James Lehman wrote:
Oh really?

Really. Do you have a copy of IEC 60908 on hand?

Are you a software engineer too!

Yes, I am.

The data on a hard drive is truly random access and because of that it can
be in any order.

"Random access" does not mean the same thing as "random order."

That's why we have things like disk defragmenters. There is
a file system in place that requires that the entire partition on the hard
drive has a format regardless of the amount of data that is stored there.

Irrelevant to the fact that an audio CD is an addressable, random
access device.

CD audio is nothing like the data structures that are stored on
a hard drive.

Might I respectfully recommend you obtain a copy of the Redbook
CD audio specification and cite the particular section that supports
your assertion?

The tracks are most definitely in order on the disk and they can be accessed
simply by moving the laser read head a certain amount to catch the stream
somewhere near the beginning of the track.

It CANNOT read arbitrarily within a CD frame, since the entire
frame is needed for CIRC decoding.

Might I respectfully recommend you obtain a copy of the Redbook
CD audio specification and cite the particular section that supports
your assertion?

CD audio was developed WAY before
anyone had the idea of putting a file format and computer data on a CD. Sure
lots of enhancements to the format have come along over the years. I'm
talking about first generation CD.

Might I respectfully recommend you obtain a copy of the Redbook
CD audio specification and cite the particular section that supports
your assertion?

And we ARE talking about "first generation," i.e., redbook
standard CD's,. i.e., IEC 60908 format audio CD's.

A reasonable summary of the principles involved can be found
in texts such as Pohlman's "Principles of Digital Audio," Ch. 9,
"The Compact Disk," and the details therein.