02/16/99

By Doug Bedell / The Dallas Morning News 

To CD or not CD? That is the question.

 If you're sitting on the fence or your answer is yes, you're in luck: Making personalized compact discs has never been easier or more affordable. But the array of speeds, brands and features now available to computing enthusiasts is enough to set heads spinning.

 In the last two years, prices for computer peripherals that record CDs have dropped to Earth from the heavenly $1,000 territory. They range between $170 and $800, making decisions on equipment options important. The alphabet soup of choices is daunting, too: CD-R or CD-RW? IDE or SCSI?

 But confusion can be assuaged. Each option has a particular purpose or advantage. The amount you pay for a recorder will depend on what kind of discs you plan to create.

 "The Number 1 inquiry is for music," said Mike Ritter, Gateway's product marketing manager. "Making CDs for your boom box is very popular. But a lady the other day called about putting movies on them, and people are coming up with all kinds of uses.

 "It opens up some very creative avenues."

 Hard data for these machines, also called CD burners, are not readily available, but numbers coming from vendors indicate some mass appeal. Sales ballooned to more than 6 million units in 1998 from about 200,000 in 1995.

 More than a dozen companies offer CD-writing add-ons for PCs and Macs. Regardless of the machine, some basic purchasing guidelines hold. If the object is to continually store and access large tubs of data, a CD-RW machine - the RW stands for rewriteable - is a must.

 If the goal is simply to record music or data once, a less-expensive CD-R is all that's needed. CD-R is short for CD-recordable. CD-Rs are WORM media - write once, read multiple - that work just like standard CDs. The advantage of CD-Rs over other types of optical media is that the discs can be used with computer CD drives or home audio CD players. The disadvantage is that they can't be rerecorded.

 CD-RWs allow you to erase discs and rewrite them, but these media won't work in all players. Blank CD-RW discs also cost as much as 10 times more than the $1 CD-R blanks.

 Both CD-R and CD-RW machines come in a host of speeds. More expensive models advertise 2X writing speed or higher. They will take less time to burn information onto a disc. The jargon is often mind-numbing. For $299 last week, you could have bought a model with "2X RW, 8X R, 24X play." It can rewrite at twice the standard speed, record at eight times and play at 24 times. But how do you compare that to the $499 Smart and Friendly unit that crows about speeds of "2X RW! 4X R"?

 Answer: Check out the software bundled with the machine. There are huge disparities in software design. Make sure that whatever package you select has software that will deliver the results you want.
 
 

Tuning in
 
 

Ronnie Neighbors of Take It Home Computers in Arlington says consumers seem most interested in the music capabilities of these computer add-ons.

 "I personally like to take two or three albums, get all of the good hits, then put them all together on a single disc," he said. "It's time-consuming. But it's fun and just nice to have."

 The advantages of CD-R technology for data storage are clear. A single disc can hold as much as 650 megabytes in a durable format readable by any CD-ROM drive. Unlike tape backups, CD-R discs are readable without conversion steps. Also, while CD drives are not as speedy as hard drives, they are fast enough for running infrequently used applications and accessing reference material.

 CD-R discs can become archives of every vital document and program from your home computer. In most cases, that can be done on a single disc using standard backup compressions. First adopters of this technology were businesses, which used CDs for interactive record catalogs, product lists, forms, and graphic and photographic images.

 Bob Freeman, a Dallas-area businessman shopping at a local appliance store, said he spent $500 on a Hewlett-Packard CD burner two years ago to produce training presentations for field engineers. Last week, as Mr. Freeman looked at the CD-ROM display, he marveled about today's cost for a similar unit - roughly $230.

 "It worked well for us, but I'd advise most people that the CD-RW option is good only for backups," said Mr. Freeman. Unless programs and documents need to be accessed and stored constantly, a CD-R machine is sufficient, he said.

 Either breed can duplicate commercial program discs such as computer operating systems and other expensive software. Copyright laws generally prohibit making copies of, say, Windows 98, for anything other than personal use.

 In the music industry, there is a widespread fear that counterfeit discs will proliferate as CD burners become commonplace at home. The industry has long expressed similar concerns, dating to the heyday of audio cassette recorders.

 Laws have been set up to protect against mass marketing by home manufacturers, and law enforcement agencies have grown increasingly attuned to consumer complaints about counterfeit CDs offered for public sale. 

Periodic rushes for large quantities of blank media trouble the music and computer software industries. As a result, computer makers such as Gateway are careful not to draw attention to ways that CD burners can be used improperly.

 "We promote CD-R and CD-RW for backing up and printing big multimedia projects," Mr. Ritter said. "Realistically, yes, I can make a music compilation. And that isn't anything that is illegal to do.

 "But it's not something we actively build into our messaging."

 Shoppers who plan to set up a CD burner themselves should first assess their computer's available resources, said Mr. Neighbors of Take It Home Computers. At the minimum, a 486-based system or Mac equivalent with 8 megabytes of random access memory and a large, fast hard drive are necessary for any of these products to work well.
 
 

Separate drive
 
 

Although you can record on blank CDs using standard IDE hard drives, many vendors recommend using a separate SCSI drive - a detachable hard drive such as Iomega's Jaz - with at least 1.2 gigabytes of free space. You'll need at least that amount of disk space to create a full 650MB CD, storing all your original files and the formatted CD material to be transferred to the recorder.

 Various CD-RW models also come equipped with video capture cards for grabbing live television broadcasts and movies. In the future, owners of CD-R machines may be able to store entire collections of MP3-formatted digital music on a single disc. At MP3 compressions, one CD will be capable of storing 30 to 40 albums worth of material.

 "Whatever you do now, get as much speed as possible," said Mr. Neighbors. "You don't want to get stuck with a drive that won't keep up."
 
 

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