making "clean" CD copies?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rusty K
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Rusty K

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Hello,

I've been having some trouble getting clean CD copies burned. The finished result is rife with little pops etc.

I have a pro burner and never had the problem with anything I've burned from scratch so I've decided that it must be a CDROM "read" problem. I read at 2x.

I'd love some input on how to insure clean copies.

Also my burner is SCSI. Shouldn't I be able to read from this unit into my computer then burn back out? I tried to select my burner as my source but it wouldn't read. Settings?

Thanks,
Rusty K
 
JustinC......

You mean slower than 2x? Damn why do they advertise "fast" if one can't get clean product at higher speeds?

I don't do so much burning that I really care what freaking speed the burner is but I do want good product?

Hey I'm not ranting at you personally Justinchannel.

Thanks,
Rusty K
 
Rusty, more info such as actual make and model of burner, burning software, computer, etc would help on this - also, what "features" are turned on, such as Auto Insert, Screen Savers, USB ports, Network Interfaces, ANYTHING that periodically asks for attention from the system - is DMA enabled for your hard drives, etc? Stuff like that - it CAN'T be burn speed, my old 200 Pentium Pro burns flawlessly at 2x, even with the screen saver enabled, and everything on that system is SCSI except the boot drive and one of the 3 CDROM drives... Steve
 
whats with peoples belief in that burning at slower speeds makes a difference? I thought that it was all 1's and 0's. ITS DIGITAL.
it either burns, or no, its not like theres varying quality. It reads or it doesn't. Its a 1, its a 0, or its nothing, and the cd doesn't work.

Is this not correct? I mean think about it, your not making an analog recording, its all digital information.

Now im assuming everyone is gonna tell me im wrong, cause i probably am. So you wanna give me some facts so i can understand why im wrong? It seems to make sense, but im probably missing out a lot of processes?
 
Hey...


I tried a German program I can't remember the name of it but it was extremely complicated to get set up. There was a data base of "CD known offsets". There is a read/write offset difference apparently from one CDROM/burner/model to the other.

The program was free but I gave up on it because the data base was so small I could never find the right pressing of the particular CD's in question.

Anyway a long story........this is a CD copying problem having to do with different offsets of the two devices.

I need alternatives if there are any out there?

Thanks

Rusty K
 
ambi said:
whats with peoples belief in that burning at slower speeds makes a difference? I thought that it was all 1's and 0's. ITS DIGITAL.
it either burns, or no, its not like theres varying quality. It reads or it doesn't. Its a 1, its a 0, or its nothing, and the cd doesn't work.

Is this not correct? I mean think about it, your not making an analog recording, its all digital information.

Now im assuming everyone is gonna tell me im wrong, cause i probably am. So you wanna give me some facts so i can understand why im wrong? It seems to make sense, but im probably missing out a lot of processes?
Click to expand...

A faster burn doesn't sound any different but it can lead to pops and skips like Rusty is describing.

Rusty, Get 'Nero' or 'Easy CD Creator' or something. As Knightfly said, any info on your actual equipment would help.
 
Audio CD-R Skips and pops are usually caused by the reader CDROM not picking up the audio data fast enough, OR you're burning at too high a speed. Reading speed doesn't matter as much as the burning speed. I've never been able to burn an audio CDR copy that reads in all CD players (old and new) at more than 4x, and my Yamaha SCSI burner is rated to burn up to 16x.

Like TexRoadkill says, try better burning software; NERO works best for me. Burn at 4x or slower.
 
Yeah, it actually can help to burn audio cd's at slower speeds. Of course, as was mentioned already, it depends on the computer, the software, brand of cd-r drive, brand of cd-r media you're using, size of buffer on drive...but what it comes down to is that if your computer doesn't have a lot of memory, or it's just generally slow, and you try to burn an audio cd at 24x on a 24x burner, with some cheap cdrs you bought at officemax, then you may hear some imperfections in the audio. If you were to try burning the same cd at 20x or 16x, it would probably fix the problem. Just because it's digital doesn't mean it's perfect. 0's and 1's get lost and out or order just like anything else. Basically, the slower you burn at, up to a point, the better chance it has of burning every 0 and 1 exactly as it was sent. All it takes is for one 0 to get lost or for it to think it's a 1 instead of a 0 for something to not transfer right.

I'd say it's not as much of an issue these days because burners are getting so fast and they have much bigger buffers on them than they used to, but it's still an issue sometimes even with new hardware. Just make sure you get good CDs (like Verbatim) and a good drive (like Lite-On, who happens to make the drives are most of the companies out there).

I'm done rambling now.

-Dinsdale
 
Ok....some of my hardware

1G Thunderbird, 512Mb RAM, XP, Nero, TEAC 4X12 SCSI burner, Delta 52X CDROM (read).

I should also add that the original CD was a mix of my bands live performance mixed and burned in club. There were some pops already present in the CD but I ran a copy and the pops seemed much more frequent. In other words my copying added to the problem. My good quality CD player also would play the original and the pops were not noticable but with the copy I made they were all audible.

My SCSI burner is considered "pro" if I'm not mistaken. I know that I have to look for "pro" media to work with it.

Actually a lot of the copied CD's my band members have been passing around have these pops in them. I attributed them to consumer quality burners and or media. I would like to work out this problem for this whole group of puter illiterates here once and for all....ha! what are the odds?

Rusty K
 
i have a fast computer with lots of ram, and i have a hp 9110i burner, just a regular ide burner no scsi, but its got a large 4meg buffer (or at least it was large when i bought it), it only burns at a max of 8x, and i burn everything at 8x and i've never had one problem. I don't hear any extra pops or skips added.
how could it add pops and skips? cause the burner is trying to burn information faster than it can be fed to it, so it has some pops and skips when writing?

Maybe its cause i burn at 8x, thats not tooo fast, and i have a large buffer and a fast computer that i have no problems...

Hey, rusty, maybe its your SCSI controller thats too slow? Maybe the info isn't getting there fast enough.
 
ambi,

I burn at 2x all the time.....?

For everyone.....the German program I mentioned before was called Exact Audio Copy. To reiterate, the program was designed to adjust for the read/write offset difference between one brand/model and another. Obviously someone saw a problem and designed a program and a data base to fix it? I'm also hearing that there is a problem not just with my copies but with other copies from other computers.


Rusty K
 
Rusty, are you burning from the Delta CD-ROM to the TEAC?

I've found the most reliable way of burning audio is to always burn from the hard drive, to the CD-RW. If you are going CD-CD try going from the hard drive instead. You will need your wav files or extract an 'image' to the hard drive from your Audio CD, and then burn from harddrive to the TEAC.
 
Hey Emeric,

Yes.....good advice! I've never had a problem from the hardrive. It's reading if from the Delta that's problematic.

Technically then this would no longer be considered copying or duplicating?....Who cares as long as the job gets done well.

Rusty K
 
Or check out a Plextor. Supreme burning performance with little or
no BLER's and capable of producing both Red & Orange book standard c/d's!
 
c7sus,

Are we talking about the same program? I didn't remember those features but like I said it was hell for me getting it set up, I never did. I didn't have access to any CD's to speak of. I even went to the library to try to find the right pressing of the CD's listed in the data base.

Anyway I'm not sure I need to actually make copies if I just burn from the HD like Emeric suggested.

Misterqcue,

As far as I know my burner is ok since I've never had a problem burning from the HD. The problem arises whenever I try to "read" from my CDROM....or did I misunderstand you?

Rusty K
 
Rusty K,

Here are a few tidbits of info followed by what I use.

First of all, audio data is stored differently on a CD that data files. In CD audio form, there is very little "location" information. If the CD reader gets "distracted" by the operating system (very little you can do about that) the disc has rotated a little and the reader will loose track of where to begin reading again. Data files have a lot of "location" info added in so the computer can quickly find the beginning of the data blocks.

Have you ever wondered how you can burn 80 minutes of 16 bit stereo wave data on an 80 minute CD, but you cannot archive the WAV data as a .WAV file on the same CD? That is because all the extra info the computer adds for data management. (An 800 MegaByte .WAV file is less than 80 minutes of audio).

OK. So if your CD reader misses a beat while reading digital audio, the ripping software will have a very difficult time figuring out where to begin again. Because of this, there will be a large discontinuity (jump) in consecutive samples in your WAV file. In english, a click or pop.

The software I have fallen in love with is called Audio Grabber by Jackie Frank. It has many reading modes which I use to get a "perfect" copy. I paid $25 USD for my version a year ago (shareware).

First, this software computes a checksum number for each audio track ripped. If the next successive reading of the same track has ONE BIT off, the checksum number will be completely different, thus letting me know that something was corrupted during the read. If two reads of the same track yield the same checksum number. Both reads were exacly the same and you can rest easy knowing you got a pristine, clean copy.

Second, this software has a synchronizing copy feature (slower). It reads large, overlapping, blocks of audio data. Then, inside the computer, it "realigns" the blocks and trims off the duplicate data. This is highly successful at preventing pops and clicks. Instead of the CD reader having to find the exact point where it left off reading, it is told to read a large block of audio data that begins well ahead of where the last read left off. Then the software lines up the data and trims off the excess.

This software has a lot of meaninful flexibility. It isn't too geekish and is not so dumbed down that you can't customize the ripping process. The help info was quite useful and educational.

I have archived well over 500 CDs (to mp3) with this software and do not have one complaint (famous last words).

Best of luck to you.

JJ
 
Hey Big Ear,

I've heard of Audio Grabber. I remember now when I started messing with Exact Audio Copy someone mentioned it. Thanks for your very useful input. I'll check it out.

Does it replace your normal burning software, in my case Nero?


Rusty K
 
Rusty K,

I havent checked to see if there is a version out there that will also burn the disks. My version (1.98 or something like that) does not. I use the cheap version of roxio that came with my burner. Also, I am not a big fan of all-in-one packages. Write software to do one thing and do it well.

Another feature of Audio Grabber is that it is completely self contained. No messing around with the registry or windows files. I had a couple of CDs that wouldn't read on my reader, so I burned the installed Audio Grabber files on a CD and went to a friend's house. His computer ran Audio Grabber just fine from his CD drive. No installation or dorking around was nescessary on his box. It even had all my personalized settings.

I love software that doesn't expand itself into the nooks and crannys of my operating system files. Why can't all software be written like that.

JJ
 
Big Ear,

I guess what I'm not understanding is....does AG rip the CD to the HD? If it does I've already got programs that will do that.

As I stated earlier for my purposes making a lot of copies is not usually necessary for me so burning from the HD would probably be ok. On the other hand if AG makes copies quick and easy without riping to the HD then the program might be useful to me and some of my music buddies.

Rusty K
 
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