TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?

Subject: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 05:55 AM

I have a CD that plays on 2 of the 3 CD players in this house but the third one won't even read it - the display comes up "no CD" while I can see it merrily spinning around. My son tells me that one of his CD's won't play on his car player but will on the others. Why is this?
Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:06 AM

Argh!

Why do people insist on putting an apostrophe into CDs?

You don't write: record's or tape's so why CD's

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: greg stephens
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:06 AM

I dont understand technicalities, but I believe it is because all machines have little gremlins living in them.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: greg stephens
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:10 AM

Cant beet a bit of spelling; inaccurate punctuation etc to get the old GUEST addrenalin flowing can u?

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:15 AM

Perhaps GUEST is really Apostrophe Man in disguise? I am with you on the gremlins Greg. This is a new CD too so it hasn't had the bejeesus played out of it.
Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:19 AM

Shouldn't there be two 'r's in Arrgh! Or is it three?
BJ

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:21 AM

Jennie,

No offence was intended toward you. A quick google search shows that about 10% of references to CDs are spelt as CD's.

Regarding your inital question, it's to do with the accuracy of the laser alignment in the player. Some are better than others.

I don't have any solutions, but found that hitting one player of mine, that misbehaved in this manner, worked.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:37 AM

GUEST, no offence taken. Did you hit the player while it was playing a CD or when it was empty? And why does it do this on only one CD not every one I play? I don't like the idea of whacking my JVC and it has been fine up till now - it's nearly 3 years old, still a toddler.
Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,greg stephens
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:40 AM

I regret to say I can't find any technical errors in that last posting of GUEST's, but I can't help noticing a certain awkwardness in that last parenthetical phrase ",that misbehaved in this manner,". I think there are other places in the sentence that that information could have been placed more felicitously. But, not to be carping, I have to say the spacing between paragraphs is very easy on the eye and does make for a more comprehensible read.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: kendall
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:05 AM

Where I come from, spelt is a type of bread.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:25 AM

Actually, I think JennieG got us off to a bad start with the thread title. Surely it should be 'Why do CDs sometimes not play'. ;-}
BJ

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:27 AM

CD's or CDs ?

Obviously you wouldn't write "compact disc's" but I would contend that historical rules of grammar do not apply to abbreviations. In earlier and simpler times people did not have a multiplicity of two-letter acronyms to deal with, and thus the question did not arise.

Nowadays, in the high-tech environment, we hawe have to contend with not only with CD's, but PM's and IM's, all of which look much more natural in the plural when embellished with an apostrophe.

So, for my part, while I am well aware of the arguments to the contrary, I will continue to write "CD's," while continuing to be just as pedantic as before whenever I see "it's" when it should be "its".

Murray

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Brakn
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:31 AM

Give the disc a wipe with a tea towel.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:37 AM

CD or not CD - that is the question.
Whether it is nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outraged guests.......
But can I do anything about the compact disc that won't play in all players? Can I spin it around my head and say magic words that will make it play in my player, or do I just accept the fact that shit happens?
Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,greg stephens
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:45 AM

banjos, banjo's or banjoes? I favour the latter but they all look a bit funny.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:50 AM

I would go the classical route, and make the plural be "banjoi"

Murray

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:59 AM

But why should we ban joy? There is little enough joy in the world as it is. Next thing we know they will be banning guitar players.
Joy to the world etc.......
Cheers (it's only coffe, I promise, but by heck it's strong)
JennieG

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,forty two
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 08:22 AM

The pick up head is dirty on the player. This happened to me the other day. I got the whole shebang cleaned for £15 (rip off?) and it works fine now.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Barbara Shaw
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 08:43 AM

I've been told that burned CDs do not work on older CD players, but CDs produced professionally should play on both old and new players. This came up because our ShoreGrass CD was produced by myself on a CD burner. Someone returned it to the store as defective, but the next one was also "defective." They discovered that it played fine on their newer CD player. Don't know why, but know that it happens.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Justa Picker
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 09:37 AM

Another possibility.
The newer CD units, including some that are installed in cars, sometimes refuse to play burnt copies...and will only play store bought originals. The files or tracks end with the extension "cda" (for CD Audio). Some burning software creates files with extensions called "wav" files. These are the culprits that don't always play on newer units, and when you do try to play these, you get skipping and random jumping of the tracks.

To get around this you need a program like Roxio's Easy CD Creator (latest verion).

Easy CD Creator will create the requisite "cda" files so that just about anything copied using this program will play on almost any unit. It's also a good idea to have a program that can convert "cda" files to "wav" files, for copying to the hardrive such as CDH's Media Wizard. Then, when Roxio burns the copied wav files to CD, it will automatically convert them back to "cda" files for the finished, copied CD.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: IvanB
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 12:39 PM

Just to add to the pluralization thread drift - the Style Manual of The American Heritage Dictionary, Second College Edition, lists one of the uses of the apostrophe: "4. Indicates the plurals of figures. letters, or words used as such." CD doesn't appear in the dictionary, but CB (for Citizens band) does, and the plural is shown as CB's. Actually, I was taught this as the proper style for pluralizing abbreviations when I was in grade school 50 years ago. I'm a nut on improper use of commas and apostrophes as well (modern style seems to be to throw them at random at your text, and wherever they land is fine), but proper usage shouldn't be criticized.

And, to make a stab at answering the query posed in the thread title, all of the above are correct. Another cause can be the color of the substrate. Some older players will work just fine with certain substrate colors but choke on others.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,Ed
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 01:35 PM

Ivan,

Does the The American Heritage Dictionary use CBs or C.B.'s (the second of which would be correct)?

This page quotes from a number of style manuals:

The Chicago Manual of Style
"So far as it can be done without confusion, single or multiple letters, hyphenated coinages, and numbers used as nouns (whether spelled out or in numerals) form the plural by adding s alone. [Examples: SOSs, several YMCAs and AYHs, CODs and IOUs, the early 1920s." [14th edition, section 6.16]

MLA [Modern Language Association] Handbook for Writers of Research Papers
"...do not use them [apostrophes] in the plurals of abbreviations or numbers (PhDs, MAs, VCRs, IRAs, 1990s, SATs in the 700s)." [3rd edition, section 2.2.2]

Turabian 'Manual for Writers'
"Form the plurals of most single and multiple capital letters used as nouns by adding s alone: 'The three Rs are taught at the two YMCAs'. [5th edition, section 3.5]

The Gregg Reference Manual
"Capital letters and abbreviations ending with capital letters are pluralized by adding s alone. [Examples:] three Rs, four Cs, five VIPs, six CPUs, CEOs, IQs, PTAs, YWCAs..." [7th edition, section 623]

European Commission Translation Service. English Style Guide
"3.37 Plurals of abbreviations. Plurals of abbreviations (MEPs, OCTs, SMEs, UFOs, VDUs) do not take an apostrophe."

Ed

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Barbara Shaw
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 03:09 PM

Actually, I used Easy CD Creator, and my burned CDs are in CDA format. They do not work on some older CD players but work fine on newer ones. Have not found out (yet) why this is, but it is.

Subject: RE: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,ET
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 03:28 PM

My brother used to work for Radio Shack fixing the things and he said that too much light shining into the mechanism may be the glitch.

(One of those "impossible to find" faults because it isn't actually in the mechanism.)

ET

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Grab
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:08 PM

Jaysus! Enough on the flaming apostrophes!

Reasons not to be cheerful about CDs and their players:-

The lens for the laser can get dirty or scratched. A dirty lens can be cleaned. A scratched lens is dead.

The lens assembly (the bit that shines the laser) moves around somewhat like the arm of a record to follow the "grooves". But the "grooves" on a CD are much finer than a record, so it has to be very accurate. Eventually something will go wrong - maybe the player will get bashed, or the motors or track will wear out and the lens will no longer follow the CD properly. End of story for the player. Some CDs seem to be easier for player to follow than others, so you'll usually find on a nearly-dead player that it'll play all except one or two, then more and more will refuse to play, until you finally give up and chuck the thing away.

The CD(s) could be dirty. CDs have error-correction built in which can take care of the occasional scratch/bit of dirt/hair on the CD, but if there's just too much then it won't play, or it'll play but skip spectacularly in place. Some players have better lenses, more powerful lasers or better software which can deal with this and recover better from problems like this.

The CD is a CD-R or a CD-RW. CD-Rs don't reflect light as well as a standard off-the-shelf CD, and CD-RWs even less so. Older players had weaker lasers which were designed to work with normal CDs, but no-one had thought about other types of CD, so they just don't shine enough light on the disk to get a CD-R to work. All modern players should work with CD-Rs, although I suspect the lower reflection off the disk will make any problems with dirt on the CD worse.

That's the common problems I can think of anyway.

Graham.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 06:58 PM

GUEST ED, the examples you give, albeit apparently hallowed by the American Heritage Dictionary, are simply opinions.

Maybe the opinions of a committee.

More probably, the opinions of one person. But opinions nonetheless.

I am afraid that "PhDs", without an apostrophe, "IOUs", without an apostrophe, and "SOSs", without an apostrophe, hit me in the face as being blindingly wrong.

Sorry, but in matters of opinion such as this, I will continue to trust my instincts.

Murray

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,greg stephens
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:04 PM

I'm with you, Murray. Those committees judge what's right for their clientele.Dont know about America, but there's no National Academy or anything in Engkand to rule on these things. Words mean what we collectively decide they mean. Punctuation is as we decide.(With the exception of the meaning of "folk". It would be lot better if everyone agreed with me on that one).

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 07:28 PM

Aah, "folk".

I've been wondering about that myself recently, greg. What does it mean, exactly ?

Murray

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Bullfrog Jones
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 08:28 PM

Whatever it is, it's NOT Neil Young!
BJ

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Joe_F
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 09:09 PM

I had this trouble with a CD I bought from Margaret Macarthur. My computer would play it; my CD player would play every other CD I had, but not that one, nor the second copy of it that I bought: it would play it for a while, and then start skipping or give up altogether. At last, a hifiddledy friend of mine explained: Folkies try to jam as many songs on one CD as they can; they do that by decreasing the pitch, which is taxing to whatever magical feedback loop it is that keeps the laser beam on track, and so such CDs cannot be played reliably except on the most modern players. He gave me a new player, and that did the job.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 29 Jul 02 - 09:29 PM

When this has happened to me, most times I have found that sticking on one of those CD lens cleaning discs for a minute sorts in out OK. They only cost a quid or so.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 30 Jul 02 - 03:39 AM

I will try McGrath of Harlow's suggestion and get one of those CD lens cleaning thingies. The CD is brand new, it arrived yesterday, and the player is 3 years old. I don't know the details of the CD's (note correct use of apostrophe) manufacture but I can ask. The player is in a sunny room near the window - could that be the source of too much light? I am getting a blind on that window soon.
Thank you, one and all, for the helpful advice and the free entertainment.
Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: rich-joy
Date: 11 Apr 04 - 01:39 AM

I've just changed over from PC to iMac and have tried burning some copies of my CDs, using both iTunes and Toast.

Now while the resultant burns will play in the iMac AND the PC AND my 10 year old portable beatbox CD player, they will NOT play on my 2+ year old expensive SONY system!!!

However, I have played plenty of other burnt CDs on the SONY in the past, with no problem, but it won't recognise the iMac burnt CD-Rs.

Anyone have any clues about what I can do???!!!

Cheers! (and Thanks in advance)
R-J

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull
Date: 11 Apr 04 - 01:45 AM

hamster's.

john

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Apr 04 - 02:44 AM

Extenuating circumstances coerce me to preclude all of you from
such a bauble of extravagance!

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,Anne Croucher
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 12:35 AM

I blame all those wave thingies coming in from outer space - put your cd player near the window and you're asking for all sorts of trouble and maybe secret messages beamed directly to your brain.

Keep CD players in a cool dark place where the satellites can't see them, and they last a lot longer and you don't get weird messages about apostrophies bouncing around the rooms.

Mmm - I might be getting too old to stay up all night for no reason but to see the dawn, 5:30 might be pushing the limits.

Anne

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Amos
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 08:09 AM

Rich Joy:

Are you using Toast software to burn these CDs? If so you must be sure to burn them as audio CDs, not as data CDs.

Otherwise it is hit or miss where they will play.

commercial CD players and computer CD players read different data structres.

A

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 08:19 AM

when all is said and done - it comes back to the gremlins.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Shanghaiceltic
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 10:54 AM

I have had this touble with both audio and video CD's. Two possible solutions.

1. It is something to do with an encoding file on the CD which tells the CD player where it comes from.

We bought a very cheap CD player here in China and it plays all the knock off video and audio CD's. However the more expensive CD player in my PC is a bit more discerning and can tell which is a knock off and refuses to play them.

Sometimes if you have burnt a CD then this file gets stuffed up or is missing.

2. Wipe the disc clean using soft tissue. This sometimes works as a fingure smudge or scratch can confuse the set up for the disc. Some players are more sensative to mucky discs.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 12:30 PM

I have been a professional proofreader and copy-editor. The real rule is that however the author of a piece may write, the priority is to make the style choices consistent throughout the piece, and also to follow the House Style of your particular publisher--- how your boss wants things to appear. So you make a choice: CDs or CD's, and then ensure it's the same all the way throughout the piece-- CDs and PMs, or CD's and PM's, but NOT CD's and PMs.

House Style varies from place to place, and may be based on a rule of grammar or a boss's preference. Bible citations are an easy example-- you would either spell out or abbreviate the books of the Bible (which set of approved abbrv's?), and either put the sentence's punctuation before or after the citation, and either italicize or bold the citation, and so forth. Also, there would be House Style conventions for capitalizing He, Him, Who (etc.) when referring to the deity, or not.

Clarity and readability are the goal for good publishers, not pedantry. This is merely Mudcat, where doing as one pleases is kinda one of the main points!

~Susan

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Amos
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 12:37 PM

That's not thread drift, it's a pole-vault!

A

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 01:26 PM

In my experience it is the homemade CDs that won't play on certain players. My cheap boombox plays anything I have but my component Admiral CD player won't. That was a cheap player too. Maybe it's still the old situation--- 'you get what you pay for'.

As for the apostraphe----: It could be the posessive 's that we're talkin' 'bout.-------- It was the CD's faults we were considering---the faults of the CD---the faults the CD had inherent in it's being.

As far a banjo's go:

If Banjo Patterson actually was the author of "Waltzing Matilda", well, then it would be "HIS" song--to own and/or keep and posess. Therefore it would be Banjo's song.

If we are talking about a banjo head, then the head would belong on that banjo and it would be "that banjo's head". The same goes the banjo's gears, the banjo's frets, the banjo's brackets or the banjo's sound. That last one would be there even though you can't see it. Yo could hear it though.

Arthur Thieme

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 01:47 PM

I've run across the odd commercial CD that won't play on my computer - and the occasional one that won't play in my car. Have on that will only play on the DVD player of my b-i-l's computer. we've tried it on eight or nine other CD players and a couple DVD players - it doesn't work on any of them.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: PennyBlack
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 01:55 PM

Sometimes the problem is caused by a build up of lubricant on the "arm" the laser head runs on, this stops the laser reading the table of contents which is held at the centre of the CD - cleaning this arm can often solve the problem (I've had an 80% success rate)

If it only happens with CDRs try changing the brands you use or recording at a slower speed (1 to 1 is always best for Audio and Video)

Handle with care!

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 02:04 PM

When I got my PC from Dell, I got all the sound-cd-speaker bells and whistles. At the same time, I was getting the BBC magazine, which includes a cd with both music and cd-rom information with each issue. They would not play on my PC. The Dell technicians couldn't help. I still don't know what is in the cd-rom portions of the recordings, but the music tracks play on any old cd-player.

My daughter bought a Mac, and can't use my PC burnings of family pictures because I used write-protect. She is going to re-copy mine, but also said that a technician told her to use only Verbatim discs if recordings from a PC are to be used on a Mac.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GLoux
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 03:43 PM

Does anal retentive have a hyphen? (my favorite t-shirt phrase)

Could the CD that doesn't play have more than 72 minutes of music on it? "Newer" CDs can hold up to 80 minutes, but many players can't handle them. I once burned a CD with 75 minutes of material on it and most of the CD players I have access to wouldn't work with it.

-Greg

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 03:59 PM

Not too long ago (ca. 2 - 3 years?) there was much discussion in the PC magazines and on various tech sites about the difficulty of matching CD blanks to the various brands and styles of burners. While not much was accomplshed in the way of sorting out why it made a difference, it was generally agreed that once you found a particular brand of blanks that worked in your burner you should stick with it.

At that time, there were some "proprietary" variations between several of the major makers' burners, and lots of problems were reported. People did seem to have more trouble with the cheap bulk disks than with the "major" brands like Verbatim and Maxell. (Names that come to mind, not to slight others.)

People also tried to relate "best brands" to particular burner programs.

I can't say whether burners and/or blanks have been improved so that matching them up is less of a problem now, but there is much less discussion in those sources.

Labels are another source of occasional problems. Some players are very sensitive to an "unbalanced" disk, and even a label screen printed on a commercial disk will sometimes make it "unplayable" in those particular devices. Needless to say, an off-center paper disk isn't going to perform well in such machines.

Some portable and mobile (vehicle) players use a "damper pad" that usually consists of a small felt button (or two) that rides the outer edge of the disk to keep it from bouncing around. A rough screen print label can prevent the disk from rotating at uniform speed if it "snags" on the damper button. An off-center paper label, or one that simply extends too close to the edge of the disk, can cause problems in such players. While the paper labels that run right out to the edge of the disk may be "prettier," a clear rim of at least 5/32" or so would likely give more reliable play in such machines. Unfortunately, "customer demand" has driven the useful ones off the market and only the "pretty ones" seem to be readily available in my area.

John

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GLoux
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 04:17 PM

Does anal retentive have a hyphen? (my favorite t-shirt phrase)

Could the CD that doesn't play have more than 72 minutes of music on it? "Newer" CDs can hold up to 80 minutes, but many players can't handle them. I once burned a CD with 75 minutes of material on it and most of the CD players I have access to wouldn't work with it.

-Greg

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 05:02 PM

GLoux -

SWMBO advises:

"He is anal retentive." No hyphen

"He is an anal-retentive jerk." Hypen

Is your shirt hand made too?

John

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 05:13 PM

The hyphen is used when a phrase is being turned into an adjective. :~)

~S~

Subject: Can't play web downloads on older model CD player.
From: GUEST,Manny
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 09:17 PM

I recently downloaded some music from a web site that consisted of Byzantine chants. I downloaded it into my music folder and then burned it to disk. If I play the disk through the computer sound system, it comes out perfect, but when I try to play the same disk on my older stereo system which has a CD player I get nothing. The web site I accessed downloaded my music with RealOne player. I'm new to computers so I don't know an mp file from a realone or quicktime player. Is there such a thing as somekind of software for dummies that can convert newer formats into ones that can be played on older CD stereo systems?

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 12 Apr 04 - 10:04 PM

Largely "borrowed"... :-) with some editing...


In 1989, Taiyo Yuden Company of Japan developed an organic dye-based CD medium that was coated with a thin layer of gold. This new medium not only provided the same physical characteristics and capacity as silver pressed CDs, but also had better reflective properties than commercially replicated CDs. Two types of devices that are able to write information to a CD Recordable (CD-R) disc are (1) Compact Disc Recorder (CD Recorder) and (2) Compact Disc ReWritable Recorder (CD-RW Recorder). A CD-RW Recorder can write to a CD-R disc as well as a CD ReWritable Recordable (CD-RW) disc. The invention of CD-R and CD-RW technology brings many benefits:

Since a typical CD-R medium has a life span of 70 - 100 years, it is ideal for durable data archival. This is a remarkable enhancement over magnetic media, which has a much shorter life span. CD-R technology is a breakthrough that will usher in the next revolution in data storage technologies as the need for large capacity forever increases in this age of information explosion.

The first manufacturers of CD Recorders were Yamaha and Sony. The first generation CD Recorders produced were single speed (150 Kbps) drives, also called 1X drives. Since then, a number of CD Recorders from various manufacturers have become available on the market. The speed of the later generation of recorders has improved to 2X, double speed (300 Kbps), 4X, quad speed (600 Kbps), 8X (1200 Kbps), and 12X (1800 Kbps). With the rapid progress of CD recording technology, the recording speed of CD Recorders is expected to increase.

CD Recorders can be either external or internal devices. An external drive can be situated separate from a PC body, while an internal drive must be installed within the PC. Operationally, compared to floppy or hard disk drives that you are familiar with, one of the characteristics of CD Recorders is that during a write operation they require a steady flow of data. All CD Recorders have a buffer memory called cache. During a write operation to the disc, the cache contains a certain amount of data to be written to the disc. During the entire write operation, the cache should never be depleted. There must be a steady stream of data that is neither too fast nor too slow, constantly flowing from the PC (RAM or hard disk) into the recorder's buffer cache. Driving this steady data stream may require a powerful PC and its dedicated resources.

CD Recorders have IDE, SCSI or USB interfaces. For SCSI CD Recorders, you need to connect it with a SCSI cable to the PC with a SCSI controller installed.

Current CD Recorders were designed for CD recording and can be used as a CD-ROM drive.

A CD-ReWritable (CD-RW) Recorder is a CD Recorder with the additional capability of being able to write CD-ReWritable (CD-RW) Recordable discs. It is both a CD Recorder and CD-ReWritable Recorder. It can be used to write to a CD-Recordable (CD-R) disc as well as CD-ReWritable (CD-RW) Recordable disc.

As previously stated, if your CD Recorder is a CD-RW Recorder you have the option of using the two different types of CD-Recordable media.

Both CD-Recordable (CD-R) disc and CD-ReWritable Recordable (CD-RW) disc have their own unique benefits as shown:

CD-Recordable (CD-R) Disc

        Excellent for long-term archived data storage.

        Low inexpensive cost per CD-Recordable (CD-R) disc.

        CD-Recordable (CD-R) disc can be read by any CD-ROM drive.

        CD-Recordable (CD-R) Audio (Music) CD's can be played in any CD player!

CD-ReWritable (CD-RW) Recordable Disc

        Excellent for short-term data storage (i.e. data file back-ups).

        Cost effective daily data backup alternative.

        CD-ReWritable (CD-RW) Recordable discs may be erased and re-used up to 1000 times!

        Allows you to test your CD-RW Recorder as well as allowing you to practice making CDs without wasting or ruining CD-Recordable media.

        Note:

If you want to read back a written CD-RW disc using a CD Recorder or CD-ROM drive, the CD Recorder or CD-ROM drive must be either ReWritable playback or Multi-Read compliant.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
CD stands for Compact Disc, which is a general term for all formats of CD media. CD formats available on the market now include Audio CD, CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA, Video CD, Enhanced CD or CD Extra and CD-I.
Among this variety of CD formats, the most familiar one is perhaps Audio CD, which is a standard CD format used for storing audio sound tracks, for example, music and songs. Due to the immense success of Audio CD, today the use of this media has been expanded into storing data, for the purpose of data archival and distribution.

A CD-DA (Audio CD) disc contains tracks with Audio only. This type of disc is defined by the Red Book format standard.

CD Extra, also known as CD Plus or Enhanced CD, includes two sessions with the first session containing up to 98 audio tracks and the second session containing a data track written in the CD-ROM XA format.

A Mixed Mode CD contains a combination of CD-ROM tracks and CD-DA tracks. A Mixed Mode disc has a CD-ROM track as the first track and CD-DA on the following tracks. Usually, the term "hybrid" refers to a disc containing both DOS/Windows and Macintosh software in separate volumes.

Session refers to data written to a CD during the span of a single recording. It is an area on the disc that consists of a Lead-In Area, a Program Area and a Lead-out Area.

With Track-At-Once writing mode, the CD-Recorder will record one track at a time. In between every track, the CD-Recorder's laser stops while the hard disk prepares the contents of the next track.

With Session-At-Once writing mode, the CD-Recorder's laser does not stop until the all data from the current session is written to disc. Session-At-Once is related to the process of recording multisession discs. See Multisession.

Multisession refers to a form of recording that allows data to be written over more than one session. The disc can be removed from the recorder in between sessions and then replaced.

Incremental Multisession recording links existing sessions with a new session being written to the disc. Data from a previous session can be accessed since the each session has links to the data written in the previous session.

Independent Multisession recording organizes multiple sessions as completely separate volumes, each with its own directory of information. In most cases, you will need a utility such as Session Explorer to view data from a previously recorded session on the disc.

The Table of Contents (TOC) contains information about the disc and tracks. When you close the current session, the Table of Contents will be written in the Lead-In Area. With an unfinished recording of the disc, however, the TOC cannot be written to the disc.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As defined by the Orange Book format standards, a CD's physical structure is: sectors are enclosed within tracks, tracks are enclosed within sessions, and sessions are enclosed within the disc.

CD Formats include:

1.        The Red Book: Defines CD-Audio format standards.

2.        The Yellow Book: Defines CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA format standards.

3.        The Green Book: Define CD-I format standards.

4.        The Orange Book: Defines CD-Recordable parts I & II format standards.

5.        The White Book: Defines Video CD format standards.

There are different writing methods. They include Track-At-Once, Session-At-Once and Disc-At-Once (this is the recommended for Audio Music CDs - see - no apostrophe!).

With Track-At-Once writing method, the CD Recorder will record one track at a time. In between tracks, the CD Recorder laser will stop while the hard disk prepares the contents of the next track.
There are two run-out blocks written when a CD Recorder finishes writing a track and there is one link block and four run-in blocks when a CD Recorder starts to write the next track.

When you read a CD-ROM, CD-Audio or Mixed-Mode disc in either a CD-ROM drive or CD Recorder, these blocks will not have any adverse effect since both drives are smart enough to skip all these blocks and will not play them.

However, since some audio players do not support Track-At-Once, when you play CD Audio disc created with this method in such audio players, you may hear some funny noises in between song tracks.
Therefore, to make a master CD in any format that is to be mastered and replicated in the factory, you must use the Disc-At-Once writing method. To make a professional CD-Audio disc, it is strongly recommended that you use Disc-At-Once.

Session refers to data written to a CD during the span of a single recording. Sessions are identified by a lead-in area, and a lead-out area which indicates the close of a session. Multisession refers to a form of recording that allows data to be written over more than one session. The disc can be removed from the recorder in between sessions and then replaced.

With Disc-At-Once writing method, the CD Recorder laser will not stop until the whole disc recording is finished. In this writing method, the disc will be closed and there are no link blocks between any two tracks. As explained above, Disc-At-Once is recommended for making master CD's.

When your CD Recorder receives the Finalize Disc command, it will write the Lead-In (with TOC) and Lead-Out to the disc. This indicates to the CD Recorder that no more sessions may be added after this last one.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ISO 9660 is an internationally accepted logical level standard that defines the format of files and directories on a CD-ROM. The ISO 9660 standard allows different computers with different operating systems to access the same data format. CD-ROMs current success is due to not only the media's own distinct advantages but also to the universal acceptance and interoperability of the media, accomplished through standards like ISO 9660.

A CD-ROM disc contains data only. For example, when you back up all the data files from your hard disk to CD, the disc that will be created is a CD-ROM disc.

An Audio CD disc contains only digital audio information. The sources of digital audio are Audio CD (music or songs) on a disc in a CD-ROM drive, sound (WAV) files on your hard disk or live Audio input from a microphone connected to your PC's sound card. A Wave (.wav) file is a file that stores analog signals (sounds) in a digital format that can be interpreted by a computer.

A Mixed Mode disc contains both data and digital audio. Data is recorded on the first track, while audio is on tracks 2 to 99 of the same disc.

CD Extra, also known as CD Plus or Enhanced CD, includes two sessions with the first session containing up to 98 audio tracks and the second session containing a data track written in the CD-ROM XA format.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Overburning allows you to burn a CD that contains more data than is normally possible on a standard CD. It is only supported on certain CD recorders and only works when you use the Disk-At-Once (DAO) writing method.

There are many uncertainties when overburning a CD. It is even possible that your CD recorder can be damaged in the process. Additionally, you may experience read or write errors at the end of the disc or other SCSI/ATAPI command failures.

There is no way to automatically determine how much additional capacity will be available on your CD recorder. In some cases, you may be able to write up to 78:00.00 but you might want to stop at 76:30.00 if you do not know the overburn capacity of your CD recorder.

Ninety-nine (99) minute CDs under certain conditions. These CD-R discs use a tighter spiral and when combined with Overburning it is possible to achieve recording capacities up to nine-nine minutes. It must be noted that only a very few drives can actually reach the nine-nine minute limit and then only at the slower writing speeds of 2x or possibly 4X. In fact, many drives will not record beyond ninety minutes and again, the vast majority of drives do not recognize nine-nine minute media at all. This is because this media is completely outside of the Red Book specification. If you are not able to use eighty minute media then you are not likely to be able to use the nine-nine minute media either.

Again, there can be many problems when using this type of media. In addition to the lack of support by most drives, many problems can be encountered when trying to play a nine-nine minute CD as well.
~~~~~~~~~~
ISO 9660 File Name Restrictions

Since a CD-ROM disc was designed to be read across various platforms, such as PC, Mac and UNIX, the ISO 9660 standard is very restrictive on file and folder names. The allowable characters for file and folder names are A-Z, 0-9 and _. ISO 9660 also restricts the subdirectory name and the depth of subdirectories to eight levels deep.

MS-DOS File Names

All MS-DOS file names are valid. If the CD is for DOS or Windows 3.1x, then this option is recommended.

        Note:

If you are working on Windows 95, some long file names may exist. In this case, if you choose the MS-DOS file name restrictions, you should vary the first eight characters of each file name so that every file name remains unique in MS-DOS format.

Joliet File Name Restrictions

This file system is designed for use with Windows 95. It allows long file names. However, it still conforms to MS-DOS restrictions for short file names. If a CD is created using this file system, the disc can be read back only under Windows 95 and/or Windows NT 4.0.

Romeo.

Romeo is defined as Windows 95 long file names only, up to 128 characters. If a CD is created using this file system, the disc can be read back only under Windows 95 and/or Windows NT 4.0.


Macs.

I don't know anything technical about macs, sorry.

~~~~~~~~~~`
An An Audio CD disc is different from a CD-ROM disc. With a CD-ROM disc you are allowed to import multisession and re-edit the previous sessions at the file and directory structure level. However, with an Audio CD disc, you may have to discard the disc if you make any mistake on it. Therefore, as a precaution, before recording your Audio CD layout to a disc, you should always verify the image contents and layout to ensure the validity of the disc.

I strongly recommend that you put all your audio tracks in one session on a disc to avoid problems when playing your audio disc on an Audio CD player. Remember you cannot turn off the CD recorder or eject the disc while the burner is preparing to record the next track.

One song occupies one track, called an Audio Track on an Audio CD disc. You can record up to 99 songs within one session on the disc.

Audio CD is a basic compact disc format, also known as CD-DA (Compact Disc Digital Audio) which was the first CD standard. Audio CD uses PCM (Pulse Code Modulated audio), 44.1 kHz sampling, 16-bit and stereo format.

MP3's (they are compressed so they are smaller in size) only work on a CD music player designed to do so - only very recent ones will do this. MPEG-1, Layer 3, or MP3 as it is more commonly known, is the portion of the MPEG-1 specification dealing with the recording of audio information to a file. This standard is gaining popularity on the Internet. Currently, most CD drives will not play this audio format directly

Wav files are a type of sound file that can store digitized analog signals supplied by the program. When you put a Wave file on your Audio CD image, if the file's format is not in the format of PCM, 44.1 kHz, 16-bit and stereo, you will have to use a Wave Editor to convert it before it is written to the CD.

If there is more than one session on an Audio CD disc, when you use an Audio-CD player to play this disc, you may hear very funny noises. Suppose there are two sessions on an Audio CD disc, the end section of Session One is called Lead-out while the beginning section of Session Two is called Lead-in. Since most of Audio CD players still try to play this Lead-in and Lead-out area, which is not an audio track, it will play as loud hissing noises.

Therefore, unless your Audio CD player can overcome this problem, I strongly recommend that you record only one session of audio data on an Audio CD disc.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In the process of recording to a disc, if any interruption occurs, you will fail to write the disc and your disc may be ruined. There are a few things to consider before writing to a disc to ensure the writing process will be as reliable and trouble-free as possible.

You should store your source data on a sufficiently fast local hard disk, which can provide a fast data transfer rate.

The larger the CD Recorder's buffer size, the safer and more reliable your recording sessions will be. On some recorders, you can upgrade the buffer size.

Thermal recalibration is a process by which some hard drives pause to recalibrate themselves in response to internal drive temperature changes. On some intelligent hard disks, during recording, thermal recalibration can be postponed. However, on other hard disks, thermal recalibration is performed at fixed intervals—even when your hard disk is in use, like when you are recording a disc. If an interruption in the data flow caused by hard disk thermal recalibration occurs during your recording, the recording may not be successful. A fast host system goes a long way towards solving this problem. Many modern drives perform intelligent thermal recalibration so this is becoming less of a problem in CD recording.

If your source files are stored on a fragmented hard disk, searching for these source files will slow down the recording operation, and may cause buffer underrun. To reduce such problems, run a disk defragmentation utility to defragment your hard disk before recording.

You should perform a simulation ach time after you have set a different recording speed. If the simulation test fails, you should choose a lower speed and test again.

If your hard disk is a SCSI hard disk, I recommend that you connect your CD Recorder and SCSI hard disk to two different host adapters. This will separate the source and the destination of your recording, making it safer.

Many current recorders are now support some type of buffer underrun error protection technology . There are several new technologies available today. Sanyo's Burn Proof and Ricoh's JustLink were the first implementations available but others, like SeamlessLink, ExacLink and SuperLink are available on the market today. These protection technologies are built directly into the drive and they prevent buffer under-run errors from producing the infamous "coaster". This condition is caused when the writing buffer is empty when the recording process is still under way. When this condition occurs, the recording process is aborted as incomplete and the media is ejected. Once this happens, the CD-R media cannot be used again, relinquishing itself to the "coaster" bin. Avoiding this situation can be a very trying experience with no guarantees, and the conditions of cause will change from occurrence to occurrence. With the buffer under-run error protection facility activated, the normal abort sequence is circumvented by the drive. Later, when the write buffer accumulates enough data to be written, the drive synchronizes and "retraces" where the under-run occurred and continues to write from that point.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 13 Apr 04 - 12:47 AM

I have an RCA gizmo which copies CD's. Before a new copy can be played in another player, it must be finalized. If it's not finalized, it will play in the RCA and seem perfectly all right.

Sometimes a CD won't play because it's not seated firmly in the player. If it's at all whopper-jawed (note correct use of hyphen AND apostrophe), the equipment may say it's not there or that the D drive is not there, or some such baloney.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 Apr 04 - 02:06 AM

GUEST,leeneia's comment refers to something already mentioned in the technical stuuf I inserted before.

Sorry, I had to rush out for an appointment, so I didn't finish my spiel. When you ask a question on the Mudcat, you get on average 75 replies, of which 73 1/2 are irrelevant, BS mucking about, personal insults from anonymous GUESTs, misinterpertations of the facts, etc. :-)

That's why I decided to quote the proper technical stuff first, then give a simple explanation which referred to the above.

To burn an "AUDIO CD" which will play back on normal Audio-CD players (which were designed before MP3) you need

1) The right sort of disk - CD-R is perferable - some older players don't digest CD-RW well.

2) Really cheap media may not work well either. As they used to say in the 1970's when I had a motorbike - "if you got a $10 head, buy a $10 helmet!", and if your head is worth nothing...

3) The right sort of CD track layout & burn pattern - read the info on the correct type of burn to do above.

4) The correct sort of file to put on the tracks - not MP3!

5) The correct burn speed - if burned too fast, the media may not be recognised as falling within the specs of the playback drive - especially older systems. Also there may be "buffer underrun" resulting in a "coaster" - if you use a Mac "Toaster", you get a Toaster Coaster"!

6) Not specified above, but also important is that some players get upset by printed or stuck on labels, it may unbalance the disk, or interfere with part of the mechanism.

7) Subtle this one - if the burning drive is mounted vertically instead of horizontally, the burn may be done eccentric - off-center - and be beyond the tracking capability of the playback drive.

8) Trying to "Overburn" - older drives will adhere to the older standard - it doesn't how much you try and cram on the disk - if you put too much, the spiral is too tight for some drives to track properly.

9) You may have a problem with your burning s/w - I know nothing about macs, and the practical details of all the various packages out there are beyond my ken.

10) and there's a few other nasty gremilns I can't remember right now.

Robin

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 13 Apr 04 - 01:37 PM

This isn't school, thank goodness. I don't have to slog through long, jargonfraught posts looking for buried tidbits of useful information.

I'm also permitted to chat with my fellow beings.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 Apr 04 - 09:25 PM

Yes.

But if you do enjoy the state of ignorance about technical matters, and spurn offered education on such matters, then you must understand that when things go wrong you will still be in a state of utter ignorance about such matters.

There's no need to practice scales on a musical instrument either. It's too much hard work at the current moment, that only pays off in the long run by making you a better player, better able to cope with the technically more difficult passages of music... :-)

Robin
"Keep it simple, for the simple minded"

This post dedicated to Gargoyle

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 14 Apr 04 - 01:44 PM

Foolstroupe -

You, or a very few others, might be interested in a document I encountered by chance not too long ago. The "Operating Manual" for the PoINT Publisher system is online, and gives a "cookbook" description of how to process stuff for CD burning. Be advised that this is a 1,587 KB .pdf file, and has no "linked" indexing. It's actually a half-dozen separate manuals on various components of the system, for a server based CD burner that burns from a magazine of blanks, and includes provisions for printing labels direct to the CDs, using a server based printer, as they're burned. It's not the sort of thing many of us will encounter, but the "instructions" are very simple and apparently complete enough to illustrate how "the big guys do it." Probably a "casual interest only" sort of thing.

Off the track a little, but I burn far more data CDs than music, so playing them in audio equipment isn't a concern. The biggest problem I encounter is with the file naming restrictions of ISO, Joliet, etc. Especially for files with long file names, Windows systems will attempt to convert to Joliet filenames, and there are a couple of "glitches" to watch for.

There are a couple of "excluded" characters that you're not supposed to use in Windows long file names. There are a couple of different excluded characters that you're not supposed to use in Joliet filenames. There are slight differences between the two character sets. It's not clear whether the differences are entirely "in the standard" or just occur commonly in the Codex files available to implement the standard(s).

Early versions of the MSCDX codex (the little program that connects your CD to your PC) failed to correctly "read" some legal Joliet characters. Users with Win95 may find CDs with filenames that include "!" unreadable, a "technically legal" character. There are a couple of other "shortages," but the problems can usually be corrected by getting an updated MSCDX file. In general, you can only use a "leading _" in a filename if it's in the "root" folder of the CD. Any use elsewhere may make at least some parts of the CD "unreadable."

Most of the file name changes that CD burner programs suggest will not cause a problem, but if you're trying to archive something saved as a "complete web page," where there's a subfolder with linked files in it, changing the name will make the file unusable. You need to open the file in your browser, use "Save As" to change the name to something that will be acceptable without change in the burn, and then use the renamed file for your archive.

There are "plug-ins" to allow MAC and Linux etc. to read Joliet, but it's really a Mickey$oft thing (and not generally used for audio CDs?).

John

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: rich-joy
Date: 18 Apr 04 - 04:49 AM

phew!

but thanks, everybody ...

Cheers! R-J

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Stewie
Date: 18 Apr 04 - 07:09 PM

Wysiwyg, I am horrified by your suggestion (12/04: 12.30) that being correct is a sign of 'pedantry'. Putting an apostrophe in the plural of 'CDs' etc is simply wrong and typical of the ignorance and indifference that is contributing to the decay of our system of punctuation. If the publishers are joining the greengrocers and supermarket signwriters in this vandalism, it is a sad day indeed.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 12:06 AM

Robin,
Thank you for the explanation, but why are there so many words containing more than 5 letters and one syllable? I can't be gorgeous and have a technological brain as well.
The CD in question (see start of thread, above) was made at home, not by me but by a singer-songwriter friend, who sent me a copy. The postings that mention home-made recordings seem to be true in this case. I will go with that.
Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 12:42 AM

JennieG
"why are there so many words containing more than 5 letters and one syllable?"

It's called TECHNOLOGY dear! ;-)

Well, actually reading it back now - I have MMD and don't always visualise things error free when reading them back immediately (seeing only what I _THOUGHT_ I typed/cut & pasted!)
- there are some typos, some miscut pastes and quite a few bits of "Japlish" in the original text...

Since it IS a homemade CD, there are just so _many_ possible reasons in that technical jargon I posted... But you can't FIX the CD.

Nothwithstanding that though, I have heard that putting some such cranky CDs in the fridge for an hour or two sometimes 'fixes' them so that they do play - God alone knows why, I don't, but it could affect the media somehow...

1) might be mp3 format - you can check this by putting it in your PC and looking at the type of tracks.

2) if it is a RW disk, then your player is not compliant - "If you want to read back a written CD-RW disc using a CD Recorder or CD-ROM drive, the CD Recorder or CD-ROM drive must be either ReWritable playback or Multi-Read compliant." I'd guess that this may be number one suspect.

3) lots of others - may not be the correct WAV format, multi-session not single session, etc, many of these could be eliminated if the thing plays back on some players and not others. But that means much more searching out of detailed technical stuff related to each of the players you try it in.


A 'Gargoyle' style Recommendation:

If the "Muso" who gives you a self cut CD is of the technical level expertise of of 'GUEST,leeneia' above, then just throw it away! :-)

(nasty evil bastard aren't I?)

Robin

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JennieG
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 02:01 AM

Thanks for those wise words Robin - I reckon I will just accept that this is one of Life's Little Buggers and go with the flow. I'll play it in whatever CD player will accept it, and be grateful!

I'm au fait with sewing machines - know my way around them pretty well - it's audio/computer technology that has me perplexed.

Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 02:08 AM

JennieG -

If the CD in question plays in some players but not in particular ones, it's likely that your PC can read it, since PCs usually are much more tolerant of all the variables. You could copy the tracks off it, do any format conversions that may be necessary to get it "like you usually do," and burn your own new "copy" CD in whatever modes/styles/formats you've used to make other CDs that do play for you - assuming you have a burner in your computer. Or see if a friend wants to mess with it.

It all depends, of course, on how badly (or is that how goodly) you really want that particular CD to play in that particular player.

John

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Joybell
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 02:54 AM

Robin, If I put a match under the yellow bits will I be able to read them? You know like that invisible writing we used to do with lemon juice.

As to the CD problem I was told by the commercial CD reproduction company I used that about 10% of players won't play some CDs. I was also told that it is not necessarily just the newer ones. Not much help but there you go for what it's worth. Joy

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 02:57 AM

Right on John! (I should have said that!)..... :-(

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 03:13 AM

Foolestroupe -

I think I heard talk about you getting an up to date system someday. When you do that, you won't have to know all this stuff, 'cause they told me it's all automagik. (That's why they left out the driver's manual.)

John

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Barbara Shaw
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 08:59 AM

Maybe I should start a new thread with this question, but it's related, so I'll ask it here first:

Do you lose anything from the original when you burn a copy? I've been burning copies of a "master" that we got from the studio, and I'm wondering if a copy of the copy would be identical, since it's all digital. (The master is showing signs of wear on the surface).

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 09:23 AM

Well, John
Babbel (the Box) has now been upgraded to a P3 1Gb 512Mb with a couple of 2nd hand H/Ds (see - no apostrophe!) & 2 CD drives, even has a working sound card! Only 98SE at moment, but as soon as I have a few more bits screwed down - like my head - I will make the leap to XP Home - S/W sitting on the shelf now! Want to wait for that leap before I try the scanner TWAIN drivers game again... corrupted the FAT tables (needing reload of win98) last time I tried!

The trouble is that they keep on CHANGING things that I USED to know HOW THEY WORKED! Have just sorted out the MSIEv6SP1 changes to the bl**dy web security stuff... :-) Now Eudora wants to hide my email files somewhere sneaky different from where they used to put it...

I'm DEFINITELY showing signs of wear on the surface, Master !

Barbara, you should really burn a 'secondary master' to work from - when they pressed LP records they only ever pressed a few test copies from the Master, they made 'secondaries' because of the wear factor. Now with CD's being copied, the only wear is from the CD drive mechanism, but sooner or later there will be too many scratches. If you create your copy in the correct format, or have a reliable copy function in your machine (which is how I assume you are making your CDs curently) I can't see any real reason for loss of quality (quality of media itself excepted).

Robin
AKA Battel (he thinks he's in charge of the troupe!)

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Blackcatter
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 11:48 AM

Also - just because the media is digital doesn't mean that you won't loose data. No rerecording process is perfect.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 03:58 PM

Barbara Shaw -

If the CD you're copying from has picked up scratches or other "blemishes" they may copy as a change in a few bits, but you're unlikely to hear the difference in an audio copy unless the changes are extreme.

For a high volume item, where you expect to make many copies, a normal practice would be to use a "Working Master" from which you copy the "production disks," but to have a "Master Master" you can use only when you need to make a new "Working Master" if/when it shows signs of wear. The truly paranoid (or just knowledgeably cautious) would make an "Archive Master" to be placed somewhere safe and never touched unless it was necessary to make a new "Master Master." Of course, in large volume production, you would also archive at least one "representative sample" from each production lot as a "quality control sample," and a "best one" of these could be a "fall back" recovery disk.

You could, of course, copy the individual tracks from your "best" version to a hard drive, and look at them in any of the several "wave analyser programs" if you're really concerned, but this can get "tedjus." If what you have sounds okay, it would be a good idea to make a "backup" from your best source and a second "production copy" to use for making repros, and then archive the "best source" and one "first generation copy" of it.

The simple answer is - yes, the bits can change. In most cases you won't hear the difference, unless there's major damage to the CD.

I once worked for several years with an engineer who always wore a belt and two sets of suspenders, wore three wristwatches on his left arm and two on his right, and usually looked at the "pocket watch" on the belt chain to see what time it was. He always had a large calculator in a belt case and carried a smaller one in hand everywhere he went, and was never seen with fewer than eight pens in his shirt pocket (we kept office "bet sheets" on whether he'd change the number of pens). He sounded perfectly normal on the 'phone, but was a strange sight around the office - but I guess he was "well prepared."

How "perfect" do you need to be?

John

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Apr 04 - 05:00 PM

Foolstroupe -

Shame, shame, shame....

Mb = MegaBIT, MB = MegyBYTE, Which did you mean?
And where'd the "/" come from in H/D? Why not C/D's?

Just joshin' you, of course.

Win98SE is the oldest "legacy" OS that still gets some "token" support from Mickey$oft, but the little available is given rather "grudgingly." They have a large number of Win98SE users in some countries that they can't export later versions to because of export licensing difficulties, so replacement files should be available for a while, but they will not generally worry about updates or incremental improvements. Specifically, they will not issue "security updates" for Win98SE except for critical threats, which will likely leave Win98SE users much more vulnerable if/when virus attacks specific to it "leak out" of the areas where it's the only choice. Win98SE can use IE v6, and many of the security holes will get patched by keeping IE up to date, but there's no assurance that you'll stay "safe."

WinXP should not be installed as an upgrade over Win98SE. To get a reliable installation, Win98SE needs to be removed and WinXP installed "clean." A principal reason for this is that WinXP should be installed using NTFS format for at least the HD partition that has the OS on it. It is, I believe, possible to install WinXP on a FAT32 format HD, but not recommended unless necessary. An example of "necessary" would be use of an alternative OS (Linux, maybe, or a "legacy" Win98?) that can't share information from the NTFS format (i.e. a dual boot machine).

Even on a dual boot setup, you should be able to use NTFS for the WinXP partition, if you keep any "shared files" in a separate partition in FAT32. While WinXP can read/write files from/to a FAT (technically FAT16) or FAT12 (floppies and other removable media) partitions, I would recommend converting anything you "carry over" to the WinXP system to FAT32. (Win98SE does work quite well - maybe better - with FAT32, but cannot read NTFS.)

Since the cleanest installation of WinXP actually or effectively includes a reformat of the OS partition, you should move all your data files, and maybe some "legacy" programs to one your new hard drives - not the one where you intend to install WinXP. Reinstalling any legacy programs after WinXP is in place would of course be the more reliable method, and reinstalling may be the simplest way of getting the off the OS drive now.

With your new CD burner (one of your 2 CD drives is a burner?) you could archive data files to CDs, but you need to be very cautious about relying on CD archives-from-HD for program files. Your burn program is quite likely to change a few file names to conform to the Joliet structure. This is not likely to cause a problem with data, since the file extension should never change, and the "new name" will usually be recognizable; but it can make program files unusable.

If you convert your Win98SE drives to FAT32 first, you may be more successful at installing WinXP as an "upgrade" over Win98SE, but it's not the recommended method. You should, of course, check out the installation instructions that came with your package, and hit the Mickey$oft WinXP "users' site" for current recommendations. They did have quite a bit of stuff on installation there, last time I looked. (Clicky not handy at the moment, but I can pull it up if you need it.)

John

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 28 Sep 04 - 06:01 AM

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Oct 04 - 03:41 PM

Why do burned CD-R's purposefully left "open' to furthers sessions, refuse to allow more sessions to be written to them?
This is true of my Toast 4.1.2 and a friends DirectCD software.

Are we doing something wrong?

J.C.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 13 Oct 04 - 03:46 PM

probably. I've never had problems writing to an open CD unless it was full or unless I had made a mistake on an earlier session and the CD was actually closed.

Note: some directCD software will close a CD when the CD is removed REGARDLESS of choices in your menu.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Oct 04 - 04:11 PM

If the program has automatically closed the CD, as Mmario suggested, there might be a facility for opening it up again, if you have a look around, JC.

Say what software you are using and so forth, and someone on the Mudcat might be able to advise.

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Bill D
Date: 13 Oct 04 - 05:03 PM

I have mistakenly tried to re-write to a CD using different software. I suppose different 'burners' may not recognize each other's code...*shrug*

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 13 Oct 04 - 06:08 PM

I've got a related question --

DVDs on my brand new combo DVD & VHS player occasionally play a crackling sound superimposed on the soundtrack. The first time it happened I thought it was because it was a borrowed DVD from a household with a four-year-old, but the disc plays fine on their player. And I tried a next-to-brand-new DVD from my sister in it and got the same crackling noise. Other discs, both new and used, are fine. The disc plays fine on another player.

This is a very related question because the other day I put a brand new commercially recorded CD into the unit to listen to it and got the crackling noise, too. The CD sounds fine on my other CD players.

What gives?

Linn

Subject: RE: TECH: Why don't CD's sometimes play?
From: Hand-Pulled Boy
Date: 14 Oct 04 - 06:35 AM

I have programmed my CD player to reject shit. Sometimes this happens automatically when there is an upset on the mains supply such as a power surge. It can happen during the night when the house is in darkness with everyone in bed and you think you've turned your deck off but strange things are still happening downstairs. Once you start to think about it it's quite scary especially if you're a female living on your own. I do sympethise with you. Do you keep a baseball bat under your bed?