No, RedBook has nothing to do with the errors on a CD.
ALTHOUGH - To meet compliance, there has to be less than 200 C1 errors per second average over any 10 second period AND there can be NO C2 (E22) errors on the disc. NOT ONE.
And speed wise, with most modern drives, 4X has become the standard as burning technology has advanced. Running the disc at 1X in a burner that can handle 24X+ causes a higher error rate than at 4X.
Other than that, I'm not an expert on RedBook either - What I can tell you are the obviosities - 150 frame pre-gap before track one, 300 frames between any two start markers, disc-at-once, Lead-in TOC, the usual lot.
One of the keys is documentation - If I can't positively document for a FACT that a disc is certifiably compliant and C2 error free, it's NOT compliant. There is no "reasonable doubt" here. Either you can alter the index points with frame accuracy or you can't. If you can, you can either document it or you can't. If you can, it's either C2 free or it's not.
Now, if I give a client a non-compliant disc and they make 3,000 copies that don't work and it's traced to a C2 error that I let through, or 149 frames instead of 150 on the pre-gap, I have to call my lawyer 'cuz the shite is hitting the fan.
LONG STORY SHORT - If Nero or Whatever-O takes all this into consideration, the pre-gap, the TOC at the lead-in, and it can't document it, it has no worth to me. Any reputable plant won't accept a disc without P&Q documentation, and I would never consider giving a client a master PMCD without serialed & signed PQ and error status docs. I wouldn't expect my clients to expect anything less, either.
I've been on the bad side of non-RB discs too many times - I do a lot of live theatre work. Dance companies come in a lot with discs that were burned using Nero, CD Creator, etc. Pop those into a pro CD deck and if you're lucky, they'll track in and play 2/3 of the time. Last summer I had a squad on stage in front of a couple thousand people just standing there waiting for the disc to go. We had to pull them off the stage, run into the studio (on site) and grab a consumer CD deck that was there. That deck played it. A lot of consumer decks run fast & loose with RB rules. THAT's a part of the problem. If you've got a pro Denon or Marantz deck lying around, you'll find that they're not very cooperative with a non-compliant TOC.
Anyway, I asked if they'd mind if I checked their disc after the show. I brought it into my DAW at the theatre and found out that the TOC wasn't up to specs. No pre-gap - 0 frames. That was enough to keep the deck from tracking.
WEBSTOP - There's no big "Pro vs. Amateur" thing going on - PQ editing programs are more expensive just because of what they are. Just like PhotoShop is more expensive than Paint Shop Pro. PhotoShop has CMYK working space (pro) and PSP doesn't. If you've got WaveLab and a Plextor PlexWriter drive with PlexTools, you can write, error-check and document a RedBook disc as good as anyone.
On the percentage of clients - I have clients that all I do for them are RedBook transfers. Most are home studios with either Nero, etc. or a stand-alone CD burner. All I do is bring it in, index it, document, burn & error-check it. Others are competitive cheerleading & dance squads that have had non-RedBook nightmares (mostly at national competitions). Once a disc doesn't start in front of a crowd of 15,000 people (including the competition - and the judges), you have a tendency to not let it happen again.
