Creating The Ultimate CD-Burning Machine? 27
Joe Schwendt asks: "Since CD Burners have become so cheap, almost everyone has one. But there are still problems associated with them, especially the faster ones (8X or 12X). It pretty much ties up your machine during the burning process, otherwise you run the risk of creating yet another coaster. If you were going to create a dedicated CD Burning machine on a network with higher speed burners, what would that be? Is a 486 enough? How much RAM? IDE or SCSI? Is Linux the ideal burning platform, or do we still have to use something from the dark side of the force (stripped down Windows95/98/NT/2000 install)? What about burning applications? "
Re:Is this an issue? (Score:2)
-Davidu
Re:Is this an issue? (Score:1)
Remember, everyone was a newbie once. It's a tired old line, but it bears repeating.
I tend to tell folks to RTFM as well, but I do try to remember that even if we have been around for all the questions, it doesn't hurt to give the answer out one more time.
An old-timer who doesn't sympathize with your view. But I respect that you can have it. :)
Re:SCSI - spray it on everything (Score:2)
Doesn't even need to be that much. I used to burn CDs on my P75 wihout problems. I'd get occasional buffer underruns when doing other stuff at the same time, but since this is going to be a dedicated burning machine, you're not going to have much else happening anyway. Also, it was an older generation burner with a small (512K, IIRC) cache. Newer drives have 2MB and above, which should be more than enough. If you're using cdrecord, you get an additional software buffer, too, so buffer underruns are virtually unheard of.
Of course, SCSI goes without saying. You don't need anything great -- a cheap $50 card will be fine. Be prepared to pay slightly more for a SCSI burner, but if you shop around, it should only be an extra 10% or so. I even managed to find my Yamaha 4416S for less than IDE version.
SCSI - spray it on everything (Score:3)
--
Re:Is this an issue? (Score:1)
But seriously, the Slashdot crowd is a lot of people from a wide variety of bakgrounds so there are probably a lot of them who are learning something from this discussion, and many of them probably consider the discussions where you learn something to be remedial from their point of view.
When you have something for everyone, everything isn't going to be to the tastes of the one.
Depends on what you're burning (Score:1)
It really depends on what you want to burn; if your software lets you make image files, and you only want to burn one CD at a time, any computer will do. If you want to burn over the network, burn lots of tiny files, and so on, you'll need a faster computer all around and software that buffers a lot.
I've tried two 4x SCSI CD burners on my Amiga 1200 - burned two separate CDs from two different sets of data at the same time. I was still able to browse and run other software without noticeable slowdown, as my SCSI is DMA and my CD software (MakeCD) can let me set large buffers.
This is a different issue than if you want to burn several CDs simultaneously from the same source; lots of generic software lets you do that, but not many let you burn different CDs from different data.
In end, do you want to do it live over a 10-base-T network? Faster computer. 100-base-TX? Not as important. Make an image file first, then burn it? Speed is irrelevant.
BTW - who ever said that the machine is tied up while burning? You're not running a multitasking OS? I thought this was the year 2000...
Is this an issue? (Score:1)
Anyhow, I run RC5 24/7, always with enough apps open to use all of my physical RAM (Navigator, xemacs, WordPerfect, XFMail, x11amp, bash, etc.). I don't ever close anything down, or use the computer less while burning (hell, I think I was even compiling something while burning once), and have yet to make a coaster.
Maybe it's the dual processors - who knows, but I don't think this is even an issue on newer machines. Maybe with some older PIIs you run the risk of making duds, I don't know...
Besides, how often do you really burn something? Are you burning CDs twice a day, or something? Why would you need a dedicated machine for burning?
Re:Is this an issue? (Score:1)
Maybe w/o the multitasking, Win95 or MacOS can't keep up, and all of this is a big trouble, but I wouldn't know. Even when I ran NT4 (for the week before my computer had an ethernet connection), and burned a couple CDs using Adaptec's software (good stuff) - I didn't have any trouble.
While I'm talking, I'd like to third the motion that this was a stupid question. I realize this is going to sound as if I'm one of those "I-was-here-before-it-got-trendy" types - but I picked up Slashdot just about two years ago (as an hourly habit) - back when BoReD aT WoRk and Anonymous Coward (the REAL GUY) were around. I remember the articles and posts being more technical, more informative, and generally of a higher caliber.
I sympathize with the true old-timers, being a medium tenured member of the 'Slashdot Community' myself.
Re:Is this an issue? (Score:1)
Do you always get an account the first time you start reading a site? I didn't think so.
I had to pass through the ranks as a lurker, first.
In defence of IDE (Score:1)
I've been using a Mitsumi CR-4801TE (4x write, 8x read) with Linux for about two years. The only bad burns I've had have been when I've been attempting to copy 'tricky' stuff to see how difficult it was. I've come to the conclusion that having a CDR drive that can do DAO and using a /good/ CDROM drive (mine is cheap n' nasty) are about the most important factors.
Under Linux, the ide-scsi pseudo driver works just fine. I use cdrecord to write, mkisofs to create the images and gcombust if I'm feeling lazy and want a nice GUI (see freshmeat for all of these apps).
Re:SCSI - spray it on everything (Score:1)
I have a dedicated burning machine, which is a 486/100, 20MB RAM. My CD-R drive is a Mitsumi 4802TE (4x write, EIDE), with a 2MB buffer. I use cdrecord for burning, and have never seen it report a cache less than 80% full. (i.e. a 512K buffer would be fine) My point is that if it's a dedicated burning machine, you don't need a PII or SCSI...
Re:SCSI - spray it on everything (Score:1)
Since you want the best thing going, your I/O subsystem is the most important thing. Go with Plextor drives (biased after many years of faithful service and exemplary performance) and a fast drive (almost any 7200/10k drive will do, heck, even the 5400 drives now have some great media xfer rates). Get a good SCSI adapter - Adaptec, Tekram equiv have been good to me, other claim much sucess with Mylex and others. Processors are cheap, and anything over $50 (K6-2 500) is more than enough horses to burn. Memory is cheap now. More is better, but again, the law of diminishing returns comes into play. 128 MB is a nice spot, though I must say that NT is amazing happy with 512MB of registered ECC SDRAM 8^) Of course, a semi-stable platform is good. NT is my burning platform of choice, due to the Adaptec CD software. Nothing seems to match it. Plextor drives also ship a nice little util if you want to dupe discs. Quick, easy.
Mmmm... I've been a little verbose. 'Nuff said.
Re:My advice... (Score:1)
Then I took that same CD-RW and put it in my P75 with SuSE linux. mkisofs+cdrecord is powerful, and works on a text-only telnet connection. I've never had a buffer underrun because cdrecord lets you know the status of the fifo so you can kill other processes if the fifo starts emptying. And it has no trouble streaming data from an NFS server, through mkisofs, and into cdrecord.
Games? Quake 2 works great in linux!
Just my $0.02 US.
486 works great for x2 burning. (Score:1)
Re:The best CD burning machine is... (Score:2)
//rdj
My advice... (Score:2)
IDE v. SCSI -- well, the snobs will berate you if you go with IDE. Now, SCSI is great, and I love my SCSI Plextors. I do all sorts of things on my SCSI NT box at my office while burning discs, and seriously, I can't remember the last time I got a coaster. The newish IDE Plextor drives look real cool, though, and you can get 'em for about $230 last time I checked... if it's a dedicated burning machine, IDE will probably work just fine for you. Get yourself a bigass IDE hard drive for stockpiling stuff until it's time to burn. And you won't go wrong with Plextor, whether it's IDE or SCSI.
So if I was you, I'd get a Pentium-class machine with a decent 10/100 card and 32mb of RAM, 64 if you have it laying around. Throw Win95 OSR2 on it with Adaptec CD Creator 3.5b (but not that DirectCD stuff) if it supports your drive; if not, be sure to grab the most recent CD Creator patch, as the 4.0 series seems to have issues (I've happily stuck with 3.5b, so I don't know the details). IDE or SCSI, you should have a decent burning box. For trickier burns, check out CDRWin and Nero, and Sonic Foundry's CD Architect program is brilliant for making audio CDs.
I'd love it if there's software for Linux comparable to CD Creator, CDRWin and CD Architect... these three programs are, besides games, of course, the best reasons I can think of for keeping an MS operating system around.
And use good quality blanks - your mileage WILL vary, so sample and test a bunch of brands with your hardware before settling on one. Personally, I'm partial to Mitsui, but I've used Verbatim blues quite a bit as well.
Good luck!
The best CD burning machine is... (Score:3)
Re:The best CD burning machine is... (Score:2)
Easy (Score:1)
Adaptec toast is probably the best burning s/w out there. That would mean that you want Mac or PC -
not like it matters anyway, because there's good software for every platform.
I assume that you want this to be economical. Well, duh, get the minimum requirements for your piece of software, plus whatever extra you can afford or want to spend.
cluestick: the more ram and speed you have, the faster it will go. the faster your drive, the faster it will go.
so, you OBVIOUSLY want to have SCSI because it is the best I/O scheme available.
i am getting tired of the rediculous ask
I move for a vote of no confidence in whoever screens the ask
...sniff, sniff... (Score:1)
here's an interesting idea for a poll - what to people do with garbage (AOL) CDs? i use them for coasters, microwave testers, things to throw at Spaz, and garbage?
anybody else?
Re:Is this an issue? (Score:1)
I just put in one about the "I LOVE YOU" suspect, which is a natural, because
I also had a ask
P166 (Score:1)
I don't know if it's the machine being too slow to handle the conversion overhead, but if I stick to 2x or if I make images before burning, it works better.
As far as software, I have had much better luck using Linux's set of tools than with any windows software. The Linux software is scriptable too, which is more convenient.
Re:Is this an issue? (Score:2)
=P
Burning system (Score:1)
101 Uses for a Dead CD (re: Sniff) (Score:2)
an appliance? (Score:1)
Re:P166 (Score:1)
Justin