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TDK 48x VeloCD and TDK 8x media - Problems with audio CD

PostPosted: Tue Apr 22, 2003 3:15 pm
by NIIDeep
Hi All,

I'm new to this forum but not new to burning. I'm here because I've recently encountered problems with my TDK 48x VeloCD. I replaced an older TDK 16x VeloCD with this. In any case, I will be doing ALOT of audio CD creations soon and need a reliable drive to do this.

I have upgraded the firmware to S7S8 and am using Nero Express 5.5.10.20. I have a whole bunch of old TDK 8x media and Sony 12x media that I was planning to use for my project. My results are as follows:

TDK 8x - Cannot make a decent audio CD. I get periodic static or noise. It's as if I burned at a higher rate then certified or something but I didn't. I have tried 8x and 4x. For some reason, Nero will not let me burn below 4x on this drive. Go figure?

Sony 12x - I'm having better luck with this but it doesn't seem to play well in my car CD whereas my 16x had not problems. Car CD will search "forever" for the first track

TDK 16x data for reference (same Nero version)...

TDK 8x - Able to create decent audio CD but at 8x only. 1x, 4x, and 2x causes the CD to excessively search for tracks.

Sony 12x - Same results as above.

The weird thing is I "used" to be able to burn TDK 8x audio CDs with no problems on my 16x. Now after a Nero upgrade is more difficult.

- I have tried going back to older version of Nero - similar results
- I have tried EZ CD 5.3.4 Platinum with Sony 12x - same results

My final question is whether there are issues with using older, slower rated media in newer faster drives? This is my only theory. The older media "seem" to work better with my 16x drive but I don't get the good results I used to get.

At this point, I have no idea WTF happend. In a moment of despartion to complete my project, I went ahead and purchased a Plextor 48x drive. Unfortunately, I've read some posts that there are problems with this drive too. Is there an answer to all this madness!!!

Any help, insight, or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

I apologize for the long post but wanted to provide as much info as possible.

Thanks in advance.

PostPosted: Tue Apr 22, 2003 3:54 pm
by cfitz
Have you tested your discs with KProbe?

http://www.cdrlabs.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=10234

cfitz

PostPosted: Wed Apr 23, 2003 3:50 pm
by NIIDeep
will try... thanks.

Any other diagnostic programs?

PostPosted: Wed Apr 23, 2003 4:00 pm
by Dartman
The LiteOn based drive don't seem to know how to properly burn those older dye type medias. All of the ones I have will try to burn at 16 and do a terrible error ridden burn. I think they have never updated the burn table in the firmware to support the older stuff and the auto guess system doesn't get it right either.
My old TDK 24x would burn them OK at 20x and my Sony 500a burns them with very low c1 errors at 24x
You might want to try disabling the burn testing stuff and see if you can find a speed that works. I did one with everything disabled at 48x that worked but still wasn't real good, better then before though.
If you still have the older burner you might just have to use it to get good burns with that stuff.

PostPosted: Wed Apr 23, 2003 9:24 pm
by dolphinius_rex
The average lifespan of an unburned CD-R is about 5 years, and then it starts burning with MASSIVE errors. I'm having the same problem with some old Maxell and Memorex CD-Rs that are about 5-6 years old. Sometime's they burn ok, but most of the time they're completely useless.

PostPosted: Thu Apr 24, 2003 1:18 pm
by Wedge Maniac
dolphinius_rex wrote:The average lifespan of an unburned CD-R is about 5 years, and then it starts burning with MASSIVE errors.


If this is the case, would one be better off using a hard drive for long-term storage (say 20 years +) rather than CDRs? Of course, the drive would be unused for routine business. I'm speaking strictly in terms of archiving the most valuable information only.

PostPosted: Thu Apr 24, 2003 3:14 pm
by NIIDeep
To all,

Thanks for the replies thus far. TDK tech support has been no help. Hmmm.. didn't know that TDK is a LiteOn based drive. In any case, I've done some more experimenting... (let's just say I have nothing better to do of late). I went out and bought a whole bunch of CD-R media to test. I used my Honda Accord stock (Alpine based) CD player to screen the end products. I should mention this particular CD player is super picky about media. If it works in this player then it should work pretty good overall. I understand this may not be a correct assumption but for me I'm going to go by it, especially since I primarily listen to alot of my CDs in the car (do alot of long distance driving). The following are just miscellaneous conclusions and discoveries. Read on if you're interested...

- I've concluded that new TDK drives ARE NOT compatible with older TDK 8x media. Don't know why, though. TDK customer support says otherwise...

- Car CD player seems to prefer CDRs that have Cyanine based dyes, particularly Type 0 and Type 1. Either light blue or deep blue color.

- Alot of media manufacturers are switching to cheaper dye processes and/or discs. Both my older TDK 8x and Sony 12x media were derivatives of Taiyo Yuden Cyanine dye formulas. ALL the newer main stream media from both TDK and SONY are from Ritek!!! The same crap dye found on Memorex media. Sorry I've had bad experiences with Memorex. Ritek is mostly phthalocyanine based. Light green or faint aqua color. Phillips media and PNY also fall in this category.

- The only Cyanine based CD-Rs out in abundance in retail stores like Best Buy's, etc. are from Fuji Films (Taiyo Yuden based dye).

- Verbatim CD-Rs are also Cyanine/Metallized Azo based (Mitsubishi Chemicals) but hard to find.

UNFORTUNATELY NONE OF THEM WORK IN MY HONDA CD PLAYER (but do play fine in my home stereo and CD-ROM).

I just hope it's just my stupid car CD player. My upcoming project will entail creating ~120 audio CDs. It would suck if they have compatibility problems. A great way to lose clients.

PostPosted: Thu Apr 24, 2003 3:43 pm
by Inertia
NIIDeep,

Unfortunately, car CD players are generally of very low quality, hence their "pickiness" about media. The problem you are experiencing is undoubtedly related to the car player.

PostPosted: Thu Apr 24, 2003 3:53 pm
by dolphinius_rex
NIIDeep wrote:- I've concluded that new TDK drives ARE NOT compatible with older TDK 8x media. Don't know why, though. TDK customer support says otherwise...



I'd have to agree with their tech support. The TDK 8x media *WAS* rather good actually (and their drives work fine), However, it's so old now, that I seriously doubt that you'll find any of it that works anymore. Un-Burned media does not last that long, and stocking up more then say a years supply is probably not a good idea.

NIIDeep wrote:- Car CD player seems to prefer CDRs that have Cyanine based dyes, particularly Type 0 and Type 1. Either light blue or deep blue color.


This is quite possible, since Cyanine was the first dye type and most older equipment is not optimized for the newer dye types

NIIDeep wrote:- Alot of media manufacturers are switching to cheaper dye processes and/or discs. Both my older TDK 8x and Sony 12x media were derivatives of Taiyo Yuden Cyanine dye formulas. ALL the newer main stream media from both TDK and SONY are from Ritek!!! The same crap dye found on Memorex media. Sorry I've had bad experiences with Memorex. Ritek is mostly phthalocyanine based. Light green or faint aqua color. Phillips media and PNY also fall in this category.


Most manufacturers switched from using Cyanine to Phthalocyanine a LONG time ago, mainly because the older Cyanine dye wasn't stable, and the CD-Rs didn't last very long. This has since been rectified, and the dye type is much more stable now, but that doesn't mean people want to switch again.

You may find that there is a reason that more brands are buying from Ritek. Ritek media has become MUCH higher quality then it was in the past, in some cases rivaling that of even Taiyo Yuden! Phthalocyanine is not a bad dye type, there aren't actually ANY bad dye types really. Each dye is different, with its own pros and cons.

If you wish to gripe about memorex, go right ahead! :D I hate them with a passion myself. But please remember that the real problem with Memorex was not that it was ALL crap, but that some of it was very good and the REST of it was crap. This led to huge battles between people swearing by different results, which were both probably true!! Take a look at the disc database on my webpage (in my signiture) for an idea of how many different disc types Memorex has used :o .

NIIDeep wrote:- The only Cyanine based CD-Rs out in abundance in retail stores like Best Buy's, etc. are from Fuji Films (Taiyo Yuden based dye).


I would say that's probably accurate. THere ARE other brands that sell Cyanine based discs, but they are getting harder to find.

NIIDeep wrote:- Verbatim CD-Rs are also Cyanine/Metallized Azo based (Mitsubishi Chemicals) but hard to find.


Umm, not quite. Mitsubishi uses their own dye AZO, which is somewhat similar to Cyanine, but not in the ways that will likely help you. It was originally based on the Cyanine dye, but it was radically altered in order to create a dye type with a longer lifespan, supposedly the LONGEST lifespan but who knows. AZO is now a VERY different dye, and slightly more difficult to read in most players (especially older ones)

NIIDeep wrote:I just hope it's just my stupid car CD player. My upcoming project will entail creating ~120 audio CDs. It would suck if they have compatibility problems. A great way to lose clients.


If you have a rebadged LiteON drive, then why not just download CD Doctor or K-Probe and properly test your media?? that would rule out the guessing on quality problem, and you can proove to clients that compatability issues are not your fault.

PostPosted: Thu Apr 24, 2003 3:59 pm
by Inertia
Wedge Maniac wrote:
dolphinius_rex wrote:The average lifespan of an unburned CD-R is about 5 years, and then it starts burning with MASSIVE errors.


If this is the case, would one be better off using a hard drive for long-term storage (say 20 years +) rather than CDRs? Of course, the drive would be unused for routine business. I'm speaking strictly in terms of archiving the most valuable information only.


Absolutely not! dolphinius_rex is referring to unburned CD-R's, which may have a estimated shelf life of about 5 to 10 years if not used for recording. Once the CDR's are recorded, if errors are low and the discs are stored properly they may last for an estimated 30-100 years or so. As if technology advances won't have made this a moot issue by then. :wink:

See Understanding CD-R & CD-RW DISC LONGEVITY

PostPosted: Thu Apr 24, 2003 8:52 pm
by Wedge Maniac
Inertia wrote:Absolutely not! dolphinius_rex is referring to unburned CD-R's, which may have a estimated shelf life of about 5 to 10 years if not used for recording. Once the CDR's are recorded, if errors are low and the discs are stored properly they may last for an estimated 30-100 years or so. As if technology advances won't have made this a moot issue by then. :wink:

See Understanding CD-R & CD-RW DISC LONGEVITY


Thanks Inertia :)

Re: TDK 48x VeloCD and TDK 8x media - Problems with audio CD

PostPosted: Thu Apr 24, 2003 9:13 pm
by Inertia
Wedge Maniac, you're welcome. :)

NIIDeep wrote:...For some reason, Nero will not let me burn below 4x on this drive. Go figure?...


NIIDeep, as you have learned, your TDK drive is a rebadged LiteOn. The minimum burn speed for the LiteOn with CDR disks is 4x, so it is not Nero but the hardware producing the lower speed limit.

PostPosted: Fri Apr 25, 2003 1:49 am
by Wedge Maniac
I have a TDK, which is actually a LTR48246S. When using burnatonce I can choose to burn at 1 or 2 speed.

So, I'm thinking that most drives can burn at those low speeds, but the software must support it? Not trying to disagree with you Inertia because I really don't know for sure. I'm just saying that this little program detects the media's potential speeds, and 1 and 2 speeds are always options (which is one of the features of this software that appealed to me in the first place).

If you haven't already, why don't you give it a try:
www.burnatonce.com
Just be sure to have ASPI 4.60 installed or you will have problems.

PostPosted: Fri Apr 25, 2003 7:55 am
by dodecahedron
Wedge:
the fact that you have the choice of selecting 1x and 2x speeds doesn't mean you're actually burning at these speeds.

as per the discussion in the B@O forums, B@O doesn't show the real burning speed.

also it's not clear about the detection of the drive's properties.
http://www.burnatonce.com/forums/index. ... l=speed&s=
jamieo wrote:I don't think there is any way to show this information with cdrdao.

so apparently B@O gives all speeds to choose from in the drive properties, but obviously it can't burn at speeds that the hardware doesn't support!

PostPosted: Fri Apr 25, 2003 12:06 pm
by Wedge Maniac
Ah, ok. Thanks for the clarification, dodecahedron :)

PostPosted: Fri Apr 25, 2003 12:21 pm
by dodecahedron
welcome.
but still, it's best to ask Jamie.
what i said is just my understanding of the situation.

PostPosted: Fri Apr 25, 2003 3:37 pm
by dolphinius_rex
besides, burning media at 1x or 2x would be a REALLY bad thing!

no current media supports such speeds, and with the current misconceptions of "less speed=greater quality" people would go off the deep end and most CD-Rs would end up useless! :o