Section 53. Customize CD Burning Options


53. Customize CD Burning Options

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

52 Create an Audio CD from a Playlist


SEE ALSO

54 Create an MP3 CD

64 Customize Importing Options

94 Back Up Your Music to CD or DVD


One of the biggest challenges faced by Apple in bringing iTunes to Windows has been supporting all the different kinds of CD burners ( drives capable of writing data to optical discs such as CD-R, CD-RW , and DVD-R ) found in Windows PCs. Apple's Macintosh computers have traditionally used drives from known manufacturers with drivers written in-house and built into the operating system; thus it has been easy for Apple to design iTunes to support the drives used by Macs. But in taking iTunes to Windows, Apple had to develop support for dozens more drive manufacturers and models than they'd ever used before. This support is good, but not perfect; Apple can't test every possible hardware configuration to ensure that it'll work with your particular PC. You might find that your computer can produce only audio CDs that have frequent errors or that can't be read at all.

KEY TERMS

Burner A CD or DVD drive capable of creating written, or burned , discs as well as reading them. Most modern computers are sold with CD burners, and many come with DVD burners as well.

CD-R Writable compact disc. A CD-R can be burned once, and after that its contents cannot be changed. A CD-R or CD-RW can hold 650 or 700 megabytes of data, depending on the format.

CD - RW Rewritable compact disc. A CD-RW can be burned multiple times, usually up to a few dozen times.

DVD-R Writable digital versatile disc. A DVD can hold 4.7 gigabytes of data and generally costs significantly more than a writable CD. Data on a DVD is heavily compressed, making the format much more complex than that of a CD. Some DVD formats, such as DVD+RW and DVD-RW, can be written to more than once. "Dual-layer" discs cost more and can store twice as much data.


53. Customize CD Burning Options


This task describes some ways to adjust your disc-burning settings in ways that might help the quality of your burned discs; it also discusses some settings you can adjust to control the structure of the discs you create and how they sound when played .

1.
Open the Burning Preferences

Open the iTunes Preferences window (choose iTunes, Preferences on the Mac or Edit, Preferences in Windows). Click the Burning tab to display the options for burning discs.

2.
Choose an Appropriate Burning Speed

First, verify that iTunes recognizes your burner. Following the CD Burner entry should be the name and model of your CD/DVD drive. If you instead see a message such as Burner or software not found , either you don't have a burner or iTunes doesn't recognize the one you have. The good news is that you're probably not alone; you can sign in at the iTunes Discussions boards (available from http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/, or by choosing Help, iTunes and Music Store Service and Support or Help, Music Store Customer Service from the menu) and post a question regarding your burning hardware. Chances are that someone else uses the same hardware and might have tips for you.

WEB RESOURCE

http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/windows/cddiagnostics/

The iTunes for Windows CD Diagnostics site provides a way to gather technical information about your CD drive and submit it to Apple, along with your contact information so that they can get back to you with an answer.

If your burner is recognized but you're having trouble creating CDs that sound good, you might benefit from choosing a slower burn speed. By default, the Preferred Speed option is set to Maximum Possible ; normally iTunes slows down the burn process automatically if it detects errors, but sometimes this process doesn't work properly. Choose a slower speed from the drop-down menu ( 1x is the slowest, burning the disc at the same speed as it would be played).

3.
Choose a Disc Format

The default Disc Format setting, Audio CD , lets iTunes create standard audio CDs with the music burned in uncompressed CDDA format just like an album you'd buy off the shelf. Other options include MP3 CD (see 54 Create an MP3 CD ) or Data CD or DVD (see 94 Back Up Your Music to CD or DVD ). An MP3 CD lets you put much more music on a single disc than an audio CD, but the player must be able to read MP3 CDs. Not all CD players do.

4.
Specify the Gap Between Tracks

The Audio CD option has a couple of settings you can adjust. By default, the Gap Between Songs is set to 2 seconds ; you can change this to anything from no gap at all ( none ) to 5 seconds , if you prefer the way a longer pause sounds. Choose none if you want to burn a copy of a live performance where the gap between tracks would be distracting and interrupt the flow of applause from one track to the next .

Enable the Use Sound Check check box to make the audio output on the disc adhere to the automatic leveling discussed in 40 Auto-Level Song Volumes . If this box is not enabled, all tracks on the disc are burned at the original levels of the CDs they came from, which might lead to variable volume levels from track to track on a mix CD. However, if the check box is enabled and you're burning a copy of a single CD (such as a comedy routine or live performance), iTunes might auto-level the individual tracks differently, which can be just as distracting.

5.
Burn Discs Using the New Settings

Click OK to save the new burn settings. The next disc you burn, whether an audio CD, an MP3 CD, or a CD or DVD backup disc, will be created according to the settings you defined here.



iPod + iTunes for Windows and Mac in a Snap
iPod + iTunes for Windows and Mac in a Snap (2nd Edition)
ISBN: 0672328992
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2005
Pages: 152
Authors: Brian Tiemann

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