Explain CD R-W drives to me please ?

[kdjoergensen]

Please let me know if I got this right:
If I buy a CD R-W drive I can do following:

- read cd's
- write CD-R's (once - no re-writing allowed)
- write CD-W-R's as many time as I like..

If I take a CD-R and store something on it (like music, or edited digital movies) and then I put the CD-R into a regular CD drive
and play back the music with no problem ?
and a CD-R which has editted movies can go into a normal DVD (which plays CD's) without problem ?
and data stored on a CD-R can be put into a normal cd-rom drive on any computer without problems ?

But CD W/R's (re-writable CD's) can only be played on CD units capable of understanding CD R-W techinques and in general I can not use these in 'normal' cd and dvd players ?

So if I buy a CD R-W drive, I would record on CD-R media for items which may be used by other peripherals (such as dvd players and regular cd players), but for normal storage, back-up, etc I would use CD R/W media ?

Did I get it correct ?

[Shinma]

Originally posted by kdjoergensen:
...
If I take a CD-R and store something on it (like music, or edited digital movies) and then I put the CD-R into a regular CD drive
and play back the music with no problem ?

and a CD-R which has editted movies can go into a normal DVD (which plays CD's) without problem ?

and data stored on a CD-R can be put into a normal cd-rom drive on any computer without problems ?

But CD W/R's (re-writable CD's) can only be played on CD units capable of understanding CD R-W techinques and in general I can not use these in 'normal' cd and dvd players ?

So if I buy a CD R-W drive, I would record on CD-R media for items which may be used by other peripherals (such as dvd players and regular cd players), but for normal storage, back-up, etc I would use CD R/W media ?



Yes, provided it has been recorded correctly.

Possibly, depends on the player and the disc used. Compatbility issue as always.

Yes, provided the session has been closed.

Not necessarily.

Generally, yes.




------------------
"I know nothing."
Cheers.

[uart]

I think what you say is mostly correct, someone who knows more than me will point it out if it's not http://discussions.hardwarecentral.com/smile.gif

I think that quite a few people seem to get a little bit of a misconception about just how difficult it is to read CDRW disks on other than CDRW drives. Many people have told me (incorrectly) that you must have a CDRW drive installed to be able to read CDRW media. In my experience just about all reasonably modern CDROM drives will read CDRW media ok. My home stereo wont read them but nearly all computers I've tried will read them ok, even some with CDROM drives as old as the 586 computers they're running with. It’s very true that some really old CDROM drives wont read them though.

Note that if you use special packet writing software, eg Ahead’s InCD or Roxio’s (Adaptec) Direct CD, then any target computer will also need special software to read the CDRW media (assuming it is inherently capable of reading it). I prefer just to use the normal multisession writing method (this means you create your CD-RW’s in exactly the same way as you create your CD-R’s) in which case no special software is needed to read those CD-RW disks on other computers. http://discussions.hardwarecentral.com/smile.gif If you use you CD-RW’s in this manner the only effective difference between creating a CDR and a CDRW is that you get the one extra option to "fully erase the CDRW" in the latter case.


[This message has been edited by uart (edited 12-18-2001).]