the SCSI recorders should work. Verify with the vendor of the software you plan to use that the drive you have in mind is supported. Don't try to use an IDE drive on the Mac (some Macs have internal IDE hard drives, but none of the software supports a CD recorder connected to that interface).
Block-by-block copies are the best way to create discs. If your pre- mastering software has to assemble files and build an ISO filesystem on the fly, you will need a high-end PowerMac. The above hardware may still be suitable for on-the-fly mastering, but as a general case, building a prototype image to a disk or disk partition will be safer.
Using the "simulated cut" feature available on Toast and other software is also prudent. Make sure you turn off file sharing before you start a burn, or things will fail if it tries to read a file that's already open. You may also have trouble writing from the boot/system volume, since it will always have files open.
(Macintoshes - especially 68K and low-end PowerMacs - have lousy I/O, notably in the filesystem and network. Fortunately, the lack of preemptive multitasking in System 7 and earlier kept things flowing at a constant rate. As an additional bonus, most internal Mac CD-ROM drives can do digital audio extraction with the appropriate software.)
The good news for Mac owners is that the hardware and software configuration for CD-R usually goes in typical Mac fashion: without a hitch.
Besides the obvious question - can it read CD-R discs that you create - there's also the question of how well the drive works as the source device when copying discs. To be more specific:
The Panasonic 12x IDE and Panasonic CR585 24x IDE have been recommended several times, as has the Teac CD516S.
The CDDA FAQ (http://www.tardis.ed.ac.uk/~psyche/cdda/) lists some drives that work well for DAE. A nice chart with info on 24x-32x IDE drives is posted on http://users.plinet.com/~burval/idecdrom/index.html.
NEC models tend to hog the SCSI bus. Older NEC models (especially the NEC 3x), some Mitsumi models, and some Acer models (e.g. Acer 8x) may have trouble reading CD-Rs.
Some IDE CD-ROM drives can be used for direct CD-to-CD copies with some programs (e.g. Adaptec CD-Creator 2 and WinOnCD). It's the same story as with digital audio extraction: some drives work, some don't, and the ones that do don't work with all available software. The Teac 8x has been mentioned as working with CD Creator for CD-to-CD copies of data discs.
There is one hard and fast rule for direct CD-to-CD duplication: the source drive must be faster than the target drive (e.g. source 4x if target is 2x, source 6x if target is 4x).
A performance test on some mid-range models can be found at: http://www.pcmag.com/features/cdrom/cd-test.htm
A quick summary of features for several models can be found at: http://www.fwb.com/ts/cdt/cdt_support.html
There is a fair amount of confusion over what exactly is an "AV drive". A brief discussion is presented here; for more information see Bertel Schmitt's article at http://www.fadden.com/doc/avdrive.txt.
The most important issue is thermal recalibration. Your basic hard drive will pause for up to half a second (or even up to a full second, depending on who you believe) every so often to adjust the head positioning to the current operating temperature. For most applications this goes unnoticed, but when recording a CD-R you must write the current track to completion without interruption. AV drives deal with the problem in a way that doesn't disrupt the disk activity.
A drive that does a quick thermal recalibration is acceptable if the system is otherwise fast enough or the buffer in the CD-R unit or in the recording software is large enough (early drives had only 64KB, while current drives have 512KB or 1MB, making it much less of an issue). You need to be sure that the recorder's write buffer won't empty during the recal period, or you'll end up with a buffer underrun.
If your recorder's buffer is less than 512KB, or you're planning to record at 4x or greater, you should seriously consider an AV drive. Otherwise, it probably won't matter. Also, don't believe everything you hear from a salesman -- verify with the manufacturer that the drive model is AV-rated.
What separates a Seagate Barracuda from a Seagate Barracuda AV is that the latter is tuned for AV performance. This is simply a software change that affects cache allocation algorithms, error correction, and other SCSI parameters that may will give better performance for transfers of large blocks of contiguous data. These sorts of optimizations are more important for digital video (which runs at a few MB/sec) than CD recording (which is only 600K/sec at 4x).
If you think AV optimizations will help you, you should take a look at "Dr. SCSI" at http://www.scsitools.com/. It will help you do the same optimizations that the AV drive sellers do, for a price that's about equal to the difference between a standard drive and an AV drive.
It's not necessary to use a SCSI hard drive. In most cases IDE will work just fine.
On a separate but related issue, all reports from people burning CDs from Win95 OSR2 FAT-32 filesystems have been positive.
This section only applies to PC users who aren't interested in an IDE recorder. Macs and most non-PC-based UNIX systems have SCSI built in.
Using different SCSI adapters for the HD and the CD recorder used to be recommended, but may not be necessary with non-ISA adapters. If your recorder hogs the SCSI bus the HD may not be able to keep the write buffer full. Under some operating systems, particularly OS/2, devices that support SCSI disconnect will work better than those that don't.
In general, the faster the better. PCI or VLB is better than ISA, and the board should support (and have enabled) SCSI disconnect. It is *not* necessary to use Wide SCSI on any component. The speed requirements for CD-R, not to mention the maximum throughput of most hard drives, are easily met by "narrow" SCSI.
You should enable synchronous transfers for devices that support it. Most CD recorders should. If the device doesn't work with it on, turn it off and try again.
The adapter MUST support the ASPI standard (ASPI provides an interface between software and the SCSI controller) for both DOS and Windows.
For some tips on cabling and termination, see Bertel Schmitt's article at http://www.fadden.com/doc/scsi-trm.txt.
The next few sections detail some specific cards. There are many others.
These are all ISA controllers, good for putting a CD recorder on, not so good for putting a hard drive or fast CD-ROM drive on. If you have an IDE-based system and just want a SCSI card for driving your CD recorder and maybe a scanner or tape drive, any of these (as well as any of the variations of these) will work fine.
See http://www.adaptec.com/
See http://www.adaptec.com/products/datasheets/specs/
The Adaptec 2940 (PCI) is a popular choice -- if not *the* most popular choice -- though some users have reported problems with the Adaptec 2840 (VLB). See the README that comes with Adaptec EZ-SCSI v4.0 and later for some important performance tests you can do with SCSIBench.
If you're having trouble writing CD-Rs with the 2940UW, go into the configuration menu (hit Ctrl-A while booting) and make sure the drive is set for 10MB/sec with Wide Negotiation disabled.
What are the differences between the 2910, 2920, and 2940? The web pages say they're all PCI bus-mastering cards. Bigger numbers apparently mean faster and better, though some have suggested that the 2910 is better than the 2920, and at a lower price (but that might only apply to the 2920A and 2920B, not the 2920C... yes, it's a mess). Only the 2940 supports booting the PC off of a CD-ROM, however.
The ASUS SC-200 is one example of an NCR/Symbios Logic 810-based card (in this case, the NCR 53C810). Such cards offer solid performance at a reasonable price, and may be a better choice than the Adaptec cards for many users. (Be sure to examine these types of cards closely though; the least expensive among them are only meant to work with a motherboard BIOS that supports SCSI.)
The ASUS SC-875, based on the 53C875 chip, offers Wide SCSI connectors as well.
High-performance SCSI cards based around Symbios Logic SCSI controller chips. Both cards offer high performance and compete directly with the Adaptec 2940 series. The FirePort 20 and 40 are based on the SYM53C875, and the FirePort 40 Dual is based on the SYM53C876.
A list of compatibility-tested hardware is available from the web site.
You can, but it's not clear that you'd want to. The seek times tend to be slower than a standard CD-ROM drive because the head assembly is heavier. There's also not much need for rapid seeks when writing a disc, so there's little reason for manufacturers to try to optimize this. Some users have reported jerky video playback on a CD-R drive.
The MTBF on CD-R units tends to be low, so it may be wise to use a different drive for general use to preserve the life of the CD-R, especially if you have a tray model.
In addition, if you're using Win95, some CD-R devices don't show up as readers without additional drivers, or (for SCSI drives) show up as 8 separate LUNs (Logical UNits, useful for CD jukeboxes). The reason why many recorders, especially older ones, don't show up by default is because they're classified as "type 4" SCSI-2 devices, which is used to indicate write-once devices. Standard CD-ROM drives are "type 5".
HP and Philips supply drivers for their units, Corel supplies several for different devices, and the Sony 920S works as-is. If you have Adaptec Easy-CD Pro 95, you can get a patch from Adaptec at ftp://ftp.adaptec.com/pub/BBS/win95/cdr4up.exe that will allow many type 4 drives, including the Yamaha CDR-100/102 and JVC XR-W2010, to appear as CD-ROM drives. (As it happens, the patch works even if you have the free Easy-CD demo, available from the Adaptec web site.)
If you don't have the drivers, you can still get it to work by loading the real-mode drivers like this (example is for an Adaptec 2940):
In Config.sys:
DEVICEHIGH=C:\SCSI\ASPI8DOS.SYS /DIn Autoexec.bat:
DEVICEHIGH=C:\SCSI\ASPICD.SYS /D:ASPICD0
LH C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\MSCDEX.EXE /D:ASPICD0 /M:12Incidentally, to *remove* the Adaptec cdr4up driver, you should remove the file "CDR4VSD.VXD" from \Windows\System\Iosubsys, and reboot.
For IDE recorders, you need a more specific driver. The manufacturer's
web page likely has a link.
This is a general CD-ROM question rather than a CD-R question, but since some of the newer recorders are available in either configuration it seems worthwhile to address it here.
The advantage of a tray is convenience. If you want to put a CD in the drive, you can just drop it in, instead of buying a pile of caddies and hunting for a free one.
The advantage of a caddy is durability. CDs are less likely to be scratched if they're put into a caddy and left there (VERY important if you have children), and the internal mechanism is less likely to collect dust. The tray units usually have a worse MTBF rating, because they have more moving parts.
There have been reports that, at 12x and higher, some CDs will cause loud vibrations in tray models, but work fine in caddy models. Not everyone has had this problem though.
It used to be the case that you had to get a caddy drive if you wanted to mount it sideways, but many tray models have tabs that will hold the CD in place. Having to use the tabs does reduce the convenience normally offered by a tray model.
Which you should choose depends on your needs and circumstances. If you are planning to write to a disc several times (multisession, packet writing, or anything with CD-RW), you are better off with the disc in a caddy.
With a little extra care, yes. For a Jaz drive, defragmenting the drive right before starting a burn seems to be the key to success. It's also very important to ensure that nothing else is trying to access the drive while the write is underway.
One user reported being able to write at 1x from a DAT tape drive using Seagate's Direct Tape Access, but this isn't recommended. Copying the data to a hard drive and doing the burn from there is much more likely to succeed.
There are no known instances of successful CD-R burns using punched card readers as the source device.
Doing a test run is strongly recommended when using any of these devices.
OPC stands for Optimum Power Control. Most CD-R units do a power calibration test before writing to adjust the laser power to the correct strength. Different brands of media require slightly different power levels.
Running OPC goes a step farther by actively monitoring the write process and adjusting the laser power as needed. If the writer encounters dust or fingerprints, the laser power can be increased to burn through the obstacles. This is especially useful for discs that are moved around between recording sessions, such as CD-RW discs or multisession CD-Rs.
For more information, see http://www2.osta.org/osta/html/opc.html.
Audio CD-R/CD-RW recorders are similar to computer CD-Rs, except that they're intended to be part of a recording system rather than attached to a Mac or PC. They have audio inputs and front-panel controls like you'd find on a tape deck. They are usually more expensive than CD-Rs meant for computers. Some CD-Rs have both audio and SCSI-II interfaces.
There are two classes of audio CD-R, consumer and professional. The units targeted at consumers require special audio blanks, and employ SCMS (Serial Copy Management System) to prevent making copies from a copy. The audio blanks used to be 4x to 5x the cost of computer CD-R blanks and only held 60 minutes of audio, but 74-minute "Consumer Audio" blanks are now available for moderately more than regular CD-R blanks.
The "professional" units use regular CD-R blanks and don't obey SCMS, and generally have a wider set of features and input/output connectors.
If you already have a computer, it's probably cheaper to buy a computer CD-R and a good sound card or digital transfer card (see sections (3-12) and (3-13) for more info). The ability to edit the sound on a computer before writing a CD can be very useful. However, there are some advantages to using an audio CD-R (not all features are present on all models):
(Incidentally, the difference in price for the audio CD-R blanks is due to licensing agreements and volume. The manufacturer pays a royalty to a studio consortium under the assumption that everything recorded to an audio CD-R is pirated material. The technology is identical; the "audio" discs just have a mark that says a royalty has been paid.)
It is theoretically possible to convince a "consumer" audio CD recorder to accept regular blanks, but in practice this would require replacing the firmware chip. If somebody has figured out how to do this, they've been quiet about it. With the Philips 870, it may be possible to trick the recorder by manually opening the drive door and replacing the disc right before recording.
Examples of "consumer" audio CD-R units are the Pioneer PDR-04 and
PDR-05 (http://www.pioneerproduct.com/prdsoft/cdr/index.html).
Marantz makes professional-grade CD-R units, e.g. the CDR615 and CDR620. See http://www-us.philips.com/marantz/product/professional/cdrecorder/.
Philips sells the CDR870 and CDR880 (based on the CDD3600), which support both CD-R and CD-RW media. http://www-us.sv.philips.com/sound/cr.html. If you're interested in the Philips CDR765, a consumer-grade dual CD deck, visit http://members.tripod.com/~charleswolff/cdr765.html.
HHB sells a "professional" unit, the CDR880. http://www.hhb.co.uk/.
Some SCSI cards on PC or UNIX systems will display a list of attached devices when the system boots. There's usually a column with a version number in it.
On a PC running Win95, go into the Device Manager (either from the Control Panels or by asking for Properties on My Computer), and find the CD-ROM drives in the device tree. Select the CD-R drive, hit the "Properties" button, and then click on the "Settings" Tab of the window that opens. Look for "Firmware Revision".
Mac users with Toast can hit Command-R to display the information. If your software doesn't have such a feature, you will need to run SCSI Tools to check the identification string.
By all accounts, they work just fine. Some people have argued that IDE CD-Rs are easier to install than SCSI. The only significant limitation at this time is that a wider variety of software is available for SCSI drives, but that's changing.
There were some concerns about whether or not a CD-to-CD copy would be reliable if the source CD-ROM drive and target CD-R drive are both IDE. The concern was that the increased CPU and bus utilization associated with IDE would cause buffer underruns. So far, all reports indicate that the concerns were unfounded.
Parallel-port drives require an ECP/EPP parallel port, which most (all?) machines have. Some BIOSs allow you to switch between ECP/EPP and "standard" mode; if you're having trouble, be sure it's set correctly.
Some people who have bought off-the-shelf parallel-to-IDE converters have found that writing at 4x doesn't work very well. This may account for why all drives that ship with parallel port support are 2x writers.
You want the hard drives and CD-ROM drives on different channels, or the slow CD-ROM drive will affect the performance of the hard drive. A typical configuration looks like this:
Keep the cables as short as you can. Sometimes the longer (60cm) cables will work fine with one drive but start having integrity problems when two devices are attached.
NOTE: the Intel PIIX Bus Mastering IDE driver may interfere with the ability to write to a disc. Typical symptom is a system hang when writing or test-writing to a disc. An uninstaller can be found at http://developer.intel.com/design/pcisets/busmastr/FAQs.htm#faq3e. The Adaptec page http://www.adaptec.com/support/configuration/cdrecide.html also describes the problem.
The ASPI (Advanced SCSI Programmer's Interface) layer is used during CD recording, even for IDE recorders. Take a look at Adaptec's FAQ on the subject, and grab a copy of ASPICHK while you're at it from http://www.adaptec.com/support/faqs/aspilayer.html. The original Win95A/B WinASPI may have problems with IDE recorders.
It depends on what you're doing. With the cost of CD-R discs dropping through the floor, there's less of an incentive to burn a test disc first. At prices around US$1.00 per disc, the extra time needed to do two full burns isn't worthwhile unless you're really tight for money. Besides, CD-RW discs aren't readable on many older CD-ROM and audio CD players.
The manual for Easy CD Creator Deluxe says that CD-RW discs are "more cost effective for near-line data storage requirements than CD-R." The definition of near-line storage puts it somewhere between online storage and offline storage.
On the other hand, if you're expecting to use packet writing to treat the disc as a big floppy, it may be useful. You should consider other forms of media for such purposes though, such as Jaz drives, which are faster and hold more, but are slightly harder to find readers for (but only slightly: CD-RW discs aren't readable on all drives, and packet-written discs may not be readable under some operating systems).
Software developers who need to create test CDs frequently will find CD-RW invaluable.
If you don't mind spending the extra money for CD-RW, it may come in handy, but if you're concerned about the cost of the recorder, chances are you won't miss CD-RW if you don't have it.
Historically, each manufacturer of CD recorders used a different command set, and perhaps even altered the commands with each new recorder. This has placed a significant burden on CD-R software authors, who have to write new drivers for each new device.
MMC (Multi Media Command) compliant recorders use a common command set. Programs that can write to one MMC-compliant recorder should be able to write to all others, and consumers should be able to use their choice of software without the long delays usually associated with the introduction of new hardware.
The Plextor PX-R412C is one example of a recorder advertising MMC compliance. Check the spec sheets for recorders you are interested in.
Draft proposals for the MMC-1 and MMC-2 standards can be obtained from ftp://ftp.symbios.com/pub/standards/io/t10/drafts/.
DOS, Win31, Win95, and WinNT all work well, though some recorders are more difficult to configure for Win95 and WinNT than others.
Mac System 7.x works well, as should 8.x. UNIX variants (notably FreeBSD and Linux) work, but there aren't as many people using them to create CD-Rs as there are on other platforms.
If you're interested in burning CDs with long Win95 filenames, be sure to get a software package that supports Joliet (see section (3-5-4)). Otherwise all filenames get mashed down to 8+3.
EMedia Professional has an index of CD-R hardware and software versions, with a different category featured each month. Take a look at http://www.emediapro.net/AprEM/news4.html#index for an example.
Generally speaking, you get what you pay for; the more expensive software has more features. However, this isn't always the case, and the software with more features isn't necessarily more reliable.
There's little standardization among CD-R drive manufacturers, so not all devices are supported by all programs.
If you're new to CD-R, on the PC start with Easy CD Creator 3 Deluxe. If you just want to "back up" discs, or you want a lot of flexbility when creating audio CDs, go with CDRWIN. On the Mac, go with Toast. If you want to write to a disc like a floppy, try DirectCD (listed with the packet writing software in section (6-3)).
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT)
See http://www.adaptec.com/cdrec/
The software was developed by a company called Incat, which was purchased by Adaptec in 1995.
Easy-CD Pro has been superseded by Adaptec's Easy CD Creator.
Easy-CD Pro 95 v1.2 seems to have trouble writing umlauts and other non-ASCII characters in Joliet mode. Romeo format will work, but the files will only be accessible from Win95 and WinNT.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT3.x)
See http://www.corel.com/
See http://www.corel.com/support/web/pages/downfile.htm [upgrades]
See http://www.adaptec.com/support/overview/cdc1n2.html
The software was developed by Corel, and published by them until it was purchased by Adaptec in mid-1996.
CD Creator has been superseded by Adaptec's Easy CD Creator.
The package includes drivers that allow several popular CD-R drives to be used as general-purpose CD readers under Win95. It can also create VideoCD and PhotoCD discs.
Version 2.x is a considerable improvement over version 1.x. Versions older than 2.01.079 had some problems inserting "knacks" into audio CDs.
Platforms supported: DOS, Windows (3.1, 95, NT), OS/2, UNIX, Mac
See http://www.elektroson.com/
This is bundled with some drives. Does not support Joliet (important for long Win95 filenames).
Versions older than 4.0 should be upgraded. A number of bugs have been fixed (e.g. one user found that v3.3 left clicks on audio CDs, another was unable to use it with Adaptec EZ-SCSI v4.0d or later).
Platforms supported: Mac
See http://www.adaptec.com/cdrec/
The software was developed by Miles GmbH and published by Astarte until Miles was purchased by Adaptec in early 1997.
This program is recommended for making Mac/PC hybrids, and is the most popular package for the Mac. It supports HFS, ISO-9660, and Joliet. At one time it was sold by an OEM as "CD-It All".
The "Toast DVD" upgrade enables creation of DVD-Video and DVD-ROM.
Software updates are available on the web site.
Platforms supported: Windows
See http://www.cequadrat.com/
WinOnCD is the full version. WinOnCD ToGo is a "lite" version that comes bundled with some drives.
Can create VideoCD discs and bootable CD-ROMs. Has very fast virtual CD creation.
Platforms supported: Windows
See http://www.ymi.com/
See also "CD Studio" for UNIX and WinNT on the web site, and some specialized solutions for things like recording over Novell networks and working with CD-R jukeboxes.
Platforms supported: DOS, Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.goldenhawk.com/
See http://www.cd-brennen.de/ (german distributor)
(CDRWIN is the name of the Win95 version. I don't believe the DOS versions have an official name.)
Contains sophisticated CD-ROM duplication programs, track-at-once and disc-at-once utilities for sound and data, and other goodies. Some of the DOS-based software is free, the rest is relatively inexpensive.
This comes highly recommended for creating audio CDs, because it gives you a great deal of control over the creation process. Updates for the software are available on the net.
The "vcache" tweak from section (4-1-2) is strongly recommended for users of CDRWIN to avoid buffer underruns.
If you use a Yamaha 200/400 and get "Logical Unit Not Ready" errors, try disabling the data caching.
A cue sheet editor is available in section (6-2-7).
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT), Mac
See http://www.microtest.com/html/optical_media.html
[ product has been discontinued ]
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT), UNIX
See http://www.cdr1.com/ (a/k/a http://www.hycd.com/)
Can create Mac/PC/UNIX hybrid CDs (i.e. CDs that work on all three platforms), as well as bootable CDs for PCs and UNIX. If you need a CD that works (and looks good) on Win95, MacOS, and UNIX, this is the program for you.
The Solaris version should be available through Sun's Catalyst program; see http://www.sun.com/sunsoft/catlink/cdr/cdrpub.htm.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT), UNIX
Sources at ftp://tsx-11.mit.edu/pub/linux/packages/mkisofs/mkisofs-1.11.tar.gz
This allows creation of a prototype ISO-9660 filesystem on disk or tape, which can then be copied to a CDR. It supports the Rock Ridge extensions, and can be configured to ignore certain facets of the ISO standard (like maximum directory depth). Newer versions support multisession and bootable discs.
This can be used in conjunction with "cdwrite" or "cdrecord" to write discs under UNIX. For other platforms, chances are good that your favorite CD recording application is able to write ISO-9660 images.
Poke around on http://www.users.fast.net/~rodsmith/rhjol.html for a link to the Win32 executable.
See http://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/CD-Writing-HOWTO for a "HOWTO" guide on writing CDs under Linux.
See http://lidar.ssec.wisc.edu/~forrest/ for a copy of "cdwrite" patched for use with SGI, and ftp://viz.tamu.edu/pub/sgi/hardware/cdrom/cd-writers for the FAQ on SGI CD writing.
Early releases of the next version of mkisofs can create images with both Joliet and Rock Ridge extensions.
Platforms supported: Amiga
See http://www.asimware.com/ (demo available)
Your basic CD-R mastering package for the Amiga.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.ntius.com/ (demo available)
CD creation and duplication software. Reportedly works very well on otherwise difficult discs.
They also make "CDR Explorer", free CD-R creation software that works like Win95 Explorer. It's available at their web site.
Platforms supported: OS/2
See http://www.cirunite.com/ (demo available)
Drag-and-drop CD creation, written specifically for OS/2. Allows creation of CDs with an HPFS (OS/2) filesystem.
[ product has been discontinued? ]
Platforms supported: Windows
See http://hohnermidia.com/proaudio.html
Windows-based CD-R software that has some nice features for creating audio discs, including the ability to edit the P-Q subcode data.
The "rrdemo.zip" on the web site is actually a demo of Samplitude Master from SEK´D Software. Samplitude Master is a fancy audio editing program that - among other things - allows you to create ISO images suitable for writing to a CD-R, but the demo package doesn't include software to do the actual writing (the full package includes PoINT CDaudio).
Platforms supported: DOS
See http://www.dataware.com/site/prodserv/cd_rom.htm
See http://www.dataware.de/untern/index.html
CD creation software aimed at the corporate user. Comes with libraries for creating custom applications.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95)
See http://www.creamware.com/
A hardware and software combo for professional-quality sound editing, this now includes an audio CD creation tool.
Platforms supported: DOS
See http://www.microtech.com/product/mmaker/
Pre-mastering software that supports the Rock Ridge extensions. The free demo creates ISO-9660 disc images.
Platforms supported: Amiga
See http://makecd.core.de/
CD-R creation software that supports the "AS" extensions (which preserve the Amiga protection bits and file comments).
You need AmiCDFS, CacheCDFS, AsimCDFS, or something similar to make use of the "AS" extensions. AmiCDFS is available from http://ftp.uni-paderborn.de/aminet/dirs/disk_cdrom.html. Look for amicdfs*.lha, where '*' is a version number.
Platforms supported: Mac
See http://www.microtest.com/html/optical_media.html
[ product has been discontinued ]
Platforms supported: UNIX (several variants)
See ftp://ftp.fokus.gmd.de/pub/unix/cdrecord
A collection of freeware software and drivers for burning CDs under UNIX. The current version supports SunOS, Solaris, Linux, NetBSD, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, SGI-IRIX and HP-UX.
Works best in conjunction with mkisofs (which should be available from the same site).
Now supports DVD-R as well.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.prassi.com/
CD mastering bundled with SCSI Rep, which allows you to write to more than one SCSI CD-R at once. See also section (3-17).
A review can be found at http://www.emediapro.net/awards/award8.html.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95)
See http://www.home.aone.net.au/nero/ (free beta version available)
Full-featured audio CD creation.
Platforms supported: Amiga
See http://www.giga.or.at/nih/cdtools.html
Free CD writing tools, with source code.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95)
See http://www.pointsoft.de/
Full-featured CD recording.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95)
See http://www.pointsoft.de/
Creates audio CDs, with full control over P/Q subcodes.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.adaptec.com/cdrec/
Adaptec's all-singing, all-dancing combination of Easy CD Pro and CD Creator. Combines the best features of both and costs less, including the ability to create PhotoCDs, VideoCDs, and jewel case inserts. Also includes some new features, including an application called "Spin Doctor" that helps convert from old LPs to CD.
The write buffer management is reported to be so robust that some testers were able to defragment their hard drive while writing a CD.
ECDC up to v3.5a has a "two-second truncation" problem, where extracted audio tracks end up missing two seconds. This doesn't happen for every system or every disc, but is 100% reproducible in situations where it arises. Version 3.01d fixed the problem for some users but not others. See also http://www.adaptec.com/support/faqs/ecdc35adae.html.
One other note: CD Copier Deluxe does *not* do disc-at-once recording when copying from disc-to-disc (the web site is right, the manual is wrong), but ECDC itself does. If you want to make a disc-to-disc copy with disc-at-once recording, you should set up ECDC to copy the disc without buffering to the hard drive. ECDC will refuse to use DAO if your writer doesn't support it reliably or the source drive is too slow.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.padus.com/ (demo available)
Allows you to write to more than one SCSI CD-R at a time. See also section (3-17).
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT)
See http://www.ahead.de/ (demo available)
Full-featured CD creation and duplication. Supports the "variable-gap track-at-once" feature of the Sony 926S.
Comes with "MultiMounter", which appears to be similar to Adaptec's "Session Selector".
NOTE: Nero may not work correctly if DirectCD is installed. You may need to uninstall DirectCD to get Nero to work.
Platforms supported: Mac
See http://www.charismac.com/html/discribe.html
CD creation for the Mac. Supports creation of hybrid CDs.
Platform supported: VMS (VAX, Alpha) See http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Technology/CD-R/vms.html
Construct CD-ROMs under VMS.
Platforms supported: Windows (95), OS/2
See http://www.rsj.de/us/default.htm
CD writing with support for ISO-9660, Joliet, and Rock Ridge extensions.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT), UNIX
See http://www.ge.ucl.ac.uk/~jcpearso/mkhybrid.html
This is a mkisofs variant that creates discs in ISO-9660 format with Joliet, Rock Ridge, and HFS extensions. HFS files can be encoded as an HFS "hybrid" or using Apple's ISO-9660 extensions.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT), Mac
See http://www.jvcinfo.com/archiver.html
See http://www.jvc-victor.co.jp/english/cdr/cdrext-e.html
JVC's CD-R software, frequently bundled with JVC recorders.
Includes "CD-R Extensions" packet-writing software for Win31/Win95 (also known as "FloppyCD"?).
Platforms supported: Mac
See http://www.adaptec.com/cdrec/
An updated version of Astarte's "CD-DA" package, intended for creating professional audio CDs.
Platforms supported: Windows (95)
See http://www.vob.de/
Standard recording software plus a fancy disc copier and some other goodies. Claims to be able to copy a variety of discs, including some copy-protected CD-ROMs.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.sonicfoundry.com/
Fancy audio CD creation, including PQ editing and cross-fades.
Platforms supported: VMS (VAX, Alpha)
See http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Lakes/9999/vmscdwri.html
Get ftp://v36.chemie.uni-konstanz.de/cdwrite/
Construct and write CD-ROMs from VMS.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.cequadrat.com/product/jaud.html
Audio CD creation. Includes de-noise program for data digitized from tapes or records, and a layout tool for creating booklets, inlay cards, or labels.
Platforms supported: Mac
See http://www.digidesign.com/prod/mlcd/
Full-featured audio CD creation.
Platforms supported: UNIX (Linux)
See http://www.fh-muenchen.de/home/ze/rz/services/projects/xcdroast/e_overview.html
This is a Tcl/Tk/Tix front-end for mkisofs and cdrecord.
Platforms supported: UNIX
See http://sunsite.auc.dk/BurnIT/
This is a Java front-end for cdrecord, mkisofs and cdda2wav.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.feurio.de/
Audio CD creation.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.asimware.com/ ("preview" available)
Looks to be a solid data and audio recording program.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.dartpro.com/ (demo available)
Audio CD creation with wide support for both analog and digital sources.
Software related to CD-Rs that isn't a direct part of the premastering process.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT), Mac
See http://www.microtest.com/html/optical_media.html
[ product has been discontinued ]
Platforms supported: Windows
See http://www.winimage.com/
Among other things, this lets you list and extract the contents of an ISO-9660 image.
Platforms supported: Amiga
See http://www.asimware.com/
Allows the Amiga to read High Sierra, Mac HFS, and ISO-9660 (including Rock Ridge extensions).
Platforms supported: UNIX
See http://www.midwinter.com/ftp/WorkMan/
In addition to its primary role as an audio CD player for UNIX workstations, version 1.4 (still in beta) allows SPARC/Solaris2.4+ workstations to extract digital audio into ".au" files.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.b.shuttle.de/cyberdyne/cdworx.html
Full-featured extraction and manipulation of audio data from CDs.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.enteract.com/~pcrowley/cdrdiag.html
Claims to do a number of useful things, such as displaying the contents of the TOC, listing the full volume label, analyzing the media, and recovering data from "lost" sessions.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.dcsoft.com/
Cue sheet editor for CDRWIN.
Packet writing is an alternative to writing entire tracks or discs. With track-at-once recording there's a maximum of 99 tracks per disc, a minimum track length of 300 blocks, and an additional 150 blocks of overhead for run-in, run-out, pregap, and linking. Packet writing allows several writes per track, with only 7 blocks of overhead per write (4 for run-in, 2 for run-out, and 1 for link). Since it's possible to write packets that are small enough to fit entirely in the CD recorder's buffer, the risk of buffer underruns can be eliminated.
There are some problems with packet writing, mostly due to the inability of older CD-ROM drives to deal with the gaps between packets. CD-ROM drives can become confused if they read into the gap, a problem complicated by read-ahead optimizations on some models.
There are two basic "philosophies" behind packet writing, fixed-size and variable-size. With fixed-size packets, the CD recorder writes data whenever it has a full packet. All packets in the same track must have the same size. It's relatively easy for a CD-ROM drive to skip over the inter-packet gaps if it knows where the gaps are ahead of time, but there's a large installed base of CD-ROM drives that aren't that smart.
With variable-sized packets, the CD-ROM drive can't tell ahead of time where the gaps are. The problem can be avoided by laying out the filesystem in such a way that the drive never tries to read from the gaps. One approach is to put the entire file into a single packet, but if the size of a file exceeds the size of the CD recorder write buffer, the risk of buffer underruns returns. An alternative is to write the file in several pieces, but the Level 1 ISO-9660 filesystem supported by most operating systems doesn't support this. Replacing the "redirector" (e.g. MSCDEX) with one that supports Level 3 ISO-9660 solves the problem.
Files on packet-written discs are typically stored in a UDF filesystem. When the session is closed -- necessary for the disc to be readable on anything but a CD recorder -- some implementations will wrap an ISO-9660 filesystem around the disc to make the files accessible on systems without a UDF reader. When DirectCD for Windows closes a disc in ISO-9660 format, it uses Level 3 multi-extent files. Support for Level 3 ISO-9660 will likely be added to future OSs, but for the time being it can be difficult to share such discs between machines that aren't running Win95/NT.
DirectCD for Mac OS leaves the disc in UDF format, so reading the discs requires a UDF driver. See section (6-4) for more information on UDF, including a web site where free UDF drivers can be downloaded. (If you have DirectCD, you don't need to download the drivers separately; you would only need them if you didn't own packet-writing software and wanted to read discs created by somebody who did.)
Writing to a CD-R with packets will be slower than writing with standard
premastering software. Since the expected application for packet writing
is "drive letter access" rather than creating an entire CD, this should not
be an issue for most people.
Audio CDs can't be written with packets.
Some CD recorders may only be able to write 99 packets, because the recorder has to calibrate the laser power before writing, and there are only 99 spaces for doing the test writes. Sony and Philips have recently developed ways to work around the problem however, and will presumably make them available to other manufacturers. For details about the problem, see http://www.emediapro.net/JanEM/standard1.html.
Drives based on the Sony 920S/940S/960S, Philips CDD2000/CDD2600, JVC XR-W2010, Ricoh MP-6200, and Yamaha CDR-400 mechanisms are capable of packet recording. (This list is not comprehensive; there are others.)
A glossy overview of packet writing software can be found here:
http://www.emediapro.net/MayEM/starrett5.html
Details on Adaptec's software, as well as a good overview of the benefits and limitations of packet writing and UDF, can be found at: http://www.adaptec.com/products/faqs/directcd.html
For a highly technical - if somewhat dated - reference, see: http://www.onlineinc.com/cdrompro/0296CP/02osborn.html
Information about Sony CDRFS can be found at: http://www.sony.co.jp/ProductsPark/Consumer/CD-R/index_e.html
Information on packet-writing software follows. It is in general a bad
idea to have more than one installed at the same time.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT), Mac
See http://www.adaptec.com/cdrec/
UDF-based packet writing software. Check the compatibility list on the web site to see if it works with your CD recorder and your firmware revision level.
DirectCD for Windows versions older than 1.01 conflicted with some scanners. Be sure to check the Adaptec web site for the latest version. Note that DirectCD for Windows 1.x and 2.x may not support the same set of drives on all operating systems; for example, 2.0 only worked with drives capable of using CD-RW media. If you're running WinNT, you need 2.x.
There seems to be a great deal of misinformation about how to disable DirectCD for Windows. There are two basic approaches: (1) run the uninstall program, or (2) make changes to several entries in the Windows reigstry. Some recipes have recommended changing one or two registry entries or killing a task, but all these really do is remove the DirectCD icon from the system "tray".
Platforms supported: Windows
See http://www.cequadrat.com/
UDF-based packet writing software. You can see a press release on http://www.cequadrat.com/news/news.html#2.
Platforms supported: Windows (NT)
See http://www.smartstorage.com/page5.htm
Packet writing software intended for shared environments.
Platforms supported: Windows (95)
See http://www.floppycd.com/
Originally released by JVC as "CD-R Extensions".
Does variable-sized packet writing that leaves you with an ISO-9660 Level 1 CD-ROM (constrast to the ISO-9660 Level 3 disc produced by some other packet writing solutions). This should make it possible to read the finalized CDs on operating systems other than Win95/NT.
Platforms supported: Windows (95)
See http://www.vob.de/
Does UDF. Don't know what else.
UDF is an acronym for the humbly-named "Universal Disk Format". It's a specification for a filesystem intended for use on write-once and rewritable media. It's currently being used for DVD and some of the CD-R/CD-RW packet writing software (e.g. Adaptec DirectCD).
There have been three important releases of the specification:
Download free UDF 1.5 drivers for MacOS and Win95/Win98/WinNT4 from http://www.adaptec.com/products/overview/udfreaders.html.
The technical specification for the UDF filesystem can be found at http://www2.osta.org/osta/html/ostatech.html#udf.
UDF is based on the ISO/IEC 13346 standard, now ECMA-167, which is available from http://www.ecma.ch/stand/ecma-167.HTM.
Some information about ISO/IEC 13346 and ISO/IEC 13490 is at http://www.mv.com/users/kaikow/.
For a technical discussion of packet writing with UDF, check out http://www.emediapro.net/MayEM/mcmurdie5.html.
You can find Linux source code under development at http://trylinux.com/projects/udf/.
It depends. If your primary interests are writing audio CDs, duplicating CD-ROMs (for backups, right?), or creating CD-ROMs full of files that you can give to others, packet writing won't help you much.
Discs written by programs like Adaptec DirectCD aren't usable in a CD-ROM reader until they're finalized. Finalized discs are in ISO-9660 format, but it's ISO-9660 Level 3, which not all operating systems can interpret (Win95 and WinNT can, with appropriate "redirectors" installed).
On the other hand, if you want to be able to add small amounts of data over time, it may be extremely useful. You can read the unfinalized discs on your system, so the data isn't inaccessible; it just can't be accessed on other systems that aren't also set up to do packet writing. You can overwrite files on CD-R media (the old data is still there, but the newer directory entry points to the new file), something that was very costly with multisession writes. And, of course, the risk of a buffer underrun is almost nonexistent.
As with CD-RW, it doesn't hurt to buy a recorder that supports it, but you're probably not missing much if you have one without it.
Source code and ready-to-link libraries are available, but the more useful products tend to be more expensive. The library authors are usually CD-R software publishers themselves, and aren't about to put themselves out of business. Expect to sign a strict licensing agreement, if they agree to do business at all.
Source code for some of the packages (notably Joerg Schilling's "CD Record" and "CD Tools" by Dieter Baron and Armin Obersteiner) is available. See sections (6-1-20) and (6-1-23).
Platforms supported: Windows, OS/2
See http://www.pointsoft.de/earchiv.html
API and SCSI device drivers.
Platforms supported: PC
See http://www.goldenhawk.com/
C++ class libraries. See the web site for licensing information.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95, NT)
See http://www.elektroson.com/products/GEAR_WRKS/HOME_GEARWRKS.HTM
16-bit and 32-bit APIs for CD-R/CD-RW, tape drives, and SCSI hard disks. DVD support is planned.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www.vob.de/us/Products/WizardSDK.htm
ActiveX interface to CD writing functions. [ Not yet available? ]
See section (3-20) for commentary.
Platforms supported: Windows (3.1, 95)
See http://www.adaptec.com/cdrec/
Backup software designed to store data on CD-Rs. Allows incremental backups via multi-session writes, but backups aren't allowed to span multiple volumes. Doesn't support long filenames.
[ no longer available ]
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT)
See http://www8.pair.com/dmurdoch/programs/doslfnbk.htm
Saves the long filenames, so that you can use backup software that only knows about short "8.3" filenames. This is an alternative to the LFNBK program that comes with Win95.
Old versions are free, new versions are inexpensive.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT), Mac
See http://www.dantz.com/
Dantz's Retrospect 4.0 can make use of CD-R and CD-RW by using packet writing. The backup server currently only runs on the Mac, but an NT product is under development.
Platforms supported: Windows (NT)
See http://www.seagatesoftware.com/
Comes bundled with some recorders. A list of compatible devices can be found at http://tech.seagatesoftware.com/dsl/devicedt_ddProduct_BEWRKNT.htm.
The basic version works with Win95 and WinNT Workstation. For WinNT Server you need a more expensive version.
Platforms supported: Windows (95, NT), OS/2
See http://www.ghostsoft.com/
Ghost is intended as a way to create boilerplate software installations and distribute them. It also works rather well as a way of backing up an entire disk partition. A "ghosted" image file can be written to a CD-R.
Platforms supported: Windows (via DOS)
See http://www.powerquest.com/ [ no CD-R product info available yet? ]
Drive Image 2.0 creates a compressed hard drive image file that allows you to backup and recover your hard drive. It runs as a DOS application to prevent Windows from messing with the disk while you're copying it.
The Special Edition for CD-R allows the disk image to span multiple CD-R discs, providing an effective way to back up or archive an entire hard drive onto CD-R. The CD-Rs created are bootable, and (if your PC supports it) you can restore your system by booting the disc.
This section covers recordable CD media.
The basic building blocks of CD-R media are cyanine dye, which is cyan blue in color, and phthalocyanine dye, which is more or less colorless. The reflective layer is either a silvery alloy, the exact composition of which is proprietary, or 24K gold.
There are gold/gold, green/gold, silver/blue, and silver/silver CD-Rs. The apparent color is determined by the color of the reflective layer (gold or silver) and the color of the dye (cyan or colorless). For example, green/gold discs combine a gold reflective layer with a cyan-colored dye, resulting in a gold appearance on the label side and a green appearance on the writing side.
Many people have jumped to the conclusion that "silver" discs are made of silver, and have attempted to speculate on the relative reflectivity and lifespan of the media based on that assumption. Until an industry representative issues a statement concerning the actual composition, it would be unwise to assume that the reflective layer has any specific formulation.
Taiyo Yuden produced the original gold/green CDs, which were used during the development of CD-R standards. Mitsui Toatsu Chemicals invented the process for gold/gold CDs. Silver/blue CD-Rs, manufactured with a process patented by Verbatim, first became widely available in 1996. According to the Ricoh web site, the silver/silver "Platinum" discs, based on "advanced phthalocyanine dye", were introduced by them in 1997. They didn't really appear on the market until mid-1998 though.
See section (7-3) for vague details on who manufactures what.
The reason why there are multiple formulations is that the materials and process for each are patented. If a new vendor wants to get into the CD-R market, they have to come up with a new combination of materials that conforms to the Orange Book specifications.
Some CDs have an extra coating (e.g. Kodak's "Infoguard") that makes the CD more scratch-resistant, but doesn't affect the way information is stored. The top (label) side of the CD is the part to be most concerned about, since that's where the data lives, and it's easy to damage on a CD-R. Applying a full circular CD label will help prevent scratches.
http://www.mitsuigold.com/ has some info on MTC media. You can visit http://www.ricohcorp.com/press/platinum2.htm for a press release concerning Ricoh's "platinum" media.
An EMedia Professional article discussing the composition of the newer discs is online at http://www.emediapro.net/EM1998/starrett10.html.
CD-RW discs have an entirely different composition. The data side (opposite the label side) is a dark silvery gray that is difficult to describe.
Yes. There are four factors to consider:
Some people have found brand X CD-R units work well with media type Y, while other people with the same unit have had different results. Recording a disc at 4x may make it unreadable on some drives, even though a disc recorded at 2x on the same drive works fine.
To top it all off, someone observed that discs burned with one brand of CD-R weren't readable in cheap CD-ROM drives, even though the same kind of media burned in a different device worked fine. The performance of any piece of media is always a combination of the disc, the drive that recorded it, and the drive that reads it.
A number of specific discoveries have been posted to Usenet, but none of them are conclusive. Many people have reported that Kenwood CD players don't deal with CD-Rs very well, while Alpine units play nearly everything.
Some users have found that the *quality* of audio recordings can vary depending on the media. Whatever the case, if you find that CD-Rs don't sound as good as the originals, it's worthwhile to try a different kind of media or a different player. See section (4-18) for other ideas.
One final comment: while there are clearly defined standards for CD-R media, there are no such standards for CD and CD-ROM drives -- other than that they be able to read CDs. It is possible for media to be within allowed tolerances, but be unreadable by a CD-ROM drive that can handle pressed discs without trouble. All you can do in this sort of situation is find a better-quality CD or CD-ROM drive, or switch to a brand of media whose characteristics are on the other side of the tolerance zone.
Taiyo Yuden made the first "green" CDs. They are now manufactured by TDK, Ricoh, Kodak, and probably several others as well.
Mitsui Toatsu Chemicals (MTC) made the first "gold" CDs. They are now manufactured by Kodak and possibly others as well.
Verbatim made the first "silver/blue" CDs.
Most CD-R brands (e.g. Yamaha and Sony) are OEMed from one of the above manufacturers. Attempting to keep track of who makes what is a difficult proposition at best, since new manufacturing plants are being built, and resellers can switch vendors.
A list of manufacturers codes is available at the OSJ (Orange Book Study group Japan), http://www.sony.co.jp/TechnoGarage/CD-R/index.html.
There is no "best" media for all recorders. You can't tell how well a disc will work just by looking at it; the only way to know is to put it in *your* recorder, write a disc, then put it in *your* reader and try it.
The Orange Book standard was written based on the original "green" discs from Taiyo Yuden. Green media is more forgiving of marginal read/write power variations, making them easier to read on some drives. TDK's media is a popular (if not the most popular) choice.
Gold media manufacturers claim it has a longer lifespan and will work better in higher speed recording than "green" discs. Mitsui's gold/gold discs are recommended by some vendors, and in some informal and unscientific tests were more compatible with car CD players than Kodak gold or TDK green discs. The response to Mitsui's "platinum" media has also been favorable.
See http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/History/Commentary/Parker/stcroix.html for some notes on low-level differences between media types.
Trying samples of blanks is strongly recommended before you make a major purchase. Remember to try them in your reader as well as your writer; they may not be so useful if you can't read them in your normal CD-ROM drive.
Maxell's CD-R media earned a miserable reputation on Usenet. In April '97 Maxell announced reformulated media that seems to work better than the previous ones. They have a web site at http://www.maxell.com/cdr.
http://www.doculabs.com/Press/CD_test_results.htm announced the results (or at least, the existence of the results) of "cross brand compatibility testing of CD-R readers, recorders, and media". A summary of results on simulated aging can be found on http://www.doculabs.com/Press/CDR_age.htm. Looks like the actual report is here: http://www.nml.org/Publications/TechnicalReports/MediaStability/DoculabsCDRCompatability/index.html
Some good technical information is available from http://www.mscience.com/.
A survey can be found at http://homepages.tcp.co.uk/~blades/cdr2/index.html.
See also "Is There a CD-R Media Problem?" by Katherine Cochrane, originally published in the Feb '96 issue of CD-ROM Professional.
The manufacturers claim 75 years (cyanine dye, used in "green" discs), 100 years (phthalocyanine dye, used in "gold" discs), or even 200 years ("advanced" phthalocyanine dye, used in "platinum" discs) once the disc has been written. The shelf life of an unrecorded disc has been estimated at between 5 and 10 years. There is no standard agreed-upon way to test discs for lifetime viability. Accelerated aging tests have been done, but they may not provide a meaningful analogue to real-world aging.
Exposing the disc to excessive heat, humidity, or to direct sunlight will greatly reduce the lifetime. In general, CD-Rs are far less tolerant of environmental conditions than pressed CDs, and should be treated with greater care. The easiest way to make a CD-R unusable is to scratch the top surface. Find a CD-R you don't want anymore, and try to scratch the top (label side) with your fingernail, a ballpoint pen, a paper clip, and anything else you have handy. The results may surprise you.
Keep them in a cool, dark, dry place, and they will probably live longer than you do (emphasis on "probably"). Some newsgroup reports have complained of discs becoming unreadable in as little as three years, but without knowing how the discs were handled and stored such anecdotes are useless. Try to keep a little perspective on the situation: a disc that degrades very little over 100 years is useless if it can't be read in your CD-ROM drive today.
By some estimates, pressed CD-ROMs may only last for 10 to 25 years, because the aluminum reflective layer starts to corrode after a while.
One user was told by Blaupunkt that CD-R discs shouldn't be left in car CD players, because if it gets too hot in the car the CD-R will emit a gas that can blind the laser optics. However, CD-Rs are constructed much the same way and with mostly the same materials as pressed CDs, and the temperatures required to cause such an emission from the materials that are exposed would melt much of the car's interior. The dye layer is sealed into the disc, and should not present any danger to drive optics even if overheated. Even so, leaving a CD-R in a hot car isn't good for for the disc, and will probably shorten its effective life.
See also http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Technology/CD-R/Media/Longevity.html, especially http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Industry/news/media-chronology.html about some inaccurate reporting in the media.
http://www.onlineinc.com/cdrompro/0296CP/02parkerstarrett.html has a very readable description of CD-R media error testing that leaves you with a numb sense of amazement that CD-Rs work at all. It also explains the errors that come out of MSCDEX and what the dreaded E32 error means to a CD stamper. Highly recommended.
There are 21-minute (80mm), 63-minute (120mm), and 74-minute (120mm) CD-Rs. These translate into data storage capacities of 184MB, 553MB, and 650MB, respectively (note these numbers are approximate). 80mm CDs never really took off, so 80mm CD-Rs are difficult if not impossible to find. There are 80-minute CD-Rs, but they are more expensive. See section (3-8-1) for more information.
CD-Rs are advertised as holding 650MB, 680MB, or even 700MB of data, while also claiming to hold 74 minutes of audio. The reality is that they're all about the same size, and while you may get as much as an extra minute or two, you're not usually going to get an extra 30MB out of a disc labeled as 74-minute media. See section (3-8-2) for information on writing beyond a disc's stated capacity.
Folks interested in "doing the math" should note that only 2048 of each 2352-byte sector is used for data on typical (Mode 1) discs. The rest is used for error correction and other misc fields. This is why you can only put 650MB of data on a disc that will hold 740MB of audio.
It should also be noted that hard drive manufacturers don't measure megabytes in the same way that CD-R and RAM manufacturers do. The "MB" for CD-Rs and RAM means 1024x1024, but for hard drives it means 1000x1000. Keep this in mind when purchasing a hard drive that needs to hold an entire CD. A data CD holds about 682 "disk" MB of data, which is why many CD-Rs are labeled as having a 680MB capacity.
Some programs, such as Easy-CD Pro 95, will tell you the exact number of 2K blocks available on the CD. (With Easy-CD, put a blank disc in the CD-R and go to the "Disc Info / Tools" menu item.) It's difficult to draw conclusions from the results though. An article in the June issue of _EMedia Professional_ found that not only does disc capacity vary from brand to brand and batch to batch, it may even vary depending on which model of recorder is used to examine the disc.
An informal survey conducted by one user found that the deviation between the largest and smallest CD-R was about 3500 blocks (47 seconds, or 7MB), which while not inconsequential is nowhere near the difference between 650MB and the 680MB or 700MB figures quoted by some manufacturers. All discs had at least 333,000 blocks, as required by the Red Book specification. (Before you ask which discs held the most data so you can run out and buy them, I should mention that the person doing the survey had trouble mounting some of the higher-capacity discs. Getting those few extra seconds may cost you in other ways.)
http://cdr.mypage.org/ has a fairly complete listing of how much data different brands of media will actually hold, as does http://resource.simplenet.com/files/compare.htm. (Again, bear in mind that different batches of the same media may have different capacities.)
The PCA (Program Calibration Area), PMA (Program Memory Area), TOC (Table of Contents), lead-in, and lead-out areas don't count against the 74-minute rating on single-session CDs. You really do get all the storage that the disc is rated for. On standard MODE 1 discs that aren't using packet writing, there is no "formatting overhead". Bear in mind, however, that the "cluster" size is 2K, and that the ISO-9660 filesystem may use more or less space than an MS-DOS FAT or HFS filesystem, so 650MB of files on a hard disk may occupy a different amount of space on a CD.
On a multisession disc, you lose about 23MB of space when the first session is closed, and about 14MB for each subsequent session. A common mistake when writing multisession CDs is to overestimate the amount of space that will be available for future sessions, so be sure to take this into account.
Factory-recorded CDs are also supposed to hold up to 74 minutes of data, but are often tweaked to hold more (see section (3-8)). BTW, to convert blocks to seconds, divide the number of blocks by 75. If your blanks have 333,000 blocks, they have 4440 seconds, which is exactly 74 minutes.
Some packet-writing solutions will take a large bite out of your available disc space. For example, if you use Adaptec DirectCD 2.x with CD-RW media, it uses fixed-length packets. This allows random file erase, which means that when you delete a file you actually get the space back, but you're reduced to about 493MB after formatting the disc.
Only if you're careful. The adhesives on some labels can dissolve the protective lacquer coating if the adhesive is based on a solvent that the lacquer is susceptible to. Asymmetric labels can throw the disc out of balance, causing read problems, and labels not designed for CDs might bubble or peel off when subjected to long periods of heat inside a CD drive. Similarly, the ink in some kinds of pens may damage the top coating of the disc.
Specific information can sometimes be found on the back of the jewel case that the discs come in. The TDK CDR-74 discs have the following warning:
"[...]Other brands say "use a permanent felt-tipped pen" or words to the effect that the ink shouldn't smudge. The most important part is to use a felt tip pen and not a ball-point, because the top layer can be delicate. Many people have had no problems with Sanford "Sharpie" pens, but make sure you don't etch the surface accidentally if you use an "Ultra Fine" pen.2. Do not attach labels or protective sheets, or apply any coating fluids to the disc.
3. When writing titles and other information on the label (gold) side of the disc, these should be written in the printed area using an oil-based felt-tipped pen.
[...]"
Dixon Ticonderoga sells a water-based felt tip marker called "Redi Sharp Plus" that is both permanent and smear-proof. It's widely recommended.
So long as you keep all of the above in mind, it's okay to write directly on the top surface of the CD, label or no. If the prospect makes you nervous, just write in the clear plastic area near the hub instead.
Whatever you do, don't try to peel the label off once it's on. You will almost certainly pull part of the recording layer off with the label.
Only use labels made specifically for recordable CDs. Attempting to remove the label once attached is probably a bad idea. ProSource Sales & Marketing, Inc. (http://www.inter-look.com/prosource/) sells labels and an applicator that are reputed to work well. See also http://www.neato.com/ for information on the NEATO CD-Label kit (complete with animated illustrations), and http://www.labelcd.com/ for the CD Stomper Pro. If you speak Italian, try http://www.ufocd.com/. Information on The Gizmo is available from http://www.greatgizmos.com/.
You can also buy printers that will write directly onto a CD-R with a printable surface. One example is http://www.fargo.com/.
A wealth of information on CD-R labeling options can be found here: http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Technology/CD-R/Labeling/
Avery's CD-R labels became quietly unavailable in October 1997. The rumor is that the adhesive caused data corruption problems, so Avery recalled them. There are indications that the adhesive would fail on some discs and start to lift off within a short period of time. If you have Avery labels (#5824) purchased before this date, you should avoid using them until more details are known.
Disclaimer: I'm not recommending you put a CD into a microwave. CDs may contain metals that will cause your microwave to arc, destroying the microwave emitter (see cautions about metal objects in the manual for your microwave). Don't try this at home. Better yet, don't try this at all.
The basic process is, take a disc that you don't want anymore, and put it shiny-side-up on something like a mug of water so it's nowhere near the top, bottom, or sides of the microwave. (Actually, you may want to leave it right-side-up if the disc doesn't have a label, because the foil is closest to the top of the CD.) Try to center it in the microwave. Turn off the lights. Program the microwave for a 3-second burst on "high", and watch the fireworks.
Performing this operation on replicated CDs results in blue sparks that dance along the CD, leaving fractal-ish patterns etched into the reflective aluminum. For those of you not with the program, this also renders the CD unreadable.
Trying this with a green/gold CD-R gives you a similar light show, but the destruction patterns are different. While pressed CDs and CD-RWs don't develop consistent patterns of destruction, CD-Rs tend to form circular patterns, possibly because of the pre-formed spiral groove.
On a different note, CD-Rs seem to smell worse, or at least they start to smell earlier, then replicated CDs. The materials used are non-toxic ("cyanine" comes from the color cyan, not from cyanide), but breathing the fumes is something best avoided.
For the curious, here's a note about why they behave like they do:
"The aluminum layer in a CD-ROM is very thin. The microwave oven induces large currents in the aluminum. This makes enough heat to vaporize the aluminum. You then see a very small lightning storm as electric arcs go through the vaporized aluminum. Within a few seconds there will be many paths etched through the aluminum, leaving behind little metalic islands. Some of the islands will be shaped so that they make very good microwave antennas. These spots will focus the microwave energy, and get very hot. Now you will see just a few bright spots spewing a lot of smoke. The good part of the light show is over, turn off the oven.I suspect that if you leave the oven going much longer, the CD-ROM will burst into flame. This will smell very bad and may do bad things to your oven and house. Don't do it."
-- Paul Haas (paulh@hamjudo.com), on http://hamjudo.com/notes/cdrom.html
If the disc wasn't closed, you can write more data in a new session. If the disc was closed, or was nearly full when the write failed but is still missing important data, then its use as digital media is over.
However, that doesn't mean it's useless. Here are a few ideas:
In one carefully controlled experiment it was determined that CD-Rs behave differently from pressed CDs when you slam them edge-on against the ground. The aluminum ones will chip (once you throw them hard enough, otherwise they just bounce) and create silver confetti. The gold one I tried chipped and the gold layer started peeling, leaving little gold flakes everywhere. One user reported that a Verbatim blue CD developed bubbles even though the plastic was intact. More experimentation is needed (but not around pets, small children, or hard-to-vacuum carpets).
On a different tack, some CD-Rs don't hold up well when immersed in water. Try pouring a little water on a disc, then let it sit until it dries. If the top surface scratches off more easily afterward, you need to be careful around moisture. Silver Verbatim discs seem particularly sensitive.
One comment about snapping discs in half with your fingers: use caution. Depending on the disc and how you break it, you may end up with lots of sharp polycarbonate slivers flying through the air. Wear eye protection, be aware of people around you, and be sure to clean up all the plastic shards afterward.
If you have far more coasters than you want to play with, consider recycling them. You can find a list of recyclers in the FAQ list on http://www.allthingscdr.com/allthings-cdr/cdrfaq.html#handling.
There are many vendors. A few are listed below.
Incidentally, you have a lot of choices when it comes to CD packaging. There are single-disc jewel cases, double-sized doubles, single-sized doubles, triples, quads, sextuples, plain colors, neon colors, paper envelopes, Tyvek envelopes, cardboard sleeves, clear jewel cases with black trays, clear jewel cases with built-in trays, CD pockets for use in three-ring binders, and on, and on.
If you can imagine it, it's probably up for sale.
Some URLs to start with:
http://www.frontiernet.net/~bags/
http://www.tape.com/cdr.html
http://www.xdr2.com/CDR-acc.htm
http://www.cdroutlet.com/cdrmediaNEWPAGE.htm
Some of these sites have both technical information and product sales; they're listed twice.
The CD-Info bibliography at http://www.cd-info.com/CDIC/Bibliography.html is updated more frequently and will probably be more accurate than this section. It also has pointers to books, magazines, relevant areas on commercial online services, and other good stuff.
Some useful web pages. Don't forget about the newsgroups, listed in section (0-5).
NOTE: this should not be considered an endorsement of these vendors. No attempt has been made to verify the quality of products or service you will receive. This list is provided as a convenience.
Most of the information contained in this FAQ was culled from the Usenet newsgroups comp.publish.cdrom.* and the WWW sites mentioned in the previous sections.
Please remember that the author is NOT a CD-R expert, so sending him mail won't get you very far. Please *post* questions to comp.publish.cdrom.*.
The CD-Recordable FAQ was first posted to Usenet on March 2nd, 1996, and was made available in HTML form on www.cd-info.com on March 24th, 1996. The current home on www.fadden.com became active May 28th, 1998.
This FAQ was written by:
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FAQ Copyright © 1998 by Andy McFadden. All Rights Reserved.