If you've already got a fast PC, about $1000 can buy the Yamaha CDR-100 recordable CD drive and Adaptec's Easy-CD Pro. You too could be cranking out your own music CDs with this combination. While it's certainly not easy, the pointers given here should shorten your learning curve and give you a fighting chance at mastering this now affordable technology.

Just in the last few months, recording your own CDs has gone from being a very expensive specialty operation to one that is reasonably affordable and easy. Dedicated CD recorders are still expensive (this is a legal issue as well as a technological one), but CD-R drives designed for use with a computer are now commonly available for under $1000, with some models even dropping below $600. Recently, prices dropped enough that I could justify buying such a drive for my PC. Although I had a number of standard data CD-ROM concerns, these are easily addressed by almost any such drive or software. What became more of a challenge was creating my own audio CDs, which I wanted to do from a variety of sources. In order to handle this sort of thing, you need several things: a CD recorder capable of handling this properly, software that supports it, and a good chunk of knowledge on how to use all of these items. I'll be addressing each of these three facets as we go along, so if you're interested come along for the ride; it's long and a little bumpy in spots, but I get where I wanted to be by the end.

One warning for you right at the beginning here first. Any time you copy a CD, or make a CD from copyrighted material, you run a risk of violating copyright law. Those who work with computers are used to things like being able to make a backup copy of the things they buy. This ability is specifically granted to you by most software licensing agreements; it's not something that comes inherent to anything you buy. When you copy someone else's material, even for your own use, you may very well be stepping over that line into performing an illegal action. I hate to use a nasty word like piracy, but that's what much of the software and music industry likes to call it when you copy something, especially if that copy ends up in someone else's hands. Experiment at your own legal peril; I'm certainly no lawyer, so I'm not even going to attempt to explain your rights to you, I just want to point out that they are murky in this area. Sorry about this disclaimer, but after writing the rest of this document I found that my ass was in desperate need of some covering here right at the start. I'm not the only one who has this feeling; the Adaptec software that I talk about here gives you a warning about not violating anyone else's copyright every time you go to write a CD out.

Why spend the money for one of these gadgets?

If you spend any time working with CDs, I'm sure you've thought of reasons you'd like to able to make your own. For data CDs, I've got expensive pieces of software where I'd really prefer not to have my only copy be the one I take with me when I'm traveling. I've got programs that originally came on stacks of floppy diskettes feet high that would greatly benefit from a CD release; the original publisher is no where to be found (or has moved on and has little concern for the older market).

And when you start taking about audio CDs, then I really start thinking of possibilities. I have a number of out-of-print CDs that I am interested in backing up so I can stop treating the originals so gingerly, as well as a variety of vinyl albums that will never make it to CD unless I transfer them myself. I try and keep my conscience clear by refusing to copy anything that I could buy a copy of; at the current price of CD blanks, running at least $7, it's not cost effective, anyway. There are also the usual applications people find for any recordable audio medium, like making compilations. As someone who spends quite a bit of time evaluating audio playback equipment, I know I'm psyched that I can record all of the 15 or so songs that I like to listen in order to evaluate a new piece of equipment on one easy to transport disc; I certainly won't miss taking that huge stack of CDs with me when I go to shopping for my next audio upgrade.

CD-R is the pits

Regular compact discs have their digital information encoded in a pattern of holes, usually called pits, in their aluminum data layer. What makes recordable CDs possible is a special type of CD where, instead of aluminum in the middle layer, there is a dye that can be heated to various temperatures to melt the pits and "burn" your data. CD-R mechanisms work by having a laser with multiple temperature settings. While at the typical CD laser temperature, data is merely read off the disc. Set to a higher temperature and you can burn data pits instead. Fundamental to this process is that, once you start the laser going at the write temperature, it has to keep moving and writing data continuously until it's done with the track it's writing. This means that the recorder must have a constant stream of things to write available in order to properly create a CD. Let that input stream stop for a moment, and the CD-R is ruined.

To even out irregularities in the transfer rate of data between your computer and the CD-R drive, a buffer (typically between 256K and 1MB) sits in the drive to spool out to the laser. The computer refreshes the information at the back of the buffer while data goes to the laser from the front. If this buffer ever empties, a condition referred to as a buffer overrun error, the laser keeps on writing anyway and your blank CD is turned into a piece of garbage usable as little more then a coaster. This has been one of the primary obstacles to creating CD-Rs in the past; if your computer is slow, or if the hard drive can't keep up with the incessant demands for more data, you end up with something that isn't even a very good paperweight instead of a getting a good CD. While normal CDs only run at a constant rate of 150KB/s for data (172KB/s for audio), it's trivial to get a CD-R drive that runs at 2X or even 4X that speed. Start burning things that fast, and you'll need a good computer to keep up. Keep this in mind before you drop big money on a fast CD-R drive; if you don't have the computer horsepower to keep up with it, it's no better for you then one that can only write at single speed.

Looking back

When it comes to audio compact discs, current CD-R products don't appear to be quite ready for mass consumption. Remember, the ones I picked were chosen because initial research indicated that they were the best for this task; other drives and software are likely to be even more difficult, so watch out. With some work and some ingenuity, there weren't any unsolvable problems here though, just the rough edges typical of new technology. I'd say recording your own CDs is something that is ready to do now, and the prices are going to keep falling. My own CD-R setup passes my harshest test for how much I like something: if you took it away from me and I was had to start over, I'd get another one just like it.