Is there any evidence that quality is improved by burning audio CDs at a
slow speed rather than the more usual 16 - 52 times?

Stephen

Is there any evidence that quality is improved by burning audio CDs at a
slow speed rather than the more usual 16 - 52 times?

As I understand it, the evidence and thinking on this suggests that
the answer is "It depends."

Advantage of burning at lower speeds:

- Since the disc is rotating more slowly, it's easier for the drive's
servo tracking electronics to keep the beam focused on the
pre-molded "wobble track" - there's less risk of the beam wandering
off due to vibration. This may reduce the risk of a failed burn
(a disc which is unreadable or has an unacceptably high error rate).

- Since the data consumption rate is lower, it's easier for your PC
to keep feeding data to the drive fast enough to avoid buffer
underruns. Although most burners these days have some form of
underrun protection (e.g. BurnProof or the equivalent) there's
some reason to believe that discs burned with a continuous
data bitstream are somewhat easier for some CD players to read
reliably.

Disadvantage of burning at lower speeds:

- Many (most?) of today's CD blanks have been optimized for high-speed
burning - they use a dye which requires only a fairly short laser
exposure... the dye layer is quite sensitive (and, according to
some reports I've read, rather thin). These blanks may actually
produce a poorer-quality burn if recorded at a very low speed.

So, you may or may not get better reliability if you burn at a lower
speed - it's going to depend on your burner, the type of blanks that
you use, your PC setup, and the CD players you use to play back the
discs. Try experimenting, and see!

My personal preference is to use some of the older blanks, when I can
get them (the 74-minute type, highest speed no greater than 8x-12x),
and to burn them at a compromise speed (usually, one notch below the
highest that they can support). The results, so far, have been good.

I use modern-version blanks (high speed) and high-speed burning only
for discs which I can afford to re-burn if they don't work out well.

A couple of manufactures (Mitsui Audio Media, and HHB) seem to be
making blanks which are optimized for high-reliability, lower-speed
burning e.g. in professional and consumer CD recorders, and for
mastering applications where readability and a low bit-error rate are
of paramount importance.

--
Dave Platt AE6EO
Hosting the Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
I do _not_ wish to receive unsolicited commercial email, and I will
boycott any company which has the gall to send me such ads!

In article ,
(Dave Platt) writes:
Is there any evidence that quality is improved by burning audio CDs at a
slow speed rather than the more usual 16 - 52 times?

My personal preference is to use some of the older blanks, when I can
get them (the 74-minute type, highest speed no greater than 8x-12x),
and to burn them at a compromise speed (usually, one notch below the
highest that they can support). The results, so far, have been good.

I use modern-version blanks (high speed) and high-speed burning only
for discs which I can afford to re-burn if they don't work out well.

I've been using a 4x CD burner for quite few years now with excellent
results with all brands of media I've tried. Recently I bought a
LITEON 52x burner on sale for $20 after rebates. I've burned quite
few 48x and 52x blanks with it and no coasters yet, and all of them
play well in my home, portable, computer, and car CD players.

In article ,
"Stephen McLuckie" wrote:

Is there any evidence that quality is improved by burning audio CDs at a
slow speed rather than the more usual 16 - 52 times?

The only good tests I've seen (ones where C1/C2 error rates are measured
and reported) showed an increased error rate when burning high speed
media at slow speeds like 8x, 4x, 2x, 1x. It's hard to find media not
rated for high speed these days so it's probably a good idea to just go
as fast as you can.

There are probably at least two major reasons why this is so. For one,
the media is manufactured with different characteristics to make it more
suitable for high speed recording. The other reason is that the
recorders likely have more engineering effort invested in fine tuning
burn quality at high speeds, since that's what they're usually used at.

I'd say the most important things to do for burn quality are to use a
good recorder (look at www.cdrinfo.com's reviews for evaluations which
include burn quality assessments), make sure its firmware is up to date,
and use high quality media which works well with that specific recorder.

--
Tim

You know , whether sound quality is better is debatable, but burning slower
IS much better as far as producing a more "error free" copy. High speed
copies will sometimes cause dropped bits and generate bit errors, which can
result in skipping or mistracking by the read laser in your home or car cd
player. This can be either software or harware related, and it does happen.
Maybe im nuts, but I do hear a difference between copies of cds made on my
pc (at any speed) , and those made on my Harman Kardon home deck. PC copies
seem harsher, with more distortion, and when played back on good front end
equipment, such as the Theta Voyager, you can hear the difference. Can
anyone explain why ?, my friends say its nonsense, "its a bit to bit copy",
they say.
But in your case, if your just burning for the car, or portable use only,
try burning a lil slower and get an error free copy. Sonically it will sound
fine.

Tony.

"Stephen McLuckie" wrote in message
...
Is there any evidence that quality is improved by burning audio CDs at a
slow speed rather than the more usual 16 - 52 times?

Stephen

In article dJ2dc.92443$w54.550851@attbi_s01,
wrote:

You know , whether sound quality is better is debatable, but burning slower
IS much better as far as producing a more "error free" copy. High speed
copies will sometimes cause dropped bits and generate bit errors, which can
result in skipping or mistracking by the read laser in your home or car cd
player. This can be either software or harware related, and it does happen.
Maybe im nuts, but I do hear a difference between copies of cds made on my
pc (at any speed) , and those made on my Harman Kardon home deck. PC copies
seem harsher, with more distortion, and when played back on good front end
equipment, such as the Theta Voyager, you can hear the difference. Can
anyone explain why ?, my friends say its nonsense, "its a bit to bit copy",
they say.
But in your case, if your just burning for the car, or portable use only,
try burning a lil slower and get an error free copy. Sonically it will sound
fine.

1) Make a "slow" CD of something. Make a "fast" CD *from the slow CD*.

or

1a) Make a H-K copy of something, then make a PC copy of the HK CD.

2) Read in corresponding data from both, to your PC. Do a bit-by-bit
compare. Any difference?

Isaac