Burning Music to CD-R's - An Introduction
"Burning" CD mixes and or making CD back-ups has caused a lot of controversy lately. With many college students and (recently) others taking "advantage" of the free peer-to-peer file swapping "services," burning became a cottage industry.
With a vast majority of people out there not fully understanding the nuances of making a CD, we present to you a step-by-step guide on how to burn a CD. (We recommend that, should you choose to download a song, to do so from a legal site such as Napster, I-Tunes, Wal-Mart.com or Rhapsody). You can also legally make one back-up copy of your CDs as long as you don't give them away.
For the purpose of this guide, I will focus on a mix CD of songs that are either legally downloaded or "ripped" from a CD.
Finding The Right Burning Program
You should find a burning program that suits your interest. I have found, through trial and error that Ahead's "Nero Burning Rom" is the best on the market (similar programs include Roxio and MusicMatch).
Even if a basic version came with your burner (and two different burners, I suggest forking over the $100 bucks to have the newest version available: Nero 6: Ultimate Edition.) You may also find a cheaper "upgrade" on their site for the basic version (typically the basic version won’t let you rip many .mp3's but you can still make a disc with larger .wav files which technically provide better sound quality).
Buying The Correct Media
Along with having a proper burning program, you'll need to buy some blank media (the CD-R's and NOT CD-RW's because CD-RW will NOT work in a standard audio player).
CD-R's are cheap to buy and come in various colors, time capacity (74 or 80 minutes), with cases, without cases, some look like records (only made by Verbatim). Since I make labels, I buy generic CDs with no manufacturing stamp on them.
When buying the CD-R's just make sure to buy ones that are compatible with your burner. For instance, if you buy some CD-Rs that burn at 12x or below but your CD-R drive burns @ 40x (the x means how many rotations per second, thus the higher the number, the quicker the burning time), your burner will automatically drop down to 12x.
It sounds complicated but really isn't. Just remember that if you want to burn quickly, (40x will usually only take 2-4 minutes to complete a full 80 minute CD-R), you need to have CD-R's that allow you to do so.
Gathering Your Content (Songs)
Gather your songs from either the legal download site or from your personal CD collection. Again, it is OK to make mixes, much like those that are sold under the "Totally Country" or "Now!" banners, as long as they're for personal consumption only.
The typical CD-R (R means "recordable") will hold about 20 to 22 songs. Now, you don't have to rip that many (I typically do so as a means to have my own radio station in the car, but rarely listen to the CD track-by-track). I would suggest picking at least 15 or so as to not "waste" the CD-R.
Using The Burning Program
If you have your song files downloaded (paid for) from a service, then skip to Step 5. If not, you'll need to "capture" your tracks into .mp3 or .wav formats.
Using Nero, you should click the "extras" tab on the taskbar. From there you need to click "Save tracks" after which a window will pop up asking you to select your drive (even if you have only one drive it'll do this). You should select the appropriate drive and then click the OK button. It will then bring up a screen that says "Nero's CD and Title Database."
If you're connected to the Internet at the time of "ripping" your tracks, you can simply click access the Internet database. After doing so the CD titles will pop up. Highlight the proper CD (some CDs, believe it or not, will have the same running and track times), and click "Use selected CD." From there simply select the Track you want to put on the CD.
The next step is to select the drive name, (typically "My Music" in your "My Documents" file) then click the "Go" button.
The CD will be ripped and there will be a progress bar showing how quick the song is being ripped. Simply repeat these steps until you have your desired amount of tracks.
Organizing The Songs
After completing the ripping process (or having paid for your files from the legal site like Napster or I-Tunes), you should then be able to select (Click and drag) the tracks from the file in which your songs were downloaded to. You should then be able to rearrange the tracks in any order which suits your personal taste. The neat thing with mixes is that you can do themes like "Drinkin' songs," "Love songs" or even "Newest Hits," (which you'll most likely have to attain from one of the legal services if they're from un-released albums).
Burning The CD
After choosing a desired track order, you should insert the blank CD-R into your computer. From there select the tab that shows a disc behind a light match to burn the CD (see accompanying picture).
When you see the dialogue box, make sure the "determine maximum speed" box is checked. After that make sure the boxes that say "burn compilation" and "finalize CD" (for a music CD always finalize, for multiple sessions aren't readable on most CD players) are selected as well (the "Simulation" tab is optional and should be only used if you fear you might mess something up).
Once those steps are completed click the burn tab and wait as the disc is burned. While burning, It is best to not multi-task as it may cause some bad "burns." While burning you will see a progress box that shows you how the disc is going along.
Burning Completed
Once you're disc is completed, it will show a box that says "burn process completed successfully." Click the OK tab then the "done" tab at the bottom of the screen and the completed disc will automatically eject. From there, you can play the disc on any CD player you own.
Final Steps/Solutions
If you choose to create a printed track listing, the Nero software comes with simple "template" that will insert track info into from the burn. You can also choose to use different label creation software as well. The labels can be simple like the ones in the picture or quite professionally done. There are even some printers that will print directly on to the CD.
In conclusion, making personal CD-R's is a fun way to utilize your CD (and download) collection while making something that's cool to listen to while doing a bunch of tasks at home or while driving your car. It's not as hard or cumbersome as it may seem and really shouldn't take all that long to master. If you follow these simple steps, you'll have a new CD in no time.
Note: All songs showcased in the pictures above are taken from the author's music collection and were not shared with others via any illegal "peer-to-peer" network. As fans of music, we should support the artists by buying their albums or tracks from various music stores, it's the best way to convince labels to continue to let our favorite singers perform songs they love.
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