Burning CDs and DVDs

Some general notes:

CDs hold about 680 mb of data (about 90 minutes of music; 10-20 minutes of high quality video)
DVDs hold about 4 gigabytes of data (about 1.5-2 hours of high-quality video)
CD-R is the most compatible CD type.
CD-RW are rewritable, but not as stable.
DVD-R is most compatible.
Newer drives are able to read and write all types of CDs and DVDs. In a couple of years, we won't be worried about types.
Finalize the CD/DVD if you want to make sure you can read it on different computers. You will not be able to add more to it.
Finalize the just the session if you want to add more to the CD later. You may not be able to read your disc on another machine.

Note: The same software is used for the PC—Roxio Easy CD Creator. The only difference is the interface.

Burning a Music CD from an existing CD
1. Open Roxio Toast or Easy CD Creator (toaster icon on a Mac)
2. Click on Audio. (PC—Select “Music” from the “File” menu.)
3. Insert music CD into CD Drive.
4. Open CD and select all the files.
5. Drag the selected files over to the Toast window. (Bottom window in the PC version)
6. You may rearrange your selections in the Toast window.
7. Click the record button.

Burning a Music CD from music located on the hard drive.
1. Open Toast.
2. Select audio.
3. Either click the add button (+ sign) to browse for the file or drag the files to the Toast window. (In a PC, you can drag the files from the top window to the bottom window or click the down arrow to add.)
4. Click the record button.

Using iTunes to burn a CD.
1. Make a playlist.
2. Insert a blank CD into the CD drive.
3. Click the burn CD button.
Some notes about music file formats:

If you want to play your music in the car or on a consumer CD player, you often need to be sure you have files in uncompressed format (.cda, .wav, or .aiff). Some players can play MP3 or other compressed formats, but not all.
If you’re just going to play the music on your computer, either compressed or uncompressed is fine. Compressed formats vary, but the most common is MP3, a format that can be read by many different media players.
You can convert files from MP3 to .cda, .wav, or .aiff using Cleaner, but you will not regain the data you lost when you compressed the file. But at least you can play the CD in your car.

Data CDs

1. Select Data CD.
2. Drag files to the window or browse for them.
3. Click record.
Burning a DVD
Burning a DVD is very similar to burning CDs. In fact, the programs mentioned above can all be used to burn DVDs by selecting DVD from the available options. Below, I will show steps for creating DVDs in other programs.

Using iDVD
From iMovie
1. After completing your movie, click on the iDVD icon.
2. Insert chapter markers to create “scenes.”
3. Click on “Create iDVD project”
4. iDVD will automatically launch.
5. Choose your theme, arrange your buttons, and type in your titles.
6. The movie files will need to be encoded before burning. Burning DVDs from iDVD goes more smoothly if you allow the program to encode the movie before you begin burning. Check the status tab for the encoding process. When the green bar reaches the end, you’re ready to go.
7. Click the burn button. A nuclear-looking icon will appear. Don’t be afraid! Click it! Soon you’ll have your own DVD.

For more on iMovie, click here.

Using the external DVD burners
1. Record directly from video tape or from a computer.
2. Set up your movie and then press record on the DVD burner. Make sure the input is set to L-1.
3. Choose from three different recording modes. XP gets you up to six hours of video on a single DVD.
4. To make chapters/tracks, press the pause button on the DVD recorder.
5. Before finalizing your DVD, you can give it a title and titles for the chapters/tracks.
6. Note: The DVD recorder recognizes Macrovision, so some commercial video tapes cannot be recorded this way. You can digitize the video first in a video editing program.

Some other tools for creating DVDs
DVD Studio Pro--allows for up to 99 chapter markers, multiple tracks (like subtitles) and hand-designed menus.

Resources

Music sites
iTunes: accessible via the iTunes software available for both the Mac and PC. Built in to Mac’s OS X operating system; free Download for PCs. 99 cents a song.
Napster: www.napster.com--Yes, Napster went legal. For PCs only, 99 cents a song.
RealOne Rhapsody--http://www.real.com/realone/dmm/rhapsody/--for PCs only. They advertise 79 cents a song, but I’ve heard that premium songs can be more than that.

Information on CD and DVD burning

Andy McFadden’s CD FAQ--everything you ever wanted to know about CDs and more (http://www.cdrfaq.org/)
A whole forum dedicated to DVDs--and they set the standards as well--http://www.dvdforum.org/forum.shtml