CD-R brands and my SCD system

[Psycho Punch]

I'll double post just because of that huge CDR image in my previous post, sorry.

I think I've found some good discs:

http://www.mam-a-store.com/sithapforcoi.html

Mitsui USA, 650 MB Silver dye CD-R. $31 for 100 discs. I'm just hoping it's not just some rebranded crap with the MAM-A logo on top of it, just bought it, couldn't resist. I'll report back when it arrives.

[HailingTheThings]

Ho ho! Them be it, 63min CDRs, wish they still made 'em. Well, then again, I guess they're aren't necessary, but whatevs. Just think it'd be cool to have CDRs that are the same capacity as early CD games and such.

Also, MAM-A are legit from what I've used. Haven't had any issues.

[LostFlunky]

I'll double post just because of that huge CDR image in my previous post, sorry.

I think I've found some good discs:

http://www.mam-a-store.com/sithapforcoi.html

Mitsui USA, 650 MB Silver dye CD-R. $31 for 100 discs. I'm just hoping it's not just some rebranded crap with the MAM-A logo on top of it, just bought it, couldn't resist. I'll report back when it arrives.

I saw those, but shipping killed it for me - more for shipping than for the spindle... (Canada...)

[Gredler]

I'll double post just because of that huge CDR image in my previous post, sorry.

I think I've found some good discs:

http://www.mam-a-store.com/sithapforcoi.html

Mitsui USA, 650 MB Silver dye CD-R. $31 for 100 discs. I'm just hoping it's not just some rebranded crap with the MAM-A logo on top of it, just bought it, couldn't resist. I'll report back when it arrives.

I want to order these for creating my library of Duo and FekaCD games, but am holding out for your review sir Punch

[xcrement5x]

I'll double post just because of that huge CDR image in my previous post, sorry.

I think I've found some good discs:

http://www.mam-a-store.com/sithapforcoi.html

Mitsui USA, 650 MB Silver dye CD-R. $31 for 100 discs. I'm just hoping it's not just some rebranded crap with the MAM-A logo on top of it, just bought it, couldn't resist. I'll report back when it arrives.

I want to order these for creating my library of Duo and FekaCD games, but am holding out for your review sir Punch

Me too.

[Psycho Punch]

Order Status:   Will ship within 24 hours.

[chemdream]

Late reply, but +1 for Taiyo Yuden CD-Rs.

We used them for audio masters, back in the day. They actually have less read errors than pressed CDs.

[Psycho Punch]

ATIP Information:
Disc ID: 97m27s58f
Manufacturer: Mitsui Chemicals Inc.
Start Time of LeadIn: 97m27s58f
Last Possible Start Time of LeadOut: 74m05s13f

edit: results here:

The results were not perfect but at least the drive didn't sound like it was dying all the time like when I used a cheap CDR for testing. Skip was minimal (there's one in the video and it was the first time it skipped with me) and I think the loading times were a little bit slower (DD2 owners please chime in!). Written 10x in a cheap notebook burner, maybe a decent burner might get better results, or another console.

Master EDIT: My burner is bad. SCSI errors aren't caused by CDR for the most part!
I can't do accurate tests, but the video above was my best burn. I'll see if I can find a decent drive here later, but I think that going for GOLD MAM-A or That's (Taiyo Yuden) discs are better options.

[HailingTheThings]

^ Get a Plextor.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00VPK9S7K?keywords=plextor%20cd%20writer&qid=1444770956&ref_=sr_1_2&sr=8-2

This is the one I've been using, haven't really had any issues so far. Only thing I don't like is that I can't burn any slower than 8x. Also, probably can find one cheaper than the one I linked.

[Psycho Punch]

Yeah I think that also maybe my Duo isn't calibrated well enough for CDRs. I'll look at getting one of that drive but I think I'll be stuck with only pressed CDs for a while.

[HailingTheThings]

Yeah I think that also maybe my Duo isn't calibrated well enough for CDRs. I'll look at getting one of that drive but I think I'll be stuck with only pressed CDs for a while.

*sadness*

You think your Duo would play burns if Playboy publicly announced that they were joking about "No more nudes?"

[kosko99]

For my DUO-R I use the common Verbatim ones you can find on every place:
/cdr-verbatim-tarrina-25uds-52x-1.gif

Just loads and sounds as if it was an original (tried to compare the same game original and burned).

[Psycho Punch]

^^
I'm starting to believe that it's more of a matter of Laser calibration than anything else. I'll try to open mine up and mess with the pots.

[NecroPhile]

Pretty much.  There is a measurable difference in reflectivity between different brands, but even the best cdr ever made won't work in some machines without pot adjustments or a new laser.

[SignOfZeta]

I never pay attention to the brand and everything I've ever tried has worked fine, this is across the one IFU setup and the two Duos I've had...also Saturn, PlayStation, Dreamcast...

Occasionally there is a read error, not often, they skip easier if you bump the system, but I've never had any issues completing entire games on CD-R. I never even heard of people having problems with CD-Rs in game systems until people started talking about it here a few years back.

This thread has made me think I should stock up on good CD-Rs though. It's a format with not a lot of life left in it, and usually when that happens the choices start getting worse and worse and the format makes its way to total obselecence, like trying to find a decent blank VHS after 2000.

[Koop]

For my DUO-R I use the common Verbatim ones you can find on every place:
http://www.pasadeotros.es/images/productos/cdr-verbatim-tarrina-25uds-52x-1.gif

Just loads and sounds as if it was an original (tried to compare the same game original and burned).

For what it's worth in my ASUS DVD burner drive (DRW-24B1ST) I got graphical glitches all day long using the same disks. This drive however could only go as low as 32x burn speed so I think it had a big impact.

I too am leaning towards burner quality as I cross referenced on some forums and was pointed in the direction of getting a better burner (funny enough they recommended the drives with an NEC chipset, go figure).

This is the drive I ordered
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00H2GTXKS

I wanted a blu-ray player anyway, and if it doesn't work out I have flexibility with amazon for a return. I'll report back on any difference this drive will give me.

[Psycho Punch]

Now my laser is stuck. Thanks, Feena.

OK I'm forced to open this bitch up. Do I need an oscilloscope to calibrate the laser?

[Psycho Punch]

This thread has made me think I should stock up on good CD-Rs though. It's a format with not a lot of life left in it, and usually when that happens the choices start getting worse and worse and the format makes its way to total obselecence, like trying to find a decent blank VHS after 2000.

That's actually a great idea. Even Taiyo Yuden left the market as far as I know, and I'm not sure if Mitsui will keep manufacturing discs, even the "Medical Grade" ones, so it's good to have a stock of good CDs. Unfortunately technology moves forward and old stuff is forgotten, we are just lucky that CDs are insanely expensive (imagine finding someone that can record or backup Laserdiscs nowadays).

[kosko99]

For my DUO-R I use the common Verbatim ones you can find on every place:
/cdr-verbatim-tarrina-25uds-52x-1.gif

Just loads and sounds as if it was an original (tried to compare the same game original and burned).

For what it's worth in my ASUS DVD burner drive (DRW-24B1ST) I got graphical glitches all day long using the same disks. This drive however could only go as low as 32x burn speed so I think it had a big impact.

I too am leaning towards burner quality as I cross referenced on some forums and was pointed in the direction of getting a better burner (funny enough they recommended the drives with an NEC chipset, go figure).

This is the drive I ordered
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00H2GTXKS

I wanted a blu-ray player anyway, and if it doesn't work out I have flexibility with amazon for a return. I'll report back on any difference this drive will give me.

I can't remember now since it's been a while when I burned the last pce game... but it was between 16x and 24x minimum.

[vacantplanets]

I'm not going to lie: I play CD-Rs. Often it's of games that I actually have real copies of. Often enough, it's not. Let's just say I'm doing my part to keep market prices low. No, don't thank me.

Anyway, in the past, I always used TDK CD-Rs with green bottoms burned at 8x. I wish I could tell you exactly what type of dye they use, but at the moment, I can't. Anyway, in my two Duo-RXs, these have always done fine. The systems never seemed to have more trouble reading them than they did real CDs, and the drives never sounded like they were struggling or anything. After hundreds of hours of CD-R gaming, I can't detect any signs of deterioration in either of them.

However, I recently got a Super CD system, and a different phenomenon with it was instantly obvious. When playing my TDK CD-Rs, the drive will occasionally emit a weird "thunk" like sound when it seeks something. Interestingly, this is not accompanied by a noticeable delay in reading the track, as sound tests from certain games seem to prove. However, it happens quite often. In my TDK CD-R burn of Dracula X, the "Op. 13" track in the sound test almost always causes this thunk to happen, especially if I play it after playing a different track later on in the CD.

So, maybe the Super CD system just doesn't like CD-Rs? That's what I was thinking. I was even resigning myself to never playing CD-Rs with this particular console. But then just for the heck of it, I burned a couple of other CD-Rs using my recently purchased, blue-bottom Taiyo Yuden CD-Rs at 16x...

The "thunk" sound doesn't happen with the Taiyo Yudens.

Now, maybe the cause is the 16x burning, or maybe it's that I'm using a different burner from when I burned the TDKs. Unless I buy some TDK CD-Rs again, I won't be able to properly isolate the problem. Anyway, this is a relief, as I can now go back to playing my favorite shooters with the audio tracks pre-amplified (if you haven't tried this, you should).

I do know that the effect of CD-Rs on these old systems is something that people around here worry about a lot. A popular theory is that CD-Rs cause the laser to work harder in order to focus and read the data. It sure seems reasonable to me that subjecting my SCD to 10,000 "thunks" might cause some real mechanical trouble. However, given the ease with which it's reading these Taiyo Yudens, I'm going to keep on playing CD-Rs. It just means I have to reburn some things.

If you have experienced trouble with CD-Rs on your system, and you aren't scared of ever trying them again, I really do recommend spending a few dollars and trying some different brands, and possibly even experimenting with different burners and burning speeds if you can. FWIW, it has always seemed to me, whether making CD-Rs for this system or for others, that the brand is the most important factor.

I guess that's all. I'm off to do some burning!

(I didn't read the entire thread.)

As others have said, the 650MB Mitsui, MAM-A or Taiyo Yuden CD-Rs are ideal. Also, here's something that I'm not sure if anyone mentioned--you actually don't want the gold ones because the silver ones perform better due to being more reflective. I found conflicting information on this so I e-mailed MAM-A and that's what I was told. The gold ones are for avoiding corrosion and having a long shelf life when storing/backing up data. If you can't find silver ones for whatever reason, the PhthaloCyanine gold ones are second best so avoid the green and blue (Cyanine and Azo) ones. Remember to check the speed rating too. Look for CD-Rs that are specifically made for low speed.

Here's another source: http://www.sincom.com.au/CD%20and%20DVD%20Media%20Info.pdf
"A gold or silver reflective layer is applied under a vacuum. This layer reflects the laser beam when reading the
CD. For economic reasons, silver has gradually replaced gold so as to reduce the cost of the end product as
well as increase the reflectivity.
Nevertheless, CD-R s with silver rather than gold layers have a shorter lifespan. "

I use my old laptop (from 2007) to burn my games at 4x with ImgBurn. I think all of the PCE drives are only 1x so you really want the lowest possible. Buy an old burner made for the low speed if you have to.

SamIAm, I'm dying to hear about amplifying the audio tracks! Can you elaborate?

[SignOfZeta]

Obviously silver reflects more than gold. That's just...basic physics. Silver is colorless, therefore absorbs no specific spectrum. 2nd graders know this.

The question is if it matters or not in any relevant way. After all, CDs don't just act like a mirror. They need pits and lands both, ie: variation in reflectivity. If reflectivity of lands is increased, great, but if it reduces the opacity of pits all you did was move the operating band over a bit. The amplitude of the signal will be the same.

FYI; when I talked up there about how every system I've ever owned plays CD-are without problem, I didn't mention that most of my CD-Rs are the green/blue ones.

[SamIAm]

SamIAm, I'm dying to hear about amplifying the audio tracks! Can you elaborate?

You're in luck, because I made up a little guide about this:
https://www.pcengine-fx.com/forums/index.php?topic=19673.0

Enjoy!

[vacantplanets]

SamIAm, your guide is genius and I will be doing that to a lot of games! Thanks!

[NightWolve]

Obviously silver reflects more than gold. That's just...basic physics. Silver is colorless, therefore absorbs no specific spectrum. 2nd graders know this.

The question is if it matters or not in any relevant way. After all, CDs don't just act like a mirror. They need pits and lands both, ie: variation in reflectivity. If reflectivity of lands is increased, great, but if it reduces the opacity of pits all you did was move the operating band over a bit. The amplitude of the signal will be the same.

FYI; when I talked up there about how every system I've ever owned plays CD-are without problem, I didn't mention that most of my CD-Rs are the green/blue ones.

"obviously" "2nd graders know this"

Wow, do you always put people down? Do you just have sand in your HuCard slot or do you always talk to everyone like that?

Heh. That's just SignOfZealotry, that's how he rolls. Not only that, he especially likes to throw pennies at the freshmen, so there's that too. ;) However, I do you think you're overreacting a bit.

[SamIAm]

Obviously silver reflects more than gold. That's just...basic physics. Silver is colorless, therefore absorbs no specific spectrum. 2nd graders know this.

The thing is, this would only be applicable if the laser were using white light. What matters for a CD and any other optical medium is how well it reflects a single color, not all colors.

Wikipedia says that CD player laser wavelengths are 780nm. Since the spectrum visible to humans ends at about 750nm, it's pretty much impossible for us to judge how easy it is for CD lasers to read a given type of disc based on how we perceive its color alone. This probably has something to do with why those black Playstation discs work.

EDIT: Looking into this a little bit more, I found this chart:


Pretty interesting. Silver is more reflective as a whole in the general visible spectrum, but gold is slightly more reflective in the red and infrared spectrum.

Apparently, DVD players use 650nm lasers, and blu-ray players use 405nm. Therefore, a blu-ray player would have an easier time reading a silver disc, while DVD and CD players have a slightly easier time reading gold. Perhaps the reason why the MAM-A representative told vacantplanets that silver is better is because it's a good catch-all.

Of course, we're only talking about pure elements here. Who knows what happens when you start getting into all the different chemical compounds out there?

Meanwhile, it's ironic that aluminum doesn't look very good on that chart. I suppose that the reason why pressed aluminum discs read better is because of better contrast between pits and better uniformity in the way the pits are strewn about the disc.

[vacantplanets]

This is crazy. I just got schooled by the gurus over at http://club.myce.com/. That forum is packed with data on CD-Rs, drives, burning, reading, testing, etc.

1. The only thing that is important is figuring out how to create a good quality burn. It's the "result of the right drive, with the right firmware (usually the latest, btw), with the right media, with the right writing speed, with the right software". The key is to figure out which speed your specific drive performs best at when burning in order to create the best burned CD-R. (You might be able to look up your drive's test results at Club Myce.) Lower burn speeds do not always mean a better burn. It seems that they recommend moderate burn speeds, not too fast and not too slow. For example, I'm going to try 16x and compare it to 12x and 24x using Nero CD Speed to test my burned CD-Rs.

2.  The fact that the console has a 1x drive is irrelevant. The read speed of the drive doesn't matter at all when worrying about compatibility or performance.

3. ImgBurn and Taiyo Yuden CD-Rs are both recommended at Club Myce.

4. To test and compare the quality of your burned CD-Rs, use a free program for scanning, Nero CD/DVD Speed. BUT, the accuracy of the scan is determined by the drive in your computer.  The drive in your computer is probably the most important aspect of this discussion! They have done extensive testing of drives at Club Myce. You can go there and find out which drive you need for the highest quality burned CD-Rs. I haven't gotten this far.

5. Finally, I also learned that we don't have to worry about damaging the drive with a low quality burn. Lots of people think (assume?) that using CD-Rs is somehow bad for our consoles.

Source:
"Matching burn speed to the read speed of your ancient CD drive in your console is not the correct way to think about the problem of compatibility. Burning a compatible CD means matching the type of disc, the disc burning strategy in the firmware, and the burn speed in an optimal combination for any particular burner. Now, that's a general description, but it means that you often have to experiment to find the best settings and best media for any burner you have. And the very slowest speeds do not always produce the best burns.

We do tend to recommend TY media, as it has been consistently good for a long time. There are other good blank discs however, and Albert mentioned a couple earlier.

Silver reflective layers should be very good, but if you are archiving data for decades, you might want to use gold, which does not tarnish. For most purposes, a gold reflective layer is not needed, and just because a disc uses gold for this layer does not mean it is good in other respects, like the dye formulation, or the quality of the construction (bonding). These other considerations will often be more important and negate the supposedly high quality, "archival" designation of the gold discs.

I'll let someone else discuss the various qualities of the dye formulas with you."
--Kerry at Club Myce

"There's the reflective surface, which is physically made of gold, silver, aluminum, and/or other alloys, which will produce part of the effective color you see on the bottom of the disc in many cases. Effectively, every reflective surface that's not gold will just be silver in "color" and will not contribute to the overall color you see on the bottom of the disc. Gold, however, will have an effect similar to mixing yellow + any other color in the read world.

There's the dye used, which when paired with the average silver-colored reflective layer + clear plastic used to make the disc is what typically gives you the overall color. For CD-R, the color of the dye can be deep blue, light blue, green, or light green in most cases. None of the dye types you run across are really clear, though some are fairly light in color.

There's the substrate (I'll call it plastic) put on the bottom. This may be clear (most popular), jet black, yellow, or any of a variety of eye-catching colors. Yellow: Some manufacturers in early days used yellow substrate to give the illusion of discs made with a gold reflective layer, but now it's just another hue for discs meant to look fun or unique with no performance difference. Black: There have been discs with black bottoms sold. Occasionally they have been proclaimed to have superior performance, but the top CD-R manufacturers (in terms of quality) never put any emphasis on use of a black substrate, and it too is regarded as just another color option. Clear: the most widely used substrate is the default clear option. It's what's used on pressed CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, and all that. Given that this is the most widely used "color", it means that when you see most discs, the color comes from the dye (and, if a gold reflective layer is used, the gold).

All this put together:

--Don't expect to have a perfectly silver CD-R. There's going to be a color, however slight it may be.
--If you get a CD-R stated to have a gold reflective layer, it will be obvious that it's gold, and that the manufacturer hasn't faked it with yellow substrate. The color will likely be a pale yellow on the edge of being a pale green (depending on how you view the disc), not a sharp yellow which obscures the color of the dye.
--(I think I'm repeating this point but) Gold reflective layers have a slightly lower reflectivity than silver-colored reflective layers. Beyond that, reflectivity shouldn't change much due to dye or anything else, so any other colors won't matter as much.
--As you mentioned, the dye used will potentially affect results. But you should be going less for dye and overall quality...and each of the dye types you mentioned (AZO, cyanine, phthalocyanine) has been used in quality CD-R from one manufacturer or another in the past. (Verbatim/MKM, Taiyo Yuden, TDK, FTI using TDK tech, Ricoh, Hitachi-Maxell...none use or used the exact same dye formula as the others for discs they produce/produced. I'm sure even FTI has slightly tweaked the tech they got from TDK for their discs.)
--The best CD-R discs you can get will be, when viewed from the bottom, green (green/light green dye + silver-colored reflective layer), blue (light blue dye + silver-colored reflective layer), or for certain uses golden (pale dye + gold reflective layer). Certain old CD-R might combine gold + darker blue dye, but unless you stumble upon rare media, this isn't necessarily something you should expect to see."
--Albert at Club Myce

[CrackTiger]

It's neat that Clube Myce scolded PCE fans because they believe that we are just theorizing about the issues of playing cdrs, but some of their blind theorizing and wild assumptions about the PCE were disproven back in the 90's.

[wilykat]

In the meanwhile I am playing Ys IV from a cheap store branded (Staples) CD-R that has cyan colored bottom burned at 52x using my BD burner which hasn't seen firmware update in 2 years.

Sometimes it just works.

[vacantplanets]

Hah, I don't understand--I thought I brought good news. We don't have to worry about this stuff anymore. We don't have to worry about CD-Rs hurting our systems (because they can't), burning at extremely low speeds, etc.

[crazydean]

I have actually made several coasters trying to burn at 4x (my drive's slowest setting) because that's what I was told to do. Also, the music used to go out sometimes. I moved it up to 8x, and now I have zero problems burning with ImgBurn.

[NightWolve]

I have actually made several coasters trying to burn at 4x (my drive's slowest setting) because that's what I was told to do. Also, the music used to go out sometimes. I moved it up to 8x, and now I have zero problems burning with ImgBurn.

That's fine, but isolated cases like that don't discredit the general principle that burning at the slowest speed is generally better. The slowest speed that the CD-R says it supports and that the drive can support as well, both much match, along with using competent software like ImgBurn. It simply is generally more effective and that's why universal advice is formulated around it.

When ImgBurn loads up a CD-R, it reads a bunch of data that the manufacturer burned in which you can view when you look at the device tab. Here's an example from one of my el cheapo CD-R brands:

Disc Information:
Status: Empty
State of Last Session: Empty
Erasable: No
Free Sectors: 359,847
Free Space: 736,966,656 bytes
Free Time: 79:59:72 (MM:SS:FF)
Next Writable Address: 0
MID: 97m27s06f (Digital Storage Technology Co.)
Supported Write Speeds: 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x

As you can see, there are only 4 supported write speeds with 8x being the minimum, so that's the speed that you're gonna set the drive to! If you set your drive lower to 4x, either it ignored you and forced the speed to 8x (which it should), or it obeyed the command, set the drive to that speed, burned it anyway, and the result was a coaster.

Now if your CD-R actually states it supports 4x, normally that'd be best, but if you found your particular drive produces coasters with it and works better at 8x, that's an isolated case. People telling you to burn 4x in the general sense in principle meant the slowest speed that the CD-R and drive can support. Nowadays, the slowest speed is 8x on CD-R brands.

Here's data from the other el cheapo CD-R brand I use:

Disc Information:
Status: Empty
State of Last Session: Empty
Erasable: No
Free Sectors: 359,843
Free Space: 736,958,464 bytes
Free Time: 79:59:68 (MM:SS:FF)
Next Writable Address: 0
MID: 97m15s17f (Ritek Co.)
Supported Write Speeds: 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x

The minimum/slowest burning speed for this one is 16x. Using other speeds, IF the drive allows it, against what the manufacturer tells you is supported, well, it's not a good idea... You should be paying attention to that information in case the drive or burning software doesn't do so for you!

[vacantplanets]

I have actually made several coasters trying to burn at 4x (my drive's slowest setting) because that's what I was told to do. Also, the music used to go out sometimes. I moved it up to 8x, and now I have zero problems burning with ImgBurn.

That's fine, but isolated cases like that don't discredit the general principle that burning at the slowest speed is generally better. The slowest speed that the CD-R says it supports and that the drive can support as well, both much match, along with using competent software like ImgBurn. It simply is generally more effective and that's why universal advice is formulated around it.

When ImgBurn loads up a CD-R, it reads a bunch of data that the manufacturer burned in which you can view when you look at the device tab. Here's an example from one of my el cheapo CD-R brands:

Disc Information:
Status: Empty
State of Last Session: Empty
Erasable: No
Free Sectors: 359,847
Free Space: 736,966,656 bytes
Free Time: 79:59:72 (MM:SS:FF)
Next Writable Address: 0
MID: 97m27s06f (Digital Storage Technology Co.)
Supported Write Speeds: 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x

As you can see, there are only 4 supported write speeds with 8x being the minimum, so that's the speed that you're gonna set the drive to! If you set your drive lower to 4x, either it ignored you and forced the speed to 8x (which it should), or it obeyed the command, set the drive to that speed, burned it anyway, and the result was a coaster.

Now if your CD-R actually states it supports 4x, normally that'd be best, but if you found your particular drive produces coasters with it and works better at 8x, that's an isolated case. People telling you to burn 4x in the general sense in principle meant the slowest speed that the CD-R and drive can support. Nowadays, the slowest speed is 8x on CD-R brands.

Here's data from the other el cheapo CD-R brand I use:

Disc Information:
Status: Empty
State of Last Session: Empty
Erasable: No
Free Sectors: 359,843
Free Space: 736,958,464 bytes
Free Time: 79:59:68 (MM:SS:FF)
Next Writable Address: 0
MID: 97m15s17f (Ritek Co.)
Supported Write Speeds: 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x

The minimum slowest burning speed for this one is 16x. Using other speeds, if the drive allows it, against what it tells you it supports is not a good idea...

ImgBurn can't always get that information from every CD drive. For example, it does with my desktop, but doesn't with my laptop. Even if it could, it wouldn't matter because those are the speeds that the drive's firmware supports, therefore it's impossible to burn at a speed that isn't listed there. If you try, this will happen:
(From ImgBurn)
"W 02:20:52 Write Speed Miscompare! - Wanted: 2,117 KB/s (12x), Got: 2,823 KB/s (16x)
W 02:20:52 The drive only supports writing these discs at 16x."

From http://www.digitalfaq.com/guides/media/dvd-media-concepts.htm :
"Myth of burning slower. Discs are made to perform at an ideal rotational speed, which is where write strategy originates. The disc will perform best up to a certain speed, and the drive will not permit any faster. The inverse is the same, but until recently, drives would not prevent unreasonably low speeds. Modern human nature tends to want more speed and more power, so this was not really a concern.

But believe it or not, there are still people who insist on waiting 55-60 minutes to burn a CD or DVD at 1x speed, because they are convinced anything faster will yield a bad or "lower" quality burn. However, burning too slow is often just as bad as burning too fast. Because of this unreasonable impulse to go too slow, some discs and drives now block out the lower range too (and causes problems, see the 16x section for more).

There was some truth to that statement in the beginning, (circa 1995 for CD-R, 2001 for DVD-R), but those days are long gone. The only reason that myth ever held truth was because 2x was the fastest speed, and burning a single full or half speed under the maximum rating is helpful on lower quality blank CD/DVD media. If you are worried about quality, or if the media tends to be dodgy quality at the maximum rated speed, then burn a full or half step slower. No more. With a 8x disc, for example, a burn speed of 4x or 6x would be optimal.

Read more: http://www.digitalfaq.com/guides/media/dvd-media-concepts.htm#ixzz3pkONHzNF "

Here's the way I understand it. You want to pick the middle speed or half of the max speed. I've read this from multiple sources. Back in the day, if you had 8x capability for example, you'd say 4x and you'd be right--this is how this got started. I think people continue to say 4x without realizing where that number came from.

[NightWolve]

ImgBurn can't always get that information from every CD drive. For example, it does with my desktop, but doesn't with my laptop. Even if it could, it wouldn't matter because those are the speeds that the drive supports, therefore it's impossible to burn at a speed that isn't listed there. If you try, this will happen:
(From ImgBurn)
"W 02:20:52 Write Speed Miscompare! - Wanted: 2,117 KB/s (12x), Got: 2,823 KB/s (16x)
W 02:20:52 The drive only supports writing these discs at 16x."

From http://www.digitalfaq.com/guides/media/dvd-media-concepts.htm :
"Myth of burning slower. Discs are made to perform at an ideal rotational speed, which is where write strategy originates. The disc will perform best up to a certain speed, and the drive will not permit any faster. The inverse is the same, but until recently, drives would not prevent unreasonably low speeds. Modern human nature tends to want more speed and more power, so this was not really a concern.

But believe it or not, there are still people who insist on waiting 55-60 minutes to burn a CD or DVD at 1x speed, because they are convinced anything faster will yield a bad or "lower" quality burn. However, burning too slow is often just as bad as burning too fast. Because of this unreasonable impulse to go too slow, some discs and drives now block out the lower range too (and causes problems, see the 16x section for more).

There was some truth to that statement in the beginning, (circa 1995 for CD-R, 2001 for DVD-R), but those days are long gone. The only reason that myth ever held truth was because 2x was the fastest speed, and burning a single full or half speed under the maximum rating is helpful on lower quality blank CD/DVD media. If you are worried about quality, or if the media tends to be dodgy quality at the maximum rated speed, then burn a full or half step slower. No more. With a 8x disc, for example, a burn speed of 4x or 6x would be optimal.

It's not a myth, and nobody said you must burn at 1X, the absolute minimum. It's not even possible nowadays anyways. If your CD-R's data can be detected, you should use the minimum from that data. In my case, that's 8x and 16x with the 2 CD-R brands that I listed. And most modern drives should have no problem reading all the data burned into a CD-R. Even so, your CD-R labeling gives you some info and you could google for more information.

The fact is the reflection marks on a disc that was burned slow versus fast visually look different! The faster DVD-R burns I did over the years were more prone to skipping when I went with the full speed while a good slow 8X burn worked much better in a real DVD player, and it looked consistent when it came to the burn marks when examined at the right angle.

Now if your slow burn doesn't work, move up to the next supported speed. But I've never had a coaster when burning at slow speeds. I HAVE had skipping when I burned at high speeds! So in the end, I generally choose to be patient and simply use the slowest speeds my recordable media supports! I know what my experiences are, and I had many others confirm them over the years that burned games as well.

[vacantplanets]

My god, could it be? After more investigation, I believe that I've found the end. It's called Incremental speed burning. 

From: http://www.weprintdiscs.com/index.php?page=burn-cd-with-proper-speed
"1）Understanding Incremental speeds: Incremental speed burning was developed for CD-R burning starting at 24x and has carried over to DVD-R burning starting at 8x. Incremental speed burning is actually multi-speed burning on the same disc. Incremental speed burning starts slow at the center of the disc and speeds up to the outer edge. Since physics won't allow a disc to burn at higher speeds at the center of the disc, incremental speed burning was a necessity but not the optimum solution. "

"8）CD-R Incremental Burning: CD-R 16x is the last speed that burns the same speed from the beginning to the end offering the fastest yet most compatible burn speed for CD-R. 24x up to 52x becomes a incremental speed burn and can cause issue for playback in older cd players and car stereos. 52x cd-r burning causes high levels of playback incompatibility in older CD players and car stereos."

Note: For DVD-R, 4x is the max speed that is not an incremental burn speed.

"4）The conclusion to DVD-R burn & playback compatibility problems is as simple as adjusting burn speeds to 4x for DVD-R Masters & Duplication & 16x for CD-R. 4x DVD-R / 16x CD-R is not an incremental burn speed. These are true burn speeds and are the fastest burn speeds that burn the same speed from the beginning to the end of your program. Burning at 4x allows the burned pits to be the same depth from the start of your program to the end (mimics Replicated/store bought CD & DVD) and thus offering your program the best opportunity to play back on most DVD players."

Haha, I'm still waiting for people to start posting their CD quality scan results from Nero CD Speed or Opti Drive Control.

[crazydean]

So, it seems that anything under 16x is safe enough?

Anyway, here are the specs from my disc on ImgBurn:

Disc Information:
Status: Empty
State of Last Session: Empty
Erasable: No
Free Sectors: 359,845
Free Space: 736,962,560 bytes
Free Time: 79:59:70 (MM:SS:FF)
Next Writable Address: 0
MID: 97m24s01f (Taiyo Yuden Co.)
Supported Write Speeds: 4x, 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x


I'm not sure what my burner is actually capable of. I believe it's 4x-52x. It's nothing fancy, just what came with the computer when I bought it ~6 years ago. Maybe I'm just an isolated incident, but I have noticed an improvement from 4x to 8x. Even when 4x worked, sometimes the Redbook audio would go out. I kept thinking it was the pots and spent a lot of time adjusting them. However, nothing I have burned at 8x has given any problems.

[wilykat]

Speaking of CD-R's minimum burn speed, what would happen if I dug out my older-than-dirt USB CD burner that only burns max 2x and pop in a CD-R that is not rated that low, would it always be coaster or would smart program just refuse to allow burning?

The early USB CD burner were limited to USB 1.1 speed and had max burn 2x, read 6x (if one's lucky) and re-write at 2x.  I don't know if mine still works, it hadn't been used in oh about 15 years and probably rusted out.

[vacantplanets]

So, it seems that anything under 16x is safe enough?

Anyway, here are the specs from my disc on ImgBurn:

Disc Information:
Status: Empty
State of Last Session: Empty
Erasable: No
Free Sectors: 359,845
Free Space: 736,962,560 bytes
Free Time: 79:59:70 (MM:SS:FF)
Next Writable Address: 0
MID: 97m24s01f (Taiyo Yuden Co.)
Supported Write Speeds: 4x, 8x, 16x, 24x, 32x, 40x, 48x


I'm not sure what my burner is actually capable of. I believe it's 4x-52x. It's nothing fancy, just what came with the computer when I bought it ~6 years ago. Maybe I'm just an isolated incident, but I have noticed an improvement from 4x to 8x. Even when 4x worked, sometimes the Redbook audio would go out. I kept thinking it was the pots and spent a lot of time adjusting them. However, nothing I have burned at 8x has given any problems.

Yes, but 16x is compatible so specifically 16x and lower.

I bet that if you run a quality scan on both CD-Rs with Nero CD speed, you'll see that the 8x copy is higher quality than the 4x copy and that's why it works better. Your specific CD burner just doesn't produce good burns with 4x. Every single different firmware version of every different drive model by each manufacturer performs best at a different burn speed.

[NightWolve]

Your specific CD burner just doesn't produce good burns with 4x.

Yeah. As he already found. Start low, in principle, and work your way up if there are problems, that's if this is about wanting to burn CD-Rs that'll work on old consoles with 20-something year old CD laser technology. Fast speeds are fine if the disc will be used with the computer's drive that burned it. The laser there is more advanced and can handle anything that isn't a coaster right off the bat.

It's exactly related to what was quoted:

24x up to 52x becomes a incremental speed burn and can cause issue for playback in older cd players and car stereos. 52x cd-r burning causes high levels of playback incompatibility in older CD players and car stereos.

Those 52x burn speeds will work fine in a PC's modern drive, but taking them to consoles with old-school CD readers like a Turbo Duo (which is a hacked CD player) WILL be a problem.

Burning at 4x allows the burned pits to be the same depth from the start of your program to the end (mimics Replicated/store bought CD & DVD) and thus offering your program the best opportunity to play back on most DVD players

And this pertains to my experience with DVD-Rs. It was great to finish at 16x, but the disc would only run skip-free on the computer's drive that burned it. Running it on a generic DVD player which is cheaper and doesn't use the same quality laser as a DVD burner resulted in some occasional skipping. The lowest burn speed supported was 8x, and that mostly solved the problem. And like I mentioned, if you looked at the DVD-R at the right angle, the burned discoloration was smooth, uniform, compared to when you burned it at 16x which visually looked sloppier, as in, some parts were more darker, some were more lighter, etc. The burning work gets sloppier the faster you go, it gives that appearance.