Primera Discribe5 User Manual

C harisM ac E ngineering

User’s Manual

CharisMac End User License Agreement

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Technical Support

This software is licensed to companies for distribution with their products and is sold as a retail product in commercial packaging. If you purchased this product bundled with a piece of hardware please refer technical support to those companies who sold you the product. If you purchased this product as a stand alone retail product please have a copy of your invoice, serial number and registration information handy prior to calling the number listed on the retail packaging.

Contents

Introduction 4 Getting Started 5

System Requirements 5 Installing Discribe 5

Getting Technical Support 8 Overview 9

A Word About CD-R and CD-RW 9

Discribe’s Quick Start Menu 10

Making an Audio CD 11 Creating A Data CD 18 Copying a CD 22

Discribe Pull-Down Menus 24

File Pull-Down Menu 24 Utilities Pull-Down Menu 27 Web Pull-Down Menu 27

Discribe’s Other Functions 29

Macintosh HFS 30

Multi-Session Macintosh HFS CD-ROMs 33

ISO-9660 35 ISO-9660 XA 39

A Word About Multi-Session ISO-9660 XA CD-ROM Discs 42

Audio CD 43

Sequencing Audio Tracks 44 Setting Audio Tracks Pre-Gaps 45

Build-A-Mac HFS 48 Mac/ISO Hybrid 51

Setup of Data 51 ISO and Shared Portion of Hybrid 53

Disc Copy Image 56

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Creating an Image 56 Writing the Saved Image to CD 56

CD to CD-RW Copy 57

Select Your Read Device 57

CD Extra 59 Video CD 61 DVD Video/Audio 64

Universal Disk Format (UDF) 68 Troubleshooting 71 Glossary of CD and DVD Terms 75 Supported Drives 99

Introduction

PLEASE RECORD RESPONSIBLY. BEFORE COPYING ANYTHING ONT O A CD-R W OR CD-R DISC, PLEASE BE SURE YOU ARE NOT VIOLATING COPYRIGHT LAWS. MOST SOFTWARE COMP ANIES ALLOW YOU TO MAKE A BACK-UP OR ARCHIVE COPY OF SOFTWARE. CHECK YOUR SOFTWARE’S LICENSE AGREEMENT FOR SPECIFIC DETAILS. CONTACT YOUR LEGAL ADVISOR IF YOU ARE UNSURE OF YOUR RIGHTS.

Version 5.0 © 2002 CharisMac Engineering, Inc. All rights reserved Reproduction in whole or part without prior written approval from CharisMac Engineering, Inc. is expressly prohibited. The Discribe software is protected by copyright law and international treaties. Unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this program, or any portion of it, may result in severe ci vil and criminal penalties.

Apple Macintosh is a trademark of Apple Computer, Incorporated. Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Questions or comments? Please let us know! CharisMac Engineering, Inc. 10000 Hill View Rd. Newcastle, CA 95658

Introduction

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Thank You for purchasing CharisMac Discribe, the Ultimate CD Recording software! Discribe was designed to allow you to easily take advantage of all the features of your CD recorder. You can do some amazing things with Discribe. Like to make music? You can record a music CD from any combination of MP3/AIFF/SDII/ WAV ﬁles, or even live audio from the included AudioScribe application. Discribe supports the full range of CD-R/RW dri ves that hav e been in the market ov er the past few years, including ATAPI/EIDE, SCSI, USB, and Firewire (IEEE1394) interface drives.

Novice and experienced users alike will ﬁnd Discribe easy and intuitive to use. For users new to CD recording, the Discribe Quick Start provides a unique “AntiWizard” interface that can create a CD in as few as 2 mouse clicks. The Quick Start performs the common CD recording tasks: CD-to-CD copies, Audio CD creation from any combination of MP3/AIFF/SDII/WAV ﬁles or CD tracks, and Data CD-ROM creation.

By clicking the “close window” button on the Quick Start screen, you enter the Discribe Main Application. Here you will ﬁnd an advanced CD creation environment that will give you ﬂexibility in creating your CD projects. For example, when you create an audio CD in the full application, you can rearrange or rename tracks, change the name of your CD, record in DiscAt-Once mode, and more. In the full application you can also create advanced format CDs such as Mac/ ISO9660 Hybrid discs. Be sure to visit the Charismac website often for updates to the Discribe software. www.Charismac.com

Getting Started

System Requirements

Before installing Discribe, check that you have these minimum system requirements:

Internet access is recommended to take advantage of all Discribe’s features.

Installing Discribe

Before installing Discribe please take the following precautions:

Getting Started

• Power PC or greater Macintosh

• 32Mb RAM

• Quicktime 2.0 or better (Quicktime 4.0 or higher recommended)

• Supported CD recorder (for the most current list, please visit www.charismac.com)

• Mac OS 8.0 (Mac OS 8.6 or newer recommended, depending on CD recorder)

• Remove any non-Apple and third party CD-ROM Drivers. We recommend you remove any CDROM driv er e xtensions from other manuf acturers. The included CD-ROM Extension is capable of supporting virtually all SCSI, AT API and USB CDROM and CD-R/R W drives on the mark et allowing you to use one CD driver for all of your CD-R OM and CD-R/RW devices, including the original CDROM drive provided by Apple.

• If installing software for USB or Firewire based CD recorders, you may want to remove any third party USB or Firewire drivers, or e xtensions. These drivers may lead to conﬂicts, which can cause your

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

recorder to not be seen by the Discribe software.

Discribe must be installed on a hard disk. Once you have installed the software, store the original program CD-ROM in a safe place.

1. Disable any unnecessary extensions and restart your Macintosh prior to installing Discribe. In some cases, extensions may interfere with the software installation process, causing the Macintosh to generate errors and forcing a restart.

2. Insert the Discribe Installation CD-ROM in your system’s CD-ROM drive.

3. If the Discribe CD-ROM window does not open automatically, double click the CD-ROM icon to open the window.

4. Double-click on the Discribe Installer ﬁle icon. Follow the on-screen instructions, read and agree to the end user license agreement.

5. Select the type of installation according to the hardware type you have. For example, if you own only a Firewire CD-RW drive, just select the “Discribe for Firewire Drives” installation option.

6. Once you’ve selected the proper software installation type, click Install.

7. Select a location for the Discribe folder to be installed and click the will be installed to their proper locations.

8. Once the installation has completed, click Quit.

9. Restart your Macintosh to complete the installation.

Discribe is now installed!

Install

button. All components

Getting Started

NOTE

Note: Please T ake A Moment T o Complete Y our Registr ation Card And Drop It In The Mail, or register online at www.charismac.com/Register. Registration Entitles Y ou To T echnical Support and Product Upgrades.

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Getting T echnical Support

CharisMac is serious about customer satisfaction. If you encounter difﬁculty installing or using Discribe, please do the following:

1. Check the troubleshooting section in this manual. The common problems and their solutions can be found there.

2. Check the Charismac website for updated problems and solutions, and for newer versions of the software that corrects speciﬁc problems. www.charismac.com/Support/Discribe/. Or email support@charismac.com.

3. For telephone technical support, please call 530-885-

4420. Before calling, please have your Macintosh conﬁguration (CPU, recorder make & Model, version of Macintosh operating system) and a description of the problem you are encountering.

NOTE

Note: When calling for support please be in front of the Macintosh computer where the software is installed so the technical support technician can easily assist you in resolving the problem.

Overview

A Word About CD-R and CD-RW

CD-R

is the term used to denote CD-Recordable media, or discs. CD-R discs are recorded permanently. Once information is written, it cannot be erased. Data can be added until the disc is full (see “Multi-Session recording). CD-R media is good for creating archived information that does not need to be changed, or for distribution thanks to the rapidly declining price of CD-R media over the past few years.

CD-RW

dia. CD-RW media allo ws your CD-R W dri ve to erase the disc, and then write to the media again as your backup scheme requires. CD-RW media is rated for approximately one thousand complete writes to the media (the actual number of writes may vary depending upon type and brand of media). CD-R and CD-RW drives differ only in the fact that CD-RW drives can write to both CD-R and CD-RW discs.

CD-RW drives are also capable of erasing CD-RW discs (through the Discribe interface) and allowing you to write to them again. Discribe handles the writing process to either CD-R or CD-RW media in the e xact same fashion. The steps of writing to a CD are exactly the same with the exception of which type of media is inserted prior to the write process (CD-R or CD-RW). With this in mind, the term CD-RW will be used throughout this manual to denote a CD-Recordable device, disc or format.

Launching Discribe

Double click on the Discribe icon and you’ll be greet-

is the term used to denote CD-Rewritable me-

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ed by the Discribe splash screen. After a few seconds

the splash screen will give way to Discribe’s Quick Start menu.

Discribe’s Quick Start Menu

While unlike a traditional “wizard” this menu allows for quick and easy selection of the most commonly used functions:

burning Data CDs (HFS), Audio CDs and Disc Copy.

Quick Start

Y ou’ ll also ﬁnd buttons that provide you with additional information about your recorder and disc information for the disc in the recorder. Additionally, you can extract audio tracks from CDs or launch AudioScribe; the direct-to-disk recording application included with Discribe.

To get started, you can make your selection from one of the three main choices presented, drag ﬁles you wish to write to CD to auto-select the disc format, or you can click the Close Window box to reveal Discribe’s other more powerful functions in Discribe’s main window.

Making an Audio CD

For a brief overview of the software, let’s start by clicking the face changes.

Audio CD

button. Notice Discribe’ s inter -

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Adding Audio Tracks

Drag AIFF, MP3, WAV , Sound Designer II (SDII) ﬁles or tracks from mounted Audio CDs to the windo w . You can drag one or multiple ﬁles to the window in any combination.

Files that are in MP3, WAV and SDII ﬁle format will need to be converted into a ﬁle format that Discribe can use to write to CD. Discribe will prompt you for a save location for these ﬁles when they are dragged to the interface. Select the desired location and click the

“Your Location”

place. Once the conversion has completed, the newly converted ﬁle will be added to your project.

button for the conversion to take

Select

NOTE

Note: AIFF Files will need to be in a speciﬁc format in order for Discribe to accept them. Please be sure that your hard disk has enough space for the converted ﬁles and that the ﬁles adhere to the following guidelines:

Quick Start

• Stereo

• 16 Bit

• 44.1 KHz

Tip: SDII, MP3 and WAV ﬁles will be converted into this format, ﬁles added from a mounted audio CD do not have to be converted, but can be con verted by holding down the Command key when drag ging tracks fr om a mounted audio CD to the interface. Discribe will prompt you to ﬁnd out where you would like the extracted tracks saved to.

Click the with an Audio Picker window.

This window will show all the tracks that have been added to your current audio project. Y ou can add tracks by clicking the sired track, or you can remove tracks by selecting them in the Audio Picker window and clicking the button.

Audio...

Add...

button and you will be presented

button and navigating to the de-

Remove

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Sequencing Audio Tracks

Click the with an Audio Picker window.

Click and drag the audio track to the desired location within the Audio Picker window. You can select multiple ﬁles in the same way that the Finder’s ‘List’ view works (click and drag or by Shift clicking on multiple ﬁles).

Audio...

button and you will be presented

Setting Audio Tracks Pre-Gaps

Click the with the Audio Picker window.

Discribe allows you to customize the pre-gap, or, the space at the beginning of a track, from 0 to 9 seconds. To set the pre-gap on a track or tracks, select the desired track(s) in the Discribe Audio Picker windo w and click the pre-gap pop-up menu and select the desired

Audio...

button and you will be presented

Quick Start

length of time.

NOTE

Note: The ﬁrst audio track must have a pre-gap of two and is not user deﬁnable. By default, Discribe will set the pre-gaps of tr acks 2 and higher to 2 seconds.

Previewing Audio Tracks

You can preview the audio within the track by selecting the desired track and clicking the

Play

button.

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

This also allows you to listen to the tracks and make sure that the tracks are sequenced the way you want them. Previewing also lets you listen to extracted tracks for any audio artifacts that may have been introduced during the extraction process if the tracks were saved to the hard disk. A speak er icon displays next to the track you are previewing.

Writing the Disc

Once you have sequenced your tracks and set the desired pre-gaps, you are ready to write the CD. If you are still in the Discribe Audio Picker window then click the OK button to return to the main interface. V erify that the correct CD-R W writer is selected, if it’ s not, select it from the Recorder pop-up menu, then click the with a Write Options window.

Write Disc...

button. You will be presented

The Write Options window contains choices for the following:

T est Write / Write

write or a simulated write to your media.

Write Speed

lected recorders write speeds. Defaults to the fastest

- Option allows for either an actual

- Allo ws for a selection of the current se-

Quick Start

write speed that the current selected writer supports.

Open Next Session

disc open for another session to be written later.

V erify After Writing

discs to be veriﬁed against the original to ensure that the copy and the original are the same.

Using BURN-Proof/JustLink

take advantage of drives using BURN-Proof/JustLink type technologies. If your CD-RW drive does not support BURN-Proof/JustLink writing this option will be grayed out.

In Background

CDs in the background, leaving your Macintosh free for other tasks. This option is available only with BURN-Proof/JustLink drives by default. See Preferences for more information.

Once you’ve set your options in the Write Options window, click the cess. When the write completes you’ll hear Discribe’s completion tone and your recorder will eject the ﬁnished CD.

- Writes to the disc leaving the

- Allows freshly written data

- Allows Discribe to

- Options allows Discribe to write

Start

button to begin the write pro-

Creating A Data CD

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

From Discribe’s Quick Start menu click the button.

Notice the change in Discribe’s interface. You can proceed by doing one of the following:

Drag and Drop Directly to the Discribe Windo w

Drag the data you wish to write to CD from your hard disk to the Discribe window. Notice the Size of the data and the Time reﬂect the data that’s been dragged

Data CD

Quick Start

into the window.

Click the Data... Button

Click the Picker window. Here you can drag ﬁles from the desktop to the picker window. The Macintosh HFS Picker window acts much like the list view in a Finder window, allowing you to rename and move ﬁles and folders around to suit your needs.

Data...

button to reveal the Macintosh HFS

T ake note that the CD name is listed as, “Untitled,” be sure to change the name as this will be the name of your ﬁnished CD when it mounts on the desktop. To edit a ﬁlename or the CD’s title you can single click an item to highlight the name, or double click it and a

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

name editing window will appear.

Macintosh HFS Picker Options

Resolve Aliases

ﬁles will be resolved to the original when they’ ve been added into the Macintosh HFS Picker window.

- When this option is checked alias

New Folder

the Macintosh HFS Picker window.

Add...

Picker window by clicking the

Remove

Macintosh HFS Picker window

Cancel

window without saving any changes

- Saves changes to the current project.

- Creates a new , “Untitled Folder ,” within

- Y ou can add a single ﬁle to the Macintosh HFS

Add...

button.

- Removes the selected ﬁle or ﬁles from the

- Returns you to the main Discribe software

Quick Start

Writing the CD

Once the data has been added and arranged to your satisfaction just click OK to return to the Discribe main window. Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the

Set up your options for Write/Test Write, Open Next Session, Write Speed, Verify After Writing, Using BURN-Proof/JustLink and In Background, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

A Word About Multi-Session Macintosh

HFS CD-ROMs

There is nothing special that needs to be done to write multiple Macintosh HFS sessions to a CD other than selecting the Open Next Session option in the Write Options Screen.

Write Disc...

button.

NOTE

Note: Macintosh HFS multi-session CD-ROMs can really be called multi-volume. When a multi-session Macintosh HFS CDROM is mounted an icon for each Macintosh HFS session written to the CD will mount on the desktop. T o eject the CD you will need to drag all of the CD icons to the trash.

Copying a CD

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

From the Discribe Quick Start menu click the

button. Notice the change in Discribe’s interface.

Select the Source Drive

Under Source will be listed a pop-up menu that states, “No reader selected. ” Select the driv e (other than your CD-RW drive) to be used as the read source for your original CD. If no CD is within the drive it will prompt you to insert a disc to read, or you can use Command. (period) to cancel. Once a disc is inserted into the source drive Discribe will display the size of the disk and/or the total time of the disc.

Copy a

Click the

Disc Info...

button to view information about

Quick Start

the current CD in the Source drive.

Writing the CD

Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the log will show up.

Write Disc...

button. The Write Options dia-

Set up your options for T est Write, Ignore Read Errors, Using BURN-Proof/JustLink, Write In Background, Write Speed, Cache Disc to File Before Writing, and Verify After Writing, then click the gin the write process.

Start

button to be-

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Discribe Pull-Down Menus

A quick overview of all of Discribe’ s pull-down menus reveals many useful functions:

File Pull-Down Menu

Open Project

project ﬁle

Save Project

a ﬁle

Save Project As...

new name that you specify

Begin Again

Preferences

- Open a previously saved Discribe

- Saves the current Discribe project into

- Saves the current project with a

- Returns you to the Discribe Quick Start

- Allo ws you to deﬁne certain parameters

Pull-Down Menus

with Discribe according to your speciﬁc needs:

Preferences: Application Startup

Show Disable Inits Warning

checked a warning will appear each time Discribe is launched reminding you to disable any unnecessary extensions prior to burning a CD.

- When this box is

Show Quick Start

Quick Start screen will appear after the Discribe application is launched. Disabling this preference will take you directly to the Main Application window upon the launch of the Discribe software.

Preferences: Default Project Settings

Show times in Min:Sec:Frames

is checked audio track information will be displayed in the format minutes ﬁrst, followed by seconds and frames.

Delete cached audio ﬁles when done

this box will cause Discribe to delete any extracted

- When this box is checked the

- When this box

- Checking

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audio tracks, whether AIFF, MP3, WAV or SDII created during the audio extraction process.

Default to Disc-at-once audio

checked audiodiscs will be burned in Disc-at-once audio format. Unchecking thebox will result in Track-at-once burns.

Default Pregap

tween audio tracks for default operation. Times can still be customized in Discribe’s Audio Picker window .

Preferences: Advanced Writing Settings

Enable Background Writing on all Drives (Not Recommended)

use this option with extreme caution. Extended lengths of time holding down the mouse button or launching processor intensive applications can cause writes to fail. We only recommend background writing on BURN-Proof/JustLink enabled CD recorders.

Save Folder Location for Disc to Disc Caching File

Quit

- Quits Discribe and returns you back to the Find-

- Sets the amount of time to set be-

- Generally not recommended,

- When this box is

Main Functions

Utilities Pull-Down Menu

Recorder Information

currently selected recorder

Disc Information

within the currently selected recorder

Extract Audio...

from a mounted Audio CD

Write Physical Image...

hard disk of the data in your current project.

Erase Disc...

it can be written to again

Eject Disc

CD-RW drive

Enable BURN-Proof /JustLink

Proof and JustLink Recording on CD-RW drives that support this ability. Check with the manufacturer of your drive to see if your drive supports this function

Web Pull-Down Menu

- Allows you to erase CD-RW media so

- Ejects the tray of the currently selected

- Shows information on the

- Shows information of the disc

- Allo ws you to Extract a single track

- Writes a physical image to

- Enables BURN-

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Support -

support section of our website

Product -

product section of our website

Home

browser and takes you to the Charismac homepage

Store

a full version or a Discribe upgrade. Also, check out CharisMac’s other exciting products.

Selecting this item takes you to the Discribe

- Selecting this item launches your default web

-Takes you to our online store so you can order

Discribe’s Other Functions

If the disc format you wish to write to CD is not a part of the Quick Start menu, don’t fret. Discribe has a host of other powerful features that can be accessed through the main interface. Upon launch of Discribe just click the close window box in the upper left corner of the interface. This will reveal the main interface. You can select any format from the pop-up menu to create just about any type of CD-ROM.

By default, the main interface will default to the Mac-

Main Functions

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

intosh HFS option.

Macintosh HFS

The Macintosh HFS function copies data from a mounted volume to a CD. The volume can be a hard disk, hard disk partition, CD-ROM, remov able media, mounted disk image, etc. of any size, but must contain less than 650 MB of data. This option allows you to set up a disc exactly the way that you want it to look (icon placement, arrangement of windows, window views, whether or not the CD-ROM’ s window should be open by default, etc.) and write it to a CD for an exact duplicate.

Main Functions

NOTE

Note: It is not recommended that you write CDs from mounted server volumes. Server trafﬁc can be unpr edictable in natur e and can cause a write failure due to lack of throughput.

Setting Up Your Volume

Set your volume up any way you like it. K eep in mind that the name of the volume will become the name of the CD, and the volume’s icon will become the CD’s icon. Name and paste the icon you want the CD to have onto the volume, you can do this by doing a Get Info on the volume’s mounted disk icon.

Once you have your volume set up simply drag the icon of the volume from the desktop of your Macintosh to the Discribe window.

An options dialog box will appear for the volume

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

you’ve dragged over.

Create a Mac / ISO Hybrid - Checking this option allows you to create a Hybrid CD-ROM (covered later in this manual).

Bootable - If checked, Discribe will prompt for a bootable CD to be inserted into the CD writer so that driver information can be read from a known good bootable CD. For best results, use your most current Apple system CD available. Remember that this volume has to meet certain requirements:

• Cannot be your Macintosh’s startup volume

• All ﬁles must be closed and must appear just as you want them on the CD

• Total volume size must be small enough to ﬁt on the CD

• Ensure you have emptied the trash

• Don’t write from a volume used by Discribe

For more information on the creation of bootable CDs see the section of Creating a Bootable CD-ROM later in this manual.

Select the desired options and click OK. Discribe’s interface will update to show the new volume has been added.

Main Functions

Adding Audio

Discribe will allow you to add audio to the end of your data track, if you wish to add audio you can simply drag-n-drop an audio ﬁle on the window. Or you can click the A udio... b utton for the Audio Pick er window. If you’ve added audio tracks into the Audio Picker window, click OK to proceed to the write process.

Writing the CD

Once the data has been added and arranged to your satisfaction just click OK to return to the Discribe main window. Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the Write Disc... button. Set up your options for T est Write, In Background, Open Ne xt Session, Write Speed and Verify After Writing, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

Multi-Session Macintosh HFS CD-ROMs

There is nothing special that needs to be done to write multiple Macintosh HFS sessions to a CD other than selecting the Open Next Session option in the Write Options Screen.

NOTE

Note: Macintosh HFS multi-session CD-ROMs can really be called multi-volume. When a multi-session Macintosh HFS CDROM is mounted an icon for each Macintosh HFS session written to the CD will mount on the desk-top. To eject the CD you will need to drag all the CD’s icons to the trash.

ISO-9660

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Discribe has the ability to create ISO-9660 CD-ROM discs for use with W indows based personal computers. This format is ideal for sharing ﬁles like web pages, JPG, GIF , text documents and for PC speciﬁc data, b ut won’t work well for backups for most Macintosh software.

Select the Format

Select the ISO-9660 format from the pop-up menu in the Discribe main interface screen.

Main Screen Options:

Data... - Clicking this button will pop up the ISO9660 Picker window. This is where you can edit, move and rename the data you wish to write to CDROM.

Disc Info... - Clicking this button show a window with speciﬁc, user deﬁnable, attributes that you can

Main Functions

give to your written CD-ROM. Like:

• Publisher ID

• Data Preparer ID

• Application ID

• Copyright File ID

• Abstract File ID

• Bibliography File

Edit Y our Data

The next step is to edit the ﬁle list for your ISO-9660 CD. Click the Data... button to open the ISO-9660 Picker window.

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desired, turning the arrows down on a folder reveals the data inside. You can drag and drop ﬁles in new folders to change their hierarchy.

ISO-9660 Picker Options

At the bottom of the ISO 9660 Picker are options that are useful in the creation of your ISO-9660 CD-ROM.

Resolve Aliases - When this option is checked alias ﬁles will be resolved to the original when they’ ve been added into the Macintosh HFS Picker window.

New Folder - Creates a new, “Untitled Folder, ” within the ISO 9660 Picker window.

Import Session - Imports data from the previous session into the session about to be written.

Naming - Allows choosing between Macintosh naming, which allows for 31 characters of any type, and ISO Level 1, which allows for the standard ISO-9660. Choosing ISO Level 1 will truncate ﬁle names to adhere to the 8.3 ﬁle naming convention, removing any foreign characters, spaces and changing all letters to uppercase. For example, a ﬁle called, “CD Artwork For Ad,” will be changed to, “CD_ARTWO.RK_.”

Add... - Y ou can add a single ﬁle to the Macintosh HFS Picker window by clicking the Add... button.

Remove - Removes the selected ﬁle from the Macintosh HFS Picker window

Main Functions

Cancel - Returns you to the main Discribe software

window without saving any changes OK - Saves changes to the current project. Select the options that suit your needs and click, OK.

Writing the CD

Set up your options for Test Write, In Background, Open Next Session, Write Speed and Verify After Writing, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

ISO-9660 XA

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Discribe has the ability to create ISO-9660 XA CDROM disk for use with Windows based personal computers. The XA signiﬁes “Extended Architecture” of the Standard ISO-9660 format, and is ideal for multimedia-related ﬁles, like Quicktime movies, etc.

Select the Format

Select the ISO-9660 XA format from the pop-up menu in the Discribe main interface screen.

Main Screen Options: Data... - Clicking this button will pop up the ISO-9660

Picker window. This is where you can edit, move and rename the data you wish to write to CD-ROM.

Disc Info... - Clicking this button sho w a window with speciﬁc, user deﬁnable attributes that you can give to your written CD-ROM. Like:

• Publisher ID

• Data Preparer ID

Main Functions

• Application ID

• Copyright File ID

• Abstract File ID

• Bibliography File

Edit Y our Data

The next step is to edit the ﬁle list for your ISO-9660 XA CD. Click the Data... button to open the ISO-9660 Picker window.

Y ou can add your data to the ISO-9660 Pick er window by dragging and dropping the ﬁles on the window . The ISO-9660 Picker window acts much the same as a Finder window, click the ﬁle names to rename ﬁles if desired, turning the arrows down on a folder reveals the data inside. You can drag and drop ﬁles in new folders to change their hierarchy.

ISO-9660 Picker Options

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At the bottom of the ISO 9660 Picker are options that are useful in the creation of your ISO-9660 CD-ROM.

Resolve Aliases - When this option is checked alias ﬁles will be resolved to the original when they’ ve been added into the ISO-9660 Picker window.

New Folder - Creates a new, “Untitled Folder, ” within the ISO 9660 Picker window.

Import Session - Imports data from the previous session into the session about to be written.

Add... - Y ou can add a single ﬁle to the Macintosh HFS Picker window by clicking the Add... button.

Remove - Removes the selected ﬁle from the ISO 9660 Picker window

Cancel - Returns you to the main Discribe software window without saving any changes

OK - Saves changes to the current project. Select the options that suit your needs and click, OK.

Writing the CD

Set up your options for Test Write, In Background,

Main Functions

Open Next Session, Write Speed and Verify After Writing, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

A Word About Multi-Session ISO-9660 XA CDROM Discs

One of the great things about the ISO-9660 XA format is it’s ability to write single v olume multi-session CDROM. Using the abov e instructions, write a session using the ISO-9660 XA format. When you wish to write the second session to the CD you set your data up the same way you always do using the instructions above.

While in the ISO-9660 Picker window, be sure click the Import Session button, when Discribe prompts you to, insert the previously written CD into the recorder. Discribe will read the existing data into the ISO-9660 Picker, click OK and proceed with the write as usual. You can write another session or ﬁnalize the disc at your discretion.

NOTE

Note: If you write an ISO 9660-XA session to a disc that already has an ISO-9660 XA session without using the Import Session button the ﬁrst session of the CD will be lost and unrecoverable. Only the new data written to the CD will be recognized.

Audio CD

NOTE

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Adding Audio Tracks

Drag AIFF, MP3, WAV , Sound Designer II (SDII) ﬁles or tracks from mounted Audio CDs to the windo w . You can drag one or multiple ﬁles to the window in any combination.

Files that are in MP3, WAV and SDII ﬁle format will need to be converted into a ﬁle format that Discribe can use to write to CD. Discribe will prompt you for a save location for the newly converted ﬁles when they are dragged to the interface.

Select the desired location and click the Select “Your Location” button for the conversion to take place. Once the conversion has completed, the newly converted ﬁle will be added to your project.

• Stereo

• 16 Bit

• 44.1 KHz

Main functions

prompt you where you would like the ﬁles saved to.

Click the Audio... button and you will be presented with an Audio Picker window.

This window will show all the tracks that have been added to your current audio project. Y ou can add tracks by clicking the Add... button and navigating to the desired track, or you can remove tracks by selecting them in the Audio Picker window and clicking the Remove button.

Sequencing Audio Tracks

Click the Audio... button and you will be presented with an Audio Picker window.

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ﬁles).

Setting Audio Tracks Pre-Gaps

Click the Audio... button and you will be presented with an Audio Picker window.

Main Functions

NOTE

Note: The ﬁrst audio track must have a pre-gap of two and is not user deﬁnable. By default, Discribe will set the pre-gaps of tr acks 2 and higher to 0.

Previewing Audio Tracks

You can preview the audio within the track by selecting the desired track and clicking the Play button. This also allows you to listen to the tracks and make sure that the tracks are sequenced the way you want them. Previewing also lets you listen to extracted tracks for any audio artifacts that may have been introduced dur ing the extraction process if the tracks were saved to the hard disk. A speaker icon displays ne xt to the track you are previewing.

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Writing the CD

NOTE

Note: Discribe allows you to write multiple Audio sessions to the same CD-ROM.While the written CD, with two or more audio sessions, will work ﬁne when played on a computer’s CD-ROM drive, consumer CD players will only recognize the ﬁrst session of the disc.

NOTE

Note: The ability to read a piece of media depends on the CDROM drive or the CD player. Audio written to CD-RW media may have trouble being read on some consumer CD players.

Build-A-Mac HFS

Discribe has the ability to write a Macintosh HFS CDROM without the use of another volume for your data to reside on.

You can proceed by doing one of the following:

Drag and Drop Directly to the Discribe Windo w

Drag the data you wish to write to CD from your hard disk to the Discribe window. Notice the Size of the data and the Time reﬂect the data that’s been dragged into the window.

Click the Data... Button

Click the Data... button to reveal the Macintosh HFS Picker window. Here you can drag ﬁles from the desktop to the picker window. The Macintosh HFS Picker window acts much like the list view in a Finder window, allowing you to rename and move ﬁles and folders around to suit your needs. Take note that the CD name is listed as, “Untitled,” be sure to change the name as this will be the name of your ﬁnished CD

Main Functions

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when it mounts on the desktop.

Macintosh HFS Picker Options

Resolve Aliases - When this option is checked alias ﬁles will be resolved to the original when they’v e been added into the Macintosh HFS Picker window .

New Folder - Creates a new, “Untitled Folder,” within the Macintosh HFS Picker window.

Add... - You can add a single ﬁle to the Macintosh HFS Picker window by clicking the Add... button.

Remove - Removes the selected ﬁle from the Macintosh HFS Picker window

Cancel - Returns you to the main Discribe soft-

Main Functions

ware window without saving any changes OK - Saves changes to the current project.

Writing the CD

Set up your options for Test Write, In Background, Open Next Session, Write Speed and Verify After Writing, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

Mac/ISO Hybrid

Discribe has the ability to write a Macintosh HFS CDROM along with ISO-9660 data on the same CDROM. The beauty of this type of CD is that it contains a self contained Mac HFS volume, and a self-contained ISO-9660 volume and both volumes have the ability to share data between each other.

For example, you can create a CD-R OM that contains Mac speciﬁc web pages on the Mac portion of the CDROM, and PC speciﬁc web pages on the ISO side of the CD-ROM, neither platform can see each others data. With that in mind, you can share common image ﬁles between both platforms so that all the images that are common for both sites are only written to the CD once, yet both platforms can still display the images.

Setup of Data

In setup of a Hybrid CD-ROM, it is required that the Mac only data, and data that is intended to be shared across to the ISO side of the CD, reside on it’s o wn volume. The PC only data can reside anywhere on your hard disk other than the volume set aside for Mac and shared data.

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Begin Mac/ISO Hybrid Project Creation

From Discribe’s format pop-up menu select Mac/ISO Hybrid.

Main Functions

You will be presented with the following dialog box:

Within the dialog box, select the mounted volume you wish to use for your Mac / shared data.

For more information on the creation of bootable CDs see the section of Creating a Bootable CD-ROM elsewhere in this manual.

This ofﬁcially sets up your Mac and shared data for the Hybrid CD-ROM. Take note of the changes in the Discribe interface.

ISO and Shared Portion of Hybrid

Once the Mac portion of the Hybrid disc has been set up it’s time to tell Discribe what data you would lik e in your ISO portion of the disc.

Click the Data... button in the Discribe interface, the ISO-9660 Picker will appear. Drag all data you wish to be on the ISO side of the disk to the ISO 9660 Picker window. Now is when you want to also set up your shared data. Drag the desired shared data from the Mac volume into the ISO-9660 Picker window, notice the ﬁle names turn blue when they are listed in the ISO-

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9660 Picker window. This means that they are shared. Good job.

Set up the options in the ISO-9660 picker window as desired.

Resolve Aliases - When this option is checked alias ﬁles will be resolved to the original when they’v e been added into the Macintosh HFS Picker window .

New Folder - Creates a new, “Untitled Folder,” within the Macintosh HFS Picker window.

Import Session - Imports data from the previous session into the session about to be written.

Main Functions

placing spaces with underscores and changing all letters to uppercase. For example, a ﬁle called, “CD Artwork For Ad,” will be changed to, “CD_ARTWO.RK_.” In general it is best to leave the naming convention on the Macintosh setting.

Add... - You can add a single ﬁle to the Macintosh HFS Picker window by clicking the Add... button.

Remove - Removes the selected ﬁle from the Macintosh HFS Picker window

Cancel - Returns you to the main Discribe software window without saving any changes

OK - Saves changes to the current project.

Once you are ﬁnished setting up your ISO-9660 portion of the CD-ROM, click OK to proceed.

Finish Up with Disc Info...

If you want, you can set up the ISO-9660 Volume Descriptor by clicking the Disc Info... button in the main interface. Editing the ISO-9660 Volume Descriptor is not an essential part of creating an ISO or Hybrid CDROM. When ﬁnished, click, OK.

Writing the CD

Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the Write Disc... button. Set up your options for T est Write, In Background, Open Ne xt Session, Write Speed and Verify After Writing, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

Disc Copy Image

Copies a disc image previously saved to your hard disk by Discribe using the Copy Disc... function under the Utilities pull-down menu.

Creating an Image

First you need to create an image from a desired CDROM. Select Copy Disc... under the Utilities pulldown menu. Discribe will prompt you to put in the disc you wish to copy into your CD recorder. Place a disc in the drive and when Discribe senses that the disc is in the drive then you will be prompted to select a sav e location on your hard disk for the extracted data.

After you’ve selected a save location, click the Start button to begin the data extraction process. Once the extraction process is complete, click Cancel to return to the main interface.

Writing the Saved Image to CD

In the main Discribe window select Disc Copy Image from the format pop-up menu. You will be presented with an Open File dialog box.

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Navigate the dialog box to the previously sav ed image ﬁle and click Open. Note the interface change to reﬂect the image that you’ve selected.

Writing the CD

CD to CD-RW Copy

A very useful function is Discribe’s direct CD to CD copy function.

This function allows you to use another CD-ROM or CD-RW drive to be selected as your read device and then write the data directly from that drive to the CDRW drive of your choice.

From Discribe’s main interface select CD to CD-RW Copy from the format pop-up menu.

Main Functions

Select Your Read Device

From the Source pop-up menu, select the CD-ROM or CD-RW dri ve you wish to use as your read source. If a disc is not present in the drive Discribe will prompt you to insert a disc for reading.

Writing the CD

Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the Write Disc... button. Set up your options for T est Write, In Background, Open Ne xt Session, Write

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Speed and Verify After Writing, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

NOTE

Note: Take care in selecting a write speed with the CD to CD-RW Copy function. Slower Macs, slower CD-ROM and CD-RW drives may not be able to supply data fast enough to the target CD-RW drive. This can result in a coaster. If a CD to CD-RW Copy fails try lowering the write speed.

CD Extra

Main Functions

CD Extra CD-ROMs are CDs which contain Audio and Data on the same CD. It is essentially a two session CD-ROM, on which Discribe writes the Audio ﬁrst, then the data second.

From Discribe’s main interface select CD Extra from the format pop-up menu.

Set Up the Data

Y ou can Drag Data directly to the Discribe interface, or you can click the Data... button to open up the ISO9660 picker window. With the picker window open you can drag data to the window, name the CD and arrange your data at will.

Set up the options in the ISO-9660 picker window as desired and when ﬁnished click OK.

Set Up the Audio

You can drag Audio tracks directly to Discribe’ s main

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interface window, or you can click the Audio... button to open up the Audio Picker window. Using the audio picker you can drag in audio tracks and arrange the audio at will.

Set up the options in the audio picker window as desired and when ﬁnished click OK.

Writing the CD

Main Functions

Video CD

A Video CD is a CD that contains MPEG 1 data that can be watched on your computer and/or many commercial DVD players). Discribe can create a V ideo CD using properly formatted MPEG 1 streams.

The MPEG-1 streams that Discribe can handle must meet the following criteria:

Resolution: 352x288 (PAL), 352x240 ("FILM"), or 320x240 (NTSC)

Frame Rate: 25fps (P AL), 30 or 29.97fps (NTSC) and 24 or 23.976fps ("FILM")

Video Data Rate: 1152Kbit/sec (some software rounds it to 1150Kbit/sec) or 1.125Mbit/sec

NOTE

"FILM" is NTSC encoded video in 24fps or 23.976fps, not frequently used by amateurs unless they con vert to Video-CD from a DVD movie encoded at 24fps (progressive).

Set Up the Data

T o write a V ideo CD select Video CD in Discribe’s format pop-up menu.

Drag in the compatible MPEG ﬁles that you want to add to your V ideo CD into the Discribe windo w directly, or you can click the Video... button to open Dis- cribe’s MPEG Picker window and drag the selected ﬁles there. While in the MPEG Picker window you can

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rearrange your MPEG streams to suit your needs.

NOTE

Discribe will reject incompatible ﬁles by not allowing them to be added to the project.

If you have the MPEG Picker window open click OK to return to Discribe’s main window. Also note that you can add Audio ﬁles to your Video CD project. You can do so by dragging them into the main Discribe window or by clicking the A udio... b utton to open the, now familiar, Audio picker window. Again, arrange songs at will via drag and drop and click OK when done to proceed to the write process.

Main Functions

Writing the CD

Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the Write Disc... button. Set up your options for Test Write, Using BURN-Proof/JustLink, In Background, Open Next Session, and Write Speed, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

DVD Video/A udio

Discribe’s DVD (Digital Versatile Disc) Video/Audio function allows you to write DVD video and audio as well as data to CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R and DVD+RW media. Please note that in order to write to DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R and DVD+RW you will need a DVD drive capable of handling each type of media.

The data is written in the UDF Format (Universal Disc Format) and is cross-platform compatible working on any platform that supports reading UDF discs.

In theory, any disc written in this format with video data will be readable in a DVD set-top reader for playback. Limitations will include the set-top reader’s ability to work with the individual disc itself. The settop reader’s ability to handle different media types (CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R and DVD+RW) is dependant upon several factors. Please check with the manufacturer of your DVD player to see if it is compatible with newer media types.

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DVD Audio/Video discs can be written by any CDRW and D VD-R/R W drive and on an y of the following media types: CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R and DVD+RW.

Set Up the Data

To write a DVD Audio/Video disc select DVD Audio/

Troubleshooting

Video in Discribe’s format pop-up menu.

Notice the option in the main window called Include Desktop Database, in general when writing a DVD disk used for video or audio playback you would not want these Mac speciﬁc ﬁles written to to the disk. We’ve disabled this option by default.

Drag in any data (including DVD video) that you would like written to the media into the main Discribe window or click the Data... button to open Discribe’s DVD Picker windo w and drag the selected ﬁles there.

NOTE

Please not that the sizes of the media differ from one format to the next. F or instance , CD-R and CD-RW media typicall range in size from 650 to 800 MB. Where DVD-R, DVD-RW and DVD+RW media will typically hold 4.7 Gigabyte. Discribe’s DVD Picker notes the amount of data added into the picker. You can use this

for your guidelines.

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DVD Picker Options

Resolve Aliases - When this option is checked alias ﬁles will be resolved to the original when they’ve been added into the DVD Picker window.

New Folder - Creates a new, “Untitled Folder,” within the DVD Picker window.

Add... - Y ou can add a single ﬁle to the D VD Picker window by clicking the Add... button.

Remove - Removes the selected ﬁle from the D VD Picker window

Cancel - Returns you to the main Discribe soft-

Glossary

ware window without saving any changes OK - Saves changes to the current project.

If you have the D VD Picker windo w open click OK to return to Discribe’s main window.

Writing the Disc

Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the Write Disc... button. Set up your options for Test Write, Using BURN-Proof/JustLink, In Background, Open Next Session, Verify After Writing and Write Speed, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

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Universal Disk Format (UDF)

This format allows data to be written in the UDF Format (Universal Disc Format) and is cross-platform compatible working on any platform that supports reading UDF discs.

Set Up the Data

T o write a D VD disc utilizing UDF select D VD Audio/ Video in Discribe’s format pop-up menu.

Glossary

NOTE

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DVD Picker Options

Resolve Aliases - When this option is checked alias ﬁles will be resolved to the original when they’ve been added into the DVD Picker window.

New Folder - Creates a new, “Untitled Folder,” within the DVD Picker window.

Add... - Y ou can add a single ﬁle to the D VD Picker window by clicking the Add... button.

Remove - Removes the selected ﬁle from the D VD Picker window

Cancel - Returns you to the main Discribe software window without saving any changes

OK - Saves changes to the current project.

If you have the D VD Picker windo w open click OK to return to Discribe’s main window.

Writing the Disc

Verify that the correct CD-RW writer is selected then click the Write Disc... button. Set up your options for Test Write, Using BURN-Proof/JustLink, In Background, Open Next Session, Verify After Writing and Write Speed, then click the Start button to begin the write process.

Troubleshooting

The following list includes some common problems that might be encountered while working to create your CD.

Q: Does Discribe work with iTunes? A: Discribe 4.5 includes a Firewire driver that allows

iTunes to write to a supported CD-RW drive. Be sure to disable the Firewire Authoring Support and Authoring Support ﬁles which get installed with the iTunes installer.

Q: Why do audio CDs work in my computer but not in my audio CD player or DVD player?

A: The most common reason that an audio CD player or a DVD player will have an issue with a particular disc is due to the media’s reﬂecti vity . Some players are very sensitive to the reﬂectivity of the disc itself and have trouble reading CD-RW media. CD-RW media, in general, will be far less compatible than CD-R media will. Try using dif ferent brands of CD-R media until you ﬁnd one that works well with your player.

Glossary

Q: I get a message before I attempt to write a CD that

says “A valid CD-R drive must be selected...” A: If you encounter a message that says, “a valid CD-

R drive must be selected...” then your Mac and Discribe are not detecting your CD-RW dri ve and they are unable to communicate with it. There are a series of simple steps that you can go through to troubleshoot this problem:

1. Check to see if the correct extensions are loading. Many USB and Firewire drives require special extensions that must load in order for Discribe to identify the drive.

If you have the correct extensions loading and still can-

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not see the drive, here are a few more suggestions:

1. Quit Discribe and then cycle the power on your CDRW drive (turn it off for 20 seconds and then turn it back on). Now reopen Discribe and see if the drive is detected.

2. Turn off your Mac. Now turn off the CD-RW dri ve. With everything off, unplug both ends of the USB cable, from the Mac and from the Spressa drive. Plug both cables back in and then turn the CD-RW drive back on.

Now boot the computer back up and reopen Discribe and see if the CD-RW drive appears by clicking the Recorder Information.

3. Try turning your CD-RW drive off, then Unplug the CD-RW drive from the power outlet. Reboot your Mac. After the Mac has completed its boot c ycle, then turn the CD-RW drive back on. After the CD-RW drive’s yellow access light goes out, launch Discribe. Click Discribe’s Recorder Information button, the CD-RW drive should show up.

4. Try connecting the CD-RW drive directly to you Mac rather than through a hub or your keyboard. If you are going directly into your Mac try switching the ports between the keyboard and the CD-RW drive.

Write Test Failure

The write test simulates writing data to the CD by exactly duplicating the write process while holding the recorder’s write laser in the off state. If this test is failed, check the following:

Fragmentation

If the ﬁles to be recorded are fragmented (not written cleanly and contiguously) on the hard drive, the time

Glossary

consumed in accessing them may cause the recorder’s buffers to “run out” of information temporarily. During the actual write process, this would make the disc being written to useless. Use Norton TM Speed Disk or another drive utility to test the hard drive for fragmentation. If fragmentation is greater than moderate, you will need to reinitialize to optimize the hard drive.

Hard Drive Too Slow

If you have an older hard drive, it may be too slow in transferring data to the recorder. T ry using a slo wer recorder speed (1X or 2X). If you are still not successful, you need a faster hard drive.

Recorder Won’t Play CD-ROM

Most recorders can be used to play back CD-ROMs, some older recorders cannot.

Check your manufacturer’s documentation and make sure the CD-ROM Extension is loaded. Ensure also that the device is connected and turned on before you start up your Macintosh, otherwise the CD-ROM Extension will be unable to see the device to load a device driver .

CD Recorder Not Accessible

SCSI - Like other SCSI devices, CD recorders must have a correctly set SCSI ID, a properly terminated SCSI connection, currently supported by Discribe and must be started before the Macintosh in order to show up on the SCSI bus. Refer to the recorder manufacturer and Apple documentation for information. Refer to the user manual

List of Supported CD Recorders or the Discribe read me for the latest up to date information regarding support for your recorder.

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Note that SCSI IDs 0, 3 (internal CD player), and 7 are generally re-served for the Macintosh itself.

ATAPI - It is possible that the driv e was unable to re gister it’s ‘bios’ information with the Macintosh at boot time. This would hinder any software’s ability to see the drive connected to the Mac. Check your CD-RW drives IDE and power cabling to ensure a ﬁrm ﬁt.

USB / Firewire - Make sure that the proper software is loading in the System Folder. Items to double check are the USB (USB manager V1.2 or higher) or Firewire (Firewire V2.1 or higher) drivers (available from Apple) and the USB or Fire wire SIM that w ould have come with the hardware, all of which should be loaded in the Extensions folder. Also check to ensure a tight ﬁt for all USB or Firewire cabling. Faster Recorder Speeds not Available Only those speeds (1X, 2X, etc.) which your recorder is capable of will appear in the Discribe Screen.

Note that CD-RW write speeds are often slower than standard CD-RW write speeds. Many CD-RW drives are distinguished in the following way: 8x4x24. In this ex-ample, the recorder would record to CD-R W media at speeds up to 8x, CD-RW media at speeds up to 4x and read CDs at speeds up to 24x.

Glossary of CD and DVD Terms

AC-3 Dolby® digital surround sound for DVD-Video capable of playing 5.1 discrete channels of audio for the ultimate in surround sound (example, front set of left & right speakers, center channel, rear set of left & right surround speakers + subwoofer). Playing back AC-3 encoded audio requires a Dolby® AC-3 compatible receiver & the appropriate speakers to be connected to the DVD-Video player or DVD-ROM drive. DVD-Video players & DVD-ROM drives can also play the audio as regular stereo for non AC-3 systems

A-Time An abbreviated form of Absolute Time. In CD-DA, the time elapsed since the beginning of the disc. Can be used in determining the start and stop times of sound segments for programming an application on a Mixed Mode disc, measuring from the very beginning of the data area (including the computer data in Track 1).

Absolute Time In Pre-Gr oove (ATIP) Absolute time on the disc from the very ﬁrst addressable block in the PCA (Power Calibration Area) on a CD-R or CD-RW disc Access To ﬁnd a piece of information on a memory medium.

Glossary

Access Time The time it takes to retrie ve a piece of in-

formation. W ith disks or discs, maximum access time is measured as the time it takes to move from one end of the disc to the other, ﬁnd a piece of information, and transfer that information to RAM.

Archive A term referring to the long term storage data. Normally, archiving involves removing a ﬁle from online storage because it doesn’t need to occupy valuable hard drive space, yet it is too valuable to be deleted or will be used again later. Long-life optical media such as CD-R, CD-RW, MO, or DVD+R W are highly desir able for archiving.

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ASMO (Previously called MO7) a high capacity Magneto-Optical drive capable of storing up to 7Gb of computer data, on a removable rewritable optical cartridge. ASMO drives may also be able to read CDROM & potentially DVD-ROM discs

A TAPI A T Attachment Peripheral Interface. Also known as Enhanced IDE (EIDE), this interface is used to attach storage devices such as hard disk drives, CDROM drives, CD recorders, and DVD-ROM drives to PC systems. ATAPI is capable of addressing up to 4 drives, and capable of transfer rates up to 16.5Mb per second.

ATIP See Absolute Time In Pre-Groove Authoring Software A set of software that allows

non-programmers to design and create programs (e.g., multi-media presentations) by entering commands or menu choices, without having to know a programming language.

Backup Backups are usually data that has been copied from one medium to another, so an additional copy of the data will exist should something happen to the original version. Nowadays, as strategically important corporate data becomes scattered across literally thousands of PC’s, good backup strategies- and high-capacity storage -are essential to a company’ s continuous function.

Binary This is how computers store digital information-in a series of ones and zeroes, or “ons” and “offs”.

Bit The smallest piece of data in a computer, it represents a single one or zero.

Block The user data portion of a logical sector in CDROM formats Block Error Correction The addition of 272 bytes of error correction code (ECC) at the of each block of data during pre-mastering, to allow correction

Glossary

of errors detected in the user data block. Bridge Disc A technique for storing data on a CD-

ROM/XA disc that allows it to be played back on a CD-I and Photo-CD player, and a CD-ROM drive.

Buffer A piece of memory that temporarily stores data, usually a small amount. This can help to compensate for differences in the rate of data from one device to another, or can be used to store small pieces of information that are likely to be used repeatedly (such as a digitized beep or other sound). Most CD-ROM drives have their own 64-kilobyte buffers, so that if you ask for, say 24 Kilobytes of data, they will be there for instant retrieval. Otherwise they are simply wiped out of the buffer when the next set of data is loaded. CD recorders use data buffers to ensure a steady stream of data from the host computer to the CD recorder. If a CD recorder’s buffer becomes empty during recording, a “buffer underrun” error occurs. this can mean that the disc is no longer usable (for CD-R discs). W ith CD-ReWritable (CD-RW), the disc can be re-recorded.

Byte A sequence of bits (usually eight on the computer or fourteen on a compact disc) representing an alphanumeric symbol. Used to measure the capacity of memory media.

Cache A performance booster for drives, caching works by storing information read from the drive in high-speed random access memory. When the computer requests information from the drive, the drive checks it relatively speedy cache for the information before looking on the disks itself. If the information is on the cache, it sent to the computer without a relatively slow disk access.

CAV See Constant Angular Velocity

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CD-DA Compact Disc-Digital Audio. Jointly developed by Philips and Sony and launched in 1983, CDDA is the ﬁrst and most popular incarnation of the compact disc, used to digitally record and play back music at unprecedented quality. It has gained worldwide acceptance as a standard to which all digital audio CD discs and CD drives adhere. Philips/Sony’s CD-DA standard is known as the Red book.

CD-Erasable (CD-E) Predecessor to CD-ReWritable. The products are exactly the same, but the name was ofﬁcially changed in 1994 to CD-ReWritable.

CD-Extra See Enhanced CD CD-I Compact Disc-Interactive, Philips’ entry into

the consumer Compact Disc market. It is a compact disc format designed to allow interactive multimedia application to be played through a small computer/disc player on a home television screen. Especially good real-time animation, video, and sound. The CD-I standard is also known as the Green Book.

CD-I Ready A set of speciﬁcations which deﬁne a way of recording

CD-I information on a CD-DA disc. CD-Plus See Enhanced CD CD-MO Compact Disc-Magneto Optical systems are

used as high-density storage media. They have an access speed slower than a magnetic hard disk but faster than CD-ROM. The discs are written by a po werful laser heating a spot on the disc surface; the spot is then polarized by an electromagnet from the other side of the disc. When read, the change in polarity changes the reﬂection of the (weaker) reading laser at that spot, and difference is interpreted as a data times, much like a magnetic hard disk, and are more durable and cheaper (per byte of storage capacity) than their magnetic cous-

Glossary

ins. The CD-MO standard is deﬁned in Part I of the Orange Book, but the technology never took off and has been replaced with CD-ReWritable (CD-RW).

CD-R This is a relatively ne w outgro wth of CD-R OM technology, whereby data can be easily recorded to a writable CD by a laser instead of being manufactured. This technology has found many uses with those who need to create limited numbers of discs for distribution. The technology is “Write Once”, Once the data is recorded it’s permanent. CD-R discs, once recorded, are compatible with all CD players and CD-ROM drives. CD-R discs can hold up to 650Mb of user data, or up to 74 minutes of digital audio, just like regular stamped discs. See Gold Disc.

CD-ROM Acronym for Compact Disc Read-Only Memory. CD-ROM drives can only read the information contained on a CD - they cannot write information to it. The discs are created by pressing them from a stamper containing a mirror image of the disc. Their cost per a unit is low, and they are commonly used for the mass distribution of software and publishing of information. CD-ROM Drive A peripheral device attached to a computer that allows it to read/play a CD disc. All CD-ROM players can also play back audio CD’s but require external head-phones or speakers to hear them. Some can be attached to ampliﬁers to function like normal audio CD players.

CD-ROM/XA “XA” stands for Extended Architecture. CD-ROM/XA is an extension of the Y ellow Book standard, generally consistent with the ISO 9660 logical format but designed to add better audio and video capabilities (taken from the CD-I standard) so that CDROM can more easily be used for multimedia applications.

CD-RW Compact Disc ReWritable, a relatively new addition to the recordable CD arena. CD-RW discs are

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the same formats and capacities of CD-R discs, but are fully erasable and rewritable. The CD-R W discs can be rewritten up to 1,000 times, but are not compatible with older (say, 12X or slower) CD-ROM drives, or consumer type CD players. Newer “Multi-Read” compatible CD-ROM drives and DVD-ROM drives can read CD-RW discs.

CD-V Compact Disc V ideo. A disc containing CD-D A music as well as analog video. These discs can be 12 cm, 20 cm EP (extended play), or 30 cm LP (long play) CD’s. CIRC Cross-Interleaved Reed-Solomon Codethe ﬁrst level of error correction used in ev ery compact disc, and the only one used for audio CD’s. It consists of two Reed-Solomon codes interleaved crosswise.

Compact Disc See CD Compact Disc Digital Audio See CD-DA Compact Disc Drive or Player See CD-R OM drive or

player

Compact Disc Interactive See CD-I Compact Disc-Magneto Optical See CD-MO Compact Disc-Read Only Memory See CD-ROM Compact Disc - Recordable See CD-R Compact Disc - ReWritable See CD-RW Compact Disc-Video See CD-V Compatibility In compact discs, the extent to which

different types of discs can be read by different types of drives or players. For e xample, all CD-DA discs are fully compatible with all CD-DA players, so any player can interpret and reproduce music from any disc regardless of the manufacturer.

Constant Angular V elocity A rotation mode in which

Glossary

a disc spins a constant speed, with the result that the tracks nearest the center pass under the reading head at a lower speed that the tracks nearer to the outer edge of the disk. This is the approach normally taken in magnetic disks, so the sectors on the disk are physically shorter near the center and longer near the edge of the disc. CAV is also used for Magneto-Optical discs and CD-R/RW discs (reading only)

Constant Linear Velocity A rotation mode in which the speed of rotation is variable, so that all data sectors pass under the reading head at exactly the same speed; the rotation rate of the disc is faster when the reading head is near the center of the disc, and slower as the reading head moves further from the center of the disc; sector size is constant. Used with Compact Discs for recording and slower speed reading/playing.

Cost-Per-Megabyte A measure of the expense incurred per megabyte of usable storage received. The common formula is to divide the cost of the drive-and the case of the removable media, the cost of the mediaby the number of megabytes. This measure alone ignores performance issues, which has a signiﬁcant impact on the selection of storage method.

Cyclability A measure of how many times a CD-RW disc can be re-written. Currently, cyclabilty for CDRW is set at 1,000 cycles (rewrites to any one sector)

Direct Overwrite (DO W) A method of recording new data onto a CD-RW disc directly o ver the existing data. This saves time since the disc does not need to be preerased prior to recording new data. Some MagnetoOptical systems are capable of DOW.

Directory In the logical format of a disc, a “branch” of the information tree containing other directories (subdirectories) and/or ﬁles.

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Disc or Optical Disc Throughout this glossary, disc with a “c” is used for optical media, since that is the spelling used in the standards deﬁning compact discs. Contrast with “disk”.

Disc-At-Once A method of recording a CD-R disc that is best suited for mastering a Compact Disc for replication. With Disc-At-Once recording, the Lead-In is written ﬁrst, followed by the data or audio tracks, and then the Lead-Out is recorded. In this way, the recording laser is never turned off and no “link” blocks are written to link the tracks, Lead-In, and Lead-Out areas, as occurs when a disc is recorded in Track-At-Once. See also Track-At-Once

Disc Image See ISO Image. Disk Hard disk or ﬂoppy disk or diskette. Refers to

magnetic storage media, as opposed to disc, which refers to an optical storage medium.

DVD Stands for Digital Versatile Disc, a high capacity disc that looks like a CD, but is capable of storing up to 4.7GB worth of data (or up to 130 minutes of MPEG-2 video with up to 8 channels of audio and 32 tracks of subtitles/menus). Higher capacity DVD discs are possible with double sided discs, and even discs with two information layers per side. DVD discs can only be read by players displaying a “DVD” logo (example: DVD-ROM drives & DVD-Video players). DVD will be available in several “formats”, including DVD-Video for distribution of consumer movies, DVD-R OM for computer data applications (including games & other multimedia content), and DVD-Audio for the ultimate music playback (speciﬁcation not yet deﬁned). DVD-RAM ReWritable D VD disc with a capacity of 2.6GB or 4.7G, and using the Micro UDF logical ﬁle system. Similar to DVD+RW, this re-recordable DVD format is backed by the DVD consortium. Drives should also be capable of reading/playing

Glossary

standard CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, DVD-R, and DVDVideo discs. DVD-RAM discs are housed in a cartridge similar to an MO cartridge, and cannot be read by standard DVD-ROM drives.

DVD-R Write once recordable version of DVD ha ving a capacity of 3.9GB or 4.7GB and using the Micro UDF logical ﬁle system. DVD-R discs are playable in DVD players and DVD-ROM drives, and DVD-R drives should be capable of reading standard CDROM, DVD-ROM, and DVD-Video discs.

DVD+RW ReWritable DVD disc & driv e system proposed by Sony , Philips, HP, Yamaha, & Ricoh as an alternative to DVD-RAM. This format provides 3.0GB or 4.7GB of data storage and affords a cleaner forward compatibility path with future DVD-R OM dri ves. The DVD+R W disc is a bare disc, similar to a CD-R W disc, and is compatible with standard DVD-R OM drives and DVD players. DVD+RW uses Constant Angular Velocity (CAV) for better performance than DVD-RAM. DVD+RW drives are also capable of reading CDROM, DVD-R, DVD-ROM, and DVD-Video discs.

ECC Acronym for Error Correction Code. In CDROM, a system of scrambling data and recording redundant data onto a disc as it is pre-mastered. On playback, this redundant information helps to detect and correct errors that may arise during data transmission. See also Block Error Correction.

EDC Error Detection Code. On a CD-ROM, 32 bits of information per sector which are used to detect errors in the data of that sector.

EIDE Enhanced IDE See IDE, ATAPI offers greater performance, and up to 2 devices per port Enhanced CD A relati vely ne w addition to the CD family. An Enhanced CD, sometimes also referred to as CD Extra or CD Plus, is essentially a Multi-session CD-ROM con-

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taining up to 98 audio tracks in the ﬁrst session, and usually 1 data track in the second session. Enhanced CD came about as better solution for putting audio and data tracks on a single CD-ROM than mixed mode discs. With Mixed mode, the data and audio tracks reside in a single session, and some CD players would try to play the data track, which comes out as static. With Enhanced CD, a regular CD player only “sees” the audio tracks in the ﬁrst session, while a CD-ROM drive would be able to play the audio tracks and access the data in the second session.

Error Correction Code See ECC Error Detection Code See EDC FireWire A high speed serial interface that can link

different types of devices on one logical bus. Apple Computer is credited with the ﬁrst implementation of FireWire on its G3 Macintosh computers. FireWire can be used to connect digital video cameras, hard drives, CD-R W dri ves, and personal computers together. Up to 63 devices can be daisy chained, and bandwidths of up to 400 Megabits per second are possible today, and o v er 1 Gigibit per second is possible by the end of 2000. See also IEEE1394, & i.LINK

Floppy Disk (ﬂoppies) These are the low-capacity (typically 1.44Mb) removable disks which most personal computers have.While they of fer e xcellent interchangeability, they also have little capacity and even less speed.

Gigabyte (Gb) 1,000 Megabytes See also Byte, Kilobyte, & Megabyte

Gold Disc The recordable disc used in CD-R systems. The blank disc is made, like all other Compact Discs, of bottom layer of polycarbonate, but instead of having a series of pits and lands stamped into it, it contains a

Glossary

pre-formed track spiral, which the recording laser beam will follow when inscribing information onto the disc. This type of disc is therefore called pre-grooved. A translucent green or gold layer of recording material (organic dye) is laid on top of the polycarbonate, then a reﬂective layer of gold (hence the name “Gold Disc”). The usual layers of lacquer and label are applied.

Green Book The Philips/Sony speciﬁcation for CDInteractive (CD-I)

Hard Disk A magnetic storage medium for digital data. Also called a ﬁx ed disk or W inchester disk (“Drive” may be appended to any of these names).

Header Field Four bytes recorded at the beginning of each CD-ROM sector which tell the address of the sector (expressed as a Logical Block Number) and the mode in which the sector is recorded.

High Sierra Format The original logical ﬁle format for CD-ROM proposed by the High Sierra; still being used by some CD-ROM publishers, although the ISO9660 logical ﬁle format is the industry standard today.

High Sierra Group The original group of twelve companies which met in 1985 to deﬁne a standard logical ﬁle format for CD-ROM. The group met at the High Sierra Hotel near Tahoe, hence the name “High Sierra”.

Hybrid Disc A disc as deﬁned in the Orange Book developed by Philips and Sony; such a disc may contain information written over more than one recording session. Used with Kodak’s Photo CD. Hybrid is also a generic term used to describe a disc with both ISO9660 and Macintosh HFS or UNIX data structures.

IDE Intelligent Drive Electronics. IDE has been the

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standard interface for hard disk drives since the early 90s. Since IDE had some limitations (only 2 devices could be supported by a controller, and only supported devices with less than 500Mb capacity), Enhanced IDE (EIDE, also called AT API) was born. T oday EIDE is the standard storage peripheral interface used on PC computers to attach hard drives, CD-R OM dri v es, CD recorders, and DVD-ROM drives

IEEE1394 International standard for the high speed serial interface also known as “FireW ire” or “i.LINK”. It provides for easy hot plug connection of digital devices such as digital video cameras, mass storage, and networking products. IEEE1394 is seen by many as the home network standard for the future, when all appliances and computers will be linked in the home. See also FireWire, & i.LINK

i.LINK Sony’ s name for the IEEE1394 serial interface standard. Sony offers digital video cameras, CD-RW recorders, personal computers, and other devices capable of being connected together. Devices are easily added or removed while the computer and peripherals are turned on. Up to 63 devices can be connected to an i.LINK chain. See also IEEE1394, and FireWire Image see ISO Image

Interactive An overused term describing a software program in which the user has some control over how he or she interacts with the program.

ISO International Organization of Standards. An organization involved in the development and deﬁnition of world-wide standards.

ISO9660 An international standard specifying the logical ﬁle format for ﬁles and directories on a CD-ROM disc. It is directly derived from the High Sierra Group Proposal.

Glossary

ISO Image Or CD-ROM Image, image, or disc im-

age. An exact representation of the entire set of data and programs, as it will appear on CD, in terms of content and logical format, simulated on some other medium. This is sent to the disc manufacturer (or a CD recorder) for creating the pre-master/master for mass replication.

Jewel Case The plastic box in which discs are often shipped and sold. Noted for being fragile and difﬁcult to open.

Kilobyte Or Kilobytes. 1,024 bytes Kilohertz (kHz) 1,000 Hertz Kodak PhotoCD A Compact Disc format based on the

Hybrid Disc speciﬁcation, used to store and distribute photographic images for display on PhotoCD players attached to television sets, or on compatible CD-ROM drives attached to personal

computers. A PhotoCD is a Mode 2 CD-R OM XA for mat disc.

Land The space between two pits along the data spiral of a Compact Disc. From the pressing side the land is raised above the pits; from the reading side it is lowered.

Laser “Light Ampliﬁcation by Stimulated Emission of Radiation” A laser beam is a focused beam of

a single wave-length of light, so when it passes ov er an uneven surface (like the data spiral of a Compact Disc), changes in its reﬂection can be accurately detected, measured, and converted into a stream of electronic bits.

Layer On a DVD disc (DVD-ROM or DVD-Video), up to 2 separate layer can exist, each having a maximum capacity of 4.7Gb. It is possible to have a DVD

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disc with 2 sides, with up to 2 layers per side, giving a total disc capacity of up to 17GB!

Layered EDC/ECC See EDC and ECC Lead-In Area On a CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-

RAM, or DVD+RW disc, a data area at the beginning of the disc that is left blank for the disc’s (or session’s) Table of Contents (TOC). The TOC will be recorded when the disc (or session) is ﬁnalized and closed.

Lead-Out Area On a CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVDRAM, or DVD+RW disc, a data area at the end of the disc (or session) that indicates the end of the disc/layer (or session) has been reached.

Logical File Format Translates the sector-and-mode view of a Compact Disc into a virtual “tree” of directories and ﬁles, which makes it easier for both humans and computers to use the information on the disc. In this CD, for brevity , we often call it simply the logical format or logical ﬁle system.

Magnetic Hard Disk Sometimes called a W inchester disk, the generic term for this storage medium is “hard disk”, and it refers to the ﬁxed magnetic storage devices supplied with almost all personal computers and workstations. Capacities range from 20 Megabytes to over 9 Gigabytes.

Magneto Optical (MO) The technology used by most rewritable optical drives. It uses a laser to heat magnetic recording media until its resistance to reversing its magnetic polarity falls at which time a small magnet reverses the ﬁeld.

Mastering The process of creating a glass master from which Compact Discs or DVD discs will be reproduced. Data is read from a tape (or CD-R/DVD-R disc) to a powerful modulated laser beam that “engraves” the corresponding pits into a photo-resistant surface.

Glossary

This glass master is then used to create the stamper that will be used to replicate mass quantities of discs.

Megabyte (MB) A measure of data storage; one Megabyte equals 1,024,000 bytes of data. See also Byte.

Micro UDF (M-UDF) A ﬁle system similar to ISO9660, but designed for DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RAM, & DVD+RW. Micro UDF can also be bridged to ISO9660 for backward compatibility.

See also UDF. Mixed Mode Disc A Compact Disc including both

computer data and CD-DA tracks. Usually, the computer data is all contained in Track 1, and up to 98 tracks of music are recorded on the following tracks.

Mode There are two recording modes for Compact Disc Read Only Memory (CD-ROM). In Mode 1, 288 bytes of each

sector are used for storing error correction code, and the remaining 2048 bytes per sector are available for user data. Mode 2, used in CD-I, CD-I ready, Video CD, PhotoCD, Enhanced CD, and other CD-ROM/XA applications, have 2 forms: Form 1 is similar to Mode 1, as it is also used to record data that requires error correction; Form 2 is used for recording information such as sound, images, or video which do not require such extreme precision. Since less error correction code is needed, more bytes in the sector can be devoted to information storage, resulting in a data area of 2336 bytes per sector.

MPEG Motion Picture Experts Group, whose name has been applied to the standard promulgated by the group for compression of full-motion video. MPEG-1 is a lower level of quality (352 x 240 pix els @ 30 ﬁelds per second) and compression, and is used for CD-I and

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Video CD. MPEG-2 is a much higher level of quality (720 x 480 @ 60 ﬁelds per second), and is used for full length motion pictures and video distributed on DVD discs. The MPEG standard has been adopted by ISO.

Multi-Function Recorder A CD recorder capable of recording more than 1 type of writable media. For example, a CD-RW recorder can record CD-Recordable (CD-R) and CD-ReWritable (CD-RW) discs, as well as reading/playing CD-R, CD-RW, and regular stamped discs. Multimedia This term covers a v ast and vague area concerned with the integration of sound, video, images, and animation. Multimedia presentations can be interactive, where the user makes decisions on how to proceed with the program, or it can be a linear presentation designed to run without user involvement.

Multi Read (MR) A certiﬁcation that a CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM drive can read the phase change CD-ReWritable (CD-RW) disc, as well as a CD-R or CD-RW disc that has been recorded using packet writing. Multi Read also covers the playback of CD-R/CDRW discs on DVD-ROM drives.

Multi-Session Originally developed by Philips and Kodak to facilitate distributing photographic images on CD-R discs. The concept is that new photographs could be added by recording a new data area (a session) on the disc. When played back, all the images in each session would be accessible as one logical volume, the user would not realize the data was in separate recording sessions. This was later applied to general data storage on CD-R and CD-RW discs. A session occupies at least 15Mb of disc space, and therefore it’s not v ery efﬁcient to record small amounts of data at a time.

OPC A procedure done by a CD recorder before recording on a CD-R or CD-RW disc to calibrate the la-

Glossary

ser to the disc using the Power Calibration Area (PCA) area on the recordable disc. See also PCA, Running OPC

Orange Book The Philips/Sony speciﬁcation for Compact Disc Magneto Optical (CD-MO), Compact Disc Write-Once (CD-WO, but commonly called CDRecordable or CD-R), and Compact Disc ReWritable (CD-RW). The Orange Book is divided into three parts, Part I is devoted to CD-MO, which ne ver got of f the ground, Part II is the CD-R portion, and Part III is the CD-RW portion. The Orange Book speciﬁed how the recordable/re-writable discs and constructed and used by the recording/playback systems. All other CD formats can be applied to the recordable/re-writable discs through the Orange Book.

Packet Writing A method of recording on a CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RAM, or DVD+RW disc where “packets” of data are recorded at a time as opposed to “tracks” or “discs” at a time. The chief beneﬁt of packet writing is that the CD recorder can start and stop recording at will, and so there is no more buffer underrun problems. However, packet writing can only be used to record data discs, all other formats must still use track-at-once or disc-at-once. See Track-at-Once and Disc-at-once.

PCA See Power Calibration Area Phase Change Optical recording technology that in-

volves changing the physical phase of the optical media using a laser. The two states are Crystalline and Amorphous. Heating the media to a certain temperature causes the phase to change to Amorphous (dark mark). Re-heating the same spot to a lower temperature causes the spot to re-crystallize back to the Crystalline state (clear). The Amorphous marks hav e lower reﬂectivity than the surrounding Crystalline lands, and have the same light scattering effects as pits and lands

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on a conventional stamped CD. CD-ReWritable (CDRW) and DVD-RAM is based on Phase Change technology.

PhotoCD See Kodak PhotoCD Physical Standards For Compact Discs, these are usu-

ally referred to as the Color Books. These standards deﬁne the mechanical and electrical speciﬁcations for the construction of the disc. The color books include the Red Book for digital audio (music discs), Yellow Book for CD-ROM, Green Book for CD-Interactive (CD-I), White Book for Video CD, and the Orange Book for the CD-Recordable (CD-R) and CD-ReWritable discs. See also Red Book, Yellow Book, Green Book, White Book, and Orange Book.

Physical Sector Described by the Yellow Book, each Compact Disc is divided into 270,000 physical sectors of 2,336 bytes each.

Pit The space between two lands along the data spiral of a Compact Disc or DVD disc. The “pits” on a CDR, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RAM, or DVD+RW disc are different from those on standard Compact Discs because they are not actual indentations but “mounds” (CD-R or DVD-R) or “marks” (CD-RW, DVD-RAM & DVD+RW) created in the recording layer by the laser beam.

Platform Describes a speciﬁc hardware and operating system, such as the DOS platform or Macintosh platform.

PMA See Program Memory Area Polycarbonate A tough plastic used in molding Com-

pact Discs. Pre-Groove CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RAM, &

DVD+RW discs have a spiral track that is molded in

Supported Recorders

List of Supported CD Recorders

the polycarbonate substrate for the recording laser beam to follow when writing data onto the disc.

Pre-Master The may be a tape, hard disk driv e, CD-R or CD-RW disc that contains data in the Compact Disc format. The data on a pre-master is recorded onto a master from which Compact Discs are then mass replicated.

Power Calibration Area (PCA) An area of a CD-R or CD-RW disc that is reserved for the CD recorder to calibrate the laser power for recording the disc.

Program Memory Area (PMA) An area on a CD-R or CD-RW disc where the information about the tracks and sessions on the disc as stored as a temporary T able of Contents (TOC). When the disc (or session) is ﬁnalized and closed, the information stored in the PMA becomes the TOC.

Random Access When data on a storage medium can be accessed randomly instead of sequentially. A close analogy would be in music - a cassette tape offers sequential access because you have to wind through the tape to reach a certain part, yet a phonograph record would be random access because you could place the needle anywhere on its surface. CD-R and CD-RW, like hard disk drives and optical drives are random access devices.

Random Mode UDF Ability for CD-RW, DVDRAM, or DVD+RW to randomly write, erase, and rewrite any random sector on the disc. In earlier “sequential” recording modes, sectors could only be recorded in a track in ascending order, so that any one ﬁle or folder could not be deleted. The user could “virtually” delete the ﬁle/folder, but it w ould physically remain on the disc until the whole disc was erased. Random mode allow a ﬁle/folder to be deleted and the free space it creates can be used immediately

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Real-Time In Compact Discs, refers to the playing or recording time as these processes are actually taking place. Also refers to single speed (1X) recording or playback.

Red Book The original Philips/Sony color book speciﬁcation that describes the layout and physical format of audio Compact Discs. All other color books are based on the Red Book. Red Book provides for two layers of error correction code to detect and correct errors while the disc is being played. Up to 99 tracks are possible on a Red Book disc, with a total playing time of up to 75 minutes on 1 disc.

Region Code DVD titles, especially movies, are encrypted with a region code. DVD players/drives are also assigned a region code, and only discs encrypted with the same region code as the player or DVD-R OM drive will play on that player/driv e. How it works is the world is broken down into 6 regions (for example, North America is part of re gion 1). Only discs intended for distribution in region 1 (encrypted with region 1 code) will play on a DVD player intended for distribution (and conﬁgured) for region 1. This helps movie companies control the release of titles in different markets around the world.

ReWritable Optical Storage A high capacity optical storage technology that operates much like a highspeed, very high capacity ﬂoppy drive - it allo ws users to write and erase data on a disc. CD-ReWritable (CDRW), along with Magneto Optical (MO), D VD-RAM, and DVD+RW are all examples of rewritable optical storage.

Rotational Speed The speed at which the disc spins inside a drive. It’s usually measured in RPM (revolutions per minute).

Running OPC A method of calibrating the recording

Supported Recorders

laser power to a CD-R or CD-R W disc. Running OPC continuously monitors the laser power, and can adjust the laser power “on the ﬂy” to compensate for dust, ﬁngerprints, or other contamination on the disc. This ensures a very consistent, robust recording.

SCSI An acronym for Small Computer System Interface, usually pronounced (“scuzzy”), which is a standard computer peripheral interface which is used on Macintosh

computers, IBM-compatible computers, and workstations to communicate with storage devices and other peripherals Up to 7 devices can be connected to a SCSI chain, and SCSI generally offers improved performance over EIDE (ATAPI) and USB. SCSI performance is par with i.LINK/IEEE1394

Seek Time This is a performance statistic which refers to the amount of time it takes the drive’s read head (or pick-up, in the case of a CD recorder) to ﬁnd a piece of data on a disc. Seek time claims can be misleading though, as manufacturers can locate all the data to be found in one narrow band of the disc - reducing the distance the pick-up must travel and shrinking seek times.•Session A complete logical v olume on a CD-R or CD-RW disc having a Lead-In area with table of contents, one or more tracks (data or audio), and a Lead-Out area. A session occupies approximately 15 Megabytes of space on the disc as overhead. See also Multi-Session.

TOC (T able Of Contents) Information on the number of tracks, their starting and stopping locations, and the total length of the data (or music) on a disc. If a disc has only one session, then there will be only one TOC. Multi-session CD-R, CD-RW, or DVD-R discs will have a T OC for each session on the disc, with references back to the previous sessions.

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

Track Adjacent bands of the data spiral on a Compact Disc. A Compact Disc (of an y format) may hav e up to 99 tracks.

T rack-At-Once (TAO) The most common method of recording a CD-R disc currently. Track-at-once simply means that one track at a time is recorded on the disc. Track-at-once is mostly used when recording Multisession CD-ROM discs, each new session will contain at least 1 track. Track-at-once is mostly used for general data storage, and is not the best way to master a disc for replication. Disc-At-Once is the preferred way to master a disc for replication. Track-at-once writes the data (or audio) tracks ﬁrst, then records the LeadIn area with the TOC, and then jumps to the end of the session to write the Lead-Out. See Disc-At-Once. Track-At-Once can also be used to record a CD-RW disc.

Track Relative Time A technique to determine the start and stop times of sound segments on a Mixed mode disc.

T ransfer Rate The rate at which digital information is transferred from a storage medium. For Compact Discs, Real time (1X) transfer rate is 150 Kilobytes (Kb) per second. 2X transfer rate is 300Kb per second, 4X transfer rate is 600Kb per second, and so on.

UDF (Universal Disc Format) A recently added logical format that is closely associated with ISO9660, but offers expanded ﬂexibility for recording CD-R or CD-RW discs using packet writing. Like ISO9660, UDF is cross platform and discs created with UDF can be interchanged with PC, Macintosh, and UNIX computers. UDF can accommodate long ﬁle names, something ISO9660 was very inﬂexible with.

Universal Serial Bus (USB) Easy to connect serial interface used on personal computers to attach lower

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performance devices such as keyboards, mice, and some storage products such as lower performance CDRW and ﬂoppy dri ves. Bandwidth is only about 1.2Mb per second (maximum), and around 600Kb per second sustained. Fast enough to record a CD at 4X. USB is attractive for attaching peripherals as ports are standard on both PC and Macintosh computers, and is easily “plug & play” installed as external devices.

White Book Speciﬁcation for the V ideo CD dev eloped by Philips, Sony , JVC, and Matsushita. This speciﬁcation uses the MPEG-1 video technology to store motion pictures efﬁciently on a standard capacity Compact Disc. A V ideo CD is a Mode 2 CD-R OM XA format disc.

Winchester Disk When originally developed, the magnetic hard disk was named because the development project was called “Winchester”, and the ﬁrst drive model was 3030. Later the generic term for this device came to be “hard disk”.

WORM An acronym for Write Once, Read Many; which is another type of optical storage that is similar to CD-R. Like CD-R, WORM is a write once technology where the data is permanently recorded onto the disc with a laser. Unlike CD-R, how-ever, WORM drives and cartridges are of a proprietary format and not suited for interchange.

Writable Optical Media This is kind of the umbrella term for all optical media that can be written or recorded. It includes write-once technologies such as CD-R and WORM, as well as rewritable optical technologies such as CD-RW, MO, etc.

Yellow Book The Philips/Sony speciﬁcation for CDROM discs based upon the Red Book standard. This book deﬁnes two sub-modes: Mode 1 & Mode 2; and provides for a third layer of error correction code over

DISCRIBE CD Mastering Software

the Red Book digital audio standard.

List of Supported Recorders

SCSI Drives

Acer CR-1420C DynaTek CDM-4000 HP CD-Writer 6020 HP SureStore 4020 Imation CDR 8x20 Imation CDRW 8x2x20 External Imation CDRW 8x2x20 Internal JVC Writeable CD-ROM JVC XR-W1001 JVC XR-W2010 JVC XR-W2012 (OEM) JVC XR-W2020 JVC XR-W2022 (OEM) Kodak PCD 200 Kodak PCD 225 Kodak PCD 600(6x) LACIE CDBP-121032S RW 12x10x32 LACIE CDBP-161040S RW 16x10x40 Melco CDRW-S4224 Melco CDRW-S4432 Melco CDRW-S8432 Melco CRWS-SB1610 16x10x32 Mitsubishi CDRW 226 Mitsubishi CDVR 2x4 Mitsubishi CDVR 2x6 Mitsubishi CDVR 4x4 Olympus CD-R2 Olympus CDS620 Optima DisKovery 1300CDR Optima DisKovery 650CDR Panasonic CW-7502 Panasonic CW-7503 (8x20) Philips CDD2000 Philips CDD2600 Philips CDD2600 (OEM) Philips CDD3600 Philips CDD521

Primera Discribe5 User Manual

Specifications and Main Features

Frequently Asked Questions

User Manual

Introduction

Getting Started

System Requirements

Installing Discribe

Getting T echnical Support

Overview

A Word About CD-R and CD-RW

Launching Discribe

Discribe’s Quick Start Menu

Making an Audio CD

Creating A Data CD

Drag and Drop Directly to the Discribe Windo w

Click the Data... Button

Copying a CD

Select the Source Drive

Writing the CD

Discribe Pull-Down Menus

File Pull-Down Menu

Utilities Pull-Down Menu

Web Pull-Down Menu

Discribe’s Other Functions

Macintosh HFS

Setting Up Your Volume

Adding Audio

Writing the CD

Multi-Session Macintosh HFS CD-ROMs

ISO-9660

Select the Format

Edit Y our Data

Writing the CD

ISO-9660 XA

Select the Format

Edit Y our Data

ISO-9660 Picker Options

Writing the CD

Audio CD

Adding Audio Tracks

Sequencing Audio Tracks

Setting Audio Tracks Pre-Gaps

Writing the CD

Build-A-Mac HFS

Drag and Drop Directly to the Discribe Windo w

Click the Data... Button

Writing the CD

Mac/ISO Hybrid

Setup of Data

Begin Mac/ISO Hybrid Project Creation

ISO and Shared Portion of Hybrid

Finish Up with Disc Info...

Writing the CD

Disc Copy Image

Creating an Image

Writing the Saved Image to CD

Writing the CD

CD to CD-RW Copy

Select Your Read Device

Writing the CD

CD Extra

Set Up the Data

Set Up the Audio

Writing the CD

Video CD

Set Up the Data

Writing the CD

DVD Video/A udio

Set Up the Data

Writing the Disc

Universal Disk Format (UDF)

Set Up the Data

Writing the Disc

Troubleshooting

Glossary of CD and DVD Terms

List of Supported Recorders

SCSI Drives