CD Burners: Computer or Stereo Component?

[J Larsen]

I've been using a Philips dual-tray stereo component cd burner for about five years now. I've also been using it as my primary cd player. Its finally starting to show signs of dying out on me. I noticed that these stereo component burners have come way down in price - there's a four tray JVC for $329 - about half what I paid for my current player.

My question is: should I just go for the JVC, or should I buy a new cd player as my primary playback machine and get a seperate burner for my computer? Thanks.

[David Williams]

Can any component burners do it at high speed? (Mine can't.) Do you want that capability?

[Claude]

I always thought those "hifi CD burners" were only for people who don't have a PC :)

A CD writer for the PC ($100) has a lot of advantages:

- it can write data CDs
- you can compile sampler CDs
- you will be able to edit the sound before burning the CD ( for example taming the agressive RVG treble)
- it uses standard CD-Rs (audio CD-Rs are more expensive here in Europe)

[J Larsen]

Yeah, my current one does 2X speed and the new JVCs do 4X speed. I never use the 2X feature on mine because when in high-speed mode, mine adds three seconds between each track regardless of how the original cd was recorded, making 2X mode unsuitable for any album where tracks bleed together (as is often the case with classical cds and rap albums).

[J Larsen]

Thanks Claude - those are all good points. I have to say that the discs burned by my Philips sound fantastic. The people I've traded with consistantly say my discs are among the best sounding cdrs they've heard. Are you getting good sound quality from your PC burner? Does any extra effort go into burning cds when you use a PC drive? Do you have to make a MP3 of the cd to be burned and then burn the MP3? I've never burned anything through a computer before. Thanks.

[David Williams]

Originally posted by Claude
I always thought those "hifi CD burners" were only for people who don't have a PC :)

Ha ha! Yes, but my original reason for buying one was to burn some LPs :cool: A component burner makes that pupsy.

[Claude]

The resulting sound quality mainly depends on the audio extraction capabilities of the drive used for audio extraction. Some drives are incapable of "ripping" the CDs in perfect quality. CD writers are often better in this.

Even if the PC can do ist faster, the CD should be ripped at max 8x speed and the resulting wav files stored on the hard drive before being burned to CD. Directly copying an audio CD from the CD-Rom to the CD writer is much more likely to produce errors. The decisive step is the audio extraction, not the CD writing. Audio CDs should however not be burned with a higher speed than 8x, because some CD players will have problems reading those CD-Rs. On the other hand actual CD-Rs (capable of 40x speed and more) should not be burned slower than 4x.

I haven't made A-B sound comparisions between original CD and CD-R copies, but I couldn't detect any flaws on the copies I use. I made CD-Rs of my Mosaic sets to restore the original album configurations and listen to those copies most of the time.

[Dennis]

I purchased the HHB-830 about a year ago primarily to burn LPs and while it is a little more expensive than mass market units (appx. 500.00 US), it has a host of great features and it sounds so sweet, I've been using it as my main playback unit as well. It does a really nice job transferring an analog source and also has coaxial and optical inputs.

[Claude]

Originally posted by David Williams

Ha ha! Yes, but my original reason for buying one was to burn some LPs :cool: A component burner makes that pupsy.

That's not the burner's fault. Most standard soundcards in PCs ($20 components) have A/D converters that are much worse than those in hifi CD recorders. But very good cards are available for $150.

The advantage of PCs in LP-to-CDR duplication is that the signal can be processed before burning.

[J Larsen]

Originally posted by Dennis
I purchased the HHB-830 about a year ago primarily to burn LPs and while it is a little more expensive than mass market units (appx. 500.00 US), it has a host of great features and it sounds so sweet, I've been using it as my main playback unit as well. It does a really nice job transferring an analog source and also has coaxial and optical inputs.

I've seen those - unfortunately they are single well machines, so if you want to burn from a cd you still need a seperate playback machine.

[Tanager]

You do not need to convert to MP3 just to get songs from one CD to another, assuming you are burning in music CD (basically WAV, as I understand it) format. In fact, you wouldn't want to introduce all the compression artifacts - you'd definitely lose some fidelity going audio->mp3->audio.

Good fast burners are cheap now, but look for a few things:

good buffer underrun software
Big onboard buffer (related to first)

I would suggest that anyone looking at buying a computer-based burner look at tomshardware.com first to get a feel for what's good, what's not, etc.

I'd also second what another poster said about sound cards - the AD converters are not exactly hifi on most sound cards. Again: tomshardware.com

[SEK]

My Pioneer PDR-609 CD recorder/player makes copies of CDs that are virtually indistinguishable from their sources. It also does a nice job recording from analog sources. As a player, the PDR-609 is lacking, compared to my NAD C541i.

I look forward to getting a new PC soon with a CD burner. In addition to making easy backups of computer data and programs, I'll be able to filter most of the pops, clicks, rumble, and other added "percussion" present in most of my CDR recordings from vinyl.

As Tanager said, Tomshardware.com is a fine computer-related resource.

[edvsys]

I have both, a Teac Burner (StereoComponent) and a 40x speed burner in my computer. I tried the Teac a couple of times but use it mainly as a cd Player and to burn live recordings from my dat recorder on cd.

For compilations I use the 40X burner in my computer, set on 8x speed, usually burning from a harddisk as described in the post before. I like the computer burner better, the failing rate is close to zero and the ability to burn compilations and mixes without a 2 second gap makes it more compatible with my needs as a DJ.

I strongly recommend the use of brand cd's like maxell. The cheap 100 disc stacks from Office Depot (or likes) are good for data storage, but don't run on every cd player and I lost a lot of them through flaws during the burning process.

[Muskrat Ramble]

Audio CDs should however not be burned with a higher speed than 8x, because some CD players will have problems reading those CD-Rs.

Other than one coaster, I've had no apparent problems burning on the fly using Nero software on my PC. The reading drive is a 48x speed, the burner is a 40/12/48 Lite-On (apparently the darling of PC hardware geeks, based on all the reviews I've seen--I love the thing, and they're inexpensive). To be safe, I usually burn at 32x instead of the maximum 40x. Again, no obvious problems. I also have a big hard disk in a high-end rig, if that makes any difference where buffering is concerned.

Clearly, I know little about all this stuff :)

[DWBass]

For my PC, I use a TDK VeloCD 48x internal burner. I usually burn at 32x and have had no coasters made so far! I can rip and burn an entire cd in about 5-6 minutes tops! That's fast!!

[Claude]

The info I have quoted is from an article of a expert from BASF (german CD-R producer).

The speed issues are not about coasters. Some CD players are said to have problems reading those fast-written CD-Rs. This is why it is recommended to burn audio CDs at less than maximum speed.

[Daniel A]

I've been considering to buy a component CD-burner, even though I've got a burner in my PC. The reason is that even if I'd get a good quality sound card, moving the turntable and pre-amp to the computer for transferring LPs is not convenient.

It may not be an issue, but I would like to think that a component burner in a normal stereo setup would be less subject of interference at the analog end than the computer sond card, as it's surrounded by a heavy power supply and a lot of other busy components.

I may still process the sound in my computer prior to burning, for example if I record the music onto CD-RW on the standalone burner, and then to CDR after processing the sound in a wav editor on the computer.

For recording from FM radio (which of course may not have that much time left) a component burner is better, because a computer close to the tuner may affect the reception, even on good quality equipment.


Probably I'll wait for DVD burners to become cheaper, though. Anyone here who knows if they can produce good CDRs as well as DVDs?

[Muskrat Ramble]

Some CD players are said to have problems reading those fast-written CD-Rs.

While I don't doubt that, I haven't had any problems using such burnt CD's in both of my computer's drives, a relatively recent stereo, and an old boom box.