Can I use a CD recorder as a general-purpose reader?
You can, though there may be reasons not to. The seek times tend to be slower than a standard CD-ROM drive because the head assembly is heavier. Early CD recorders were optimized for writing, which doesn’t require fast seeks, and some users experienced jerky video playback as a result. Most current models have pretty good seek times though. The MTBF on CD-R units has historically been lower than that of CD-ROM drives, so it may be wise to use a different drive for general use to preserve the life of the CD-R. Now that CD recorders are cheap enough to be nearly disposable, though, there’s not much point in worrying about them. See also section (5-27) on laser diode lifetime. (What follows are instructions for getting some of the early consumer CD recorders to work as CD-ROM drives. You shouldn’t need to worry about any of this unless you bought an old drive in an auction.) If you’re using Win95, some older CD recorders don’t show up as readers without additional drivers, or (for SCSI dr
You can, though there may be reasons not to. The seek times tend to be slower than a standard CD-ROM drive because the head assembly is heavier. Early CD recorders were optimized for writing, which doesn’t require fast seeks, and some users experienced jerky video playback as a result. Most current models have pretty good seek times though (about 100ms vs. 80ms for a playback-only drive). The MTBF on CD-R units has historically been lower than that of CD-ROM drives, so it may be wise to use a different drive for general use to preserve the life of the CD-R. Now that CD recorders are cheap enough to be nearly disposable, though, there’s not much point in worrying about them. See also section (5-27) on laser diode lifetime. (What follows are instructions for getting some of the early consumer CD recorders to work as CD-ROM drives. You shouldn’t need to worry about any of this unless you bought an old drive in an auction.) If you’re using Win95, some older CD recorders don’t show up as re
You can, but it’s not clear that you’d want to. The seek times tend to be slower than a standard CD-ROM drive because the head assembly is heavier. There’s also not much need for rapid seeks when writing a disc, so there’s little reason for manufacturers to try to optimize this. Some users have reported jerky video playback on a CD-R drive. (Some of the recent models actually have pretty good access time figures, so this may be changing.) The MTBF on CD-R units tends to be low, so it may be wise to use a different drive for general use to preserve the life of the CD-R, especially if you have a tray model. The following applies to some older recorders only… If you’re using Win95, some older CD recorders don’t show up as readers without additional drivers, or (for SCSI drives) show up as 8 separate LUNs. (LUNs are Logical UNits, useful for distinguishing between different items loaded in a CD jukebox.) The reason why some older recorders don’t show up by default is that they’re classif
You can, but it’s not clear that you’d want to. The seek times tend to be slower than a standard CD-ROM drive because the head assembly is heavier. There’s also not much need for rapid seeks when writing a disc, so there’s little reason for manufacturers to try to optimize this. Some users have reported jerky video playback on a CD-R drive. (Some of the recent models actually have pretty good access time figures, so this may be changing.) The MTBF on CD-R units tends to be low, so it may be wise to use a different drive for general use to preserve the life of the CD-R, especially if you have a tray model. If you’re using Win95, some older CD recorders don’t show up as readers without additional drivers, or (for SCSI drives) show up as 8 separate LUNs. (LUNs are Logical UNits, useful for distinguishing between different items loaded in a CD jukebox.) The reason why some older recorders don’t show up by default is that they’re classified as “type 4” SCSI-2 devices, which is used to indic
(2002/12/14) You can, though there may be reasons not to. The seek times tend to be slower than a standard CD-ROM drive because the head assembly is heavier. Early CD recorders were optimized for writing, which doesn’t require fast seeks, and some users experienced jerky video playback as a result. Most current models have pretty good seek times though (about 100ms vs. 80ms for a playback-only drive). The MTBF on CD-R units has historically been lower than that of CD-ROM drives, so it may be wise to use a different drive for general use to preserve the life of the CD-R. Now that CD recorders are cheap enough to be nearly disposable, though, there’s not much point in worrying about them. See also section (5-27) on laser diode lifetime. (What follows are instructions for getting some of the early consumer CD recorders to work as CD-ROM drives. You shouldn’t need to worry about any of this unless you bought an old drive in an auction.) If you’re using Win95, some older CD recorders don’t
