TAScam CD-R624W User Guide

TASCAM CD-R624W

Packing List

The following items should be present in your CD-R624W bundle:

- TEAC 6x24 external CD-R drive (CD-R56S/614)

- Adaptec PCI SCSI Card

- SCSI Cable

- SCSI Terminator

- CD-R624W software CD-ROM

- CD Stomper w/ CD Stomper CD-ROM and CD Labels

- (2) Blank TEAC CD-R media

- TEAC 6x24 Installation Guide

- CD-R624 QuickStart Guide (That’d be this book.)

Be sure to go into the Red Roaster-E folder; Red Roaster-D installs
the program in German, and Red Roaster-F installs the program in
French.

To install Adaptec EZ CD Creator, run the set-up file for EZ CD
Creator. To access it, go inside the English Folder, to the Disk 1
Folder. There will be a program called “Setup.exe” in that folder.

Cdr624w\English\Disk 1\Setup.exe

There are folders in the root directory for Dutch, German, French,
Italian, and Spanish for EZ CD Creator. (If you want to exercise your
foreign languages, be my guest.)

To install Xing AudioCatalyst, run the set-up file for Audio
Catalyst. It is located in the root directory of the CD-R624W disc,
entitled “AudioCatalyst Installer”.

Installing the CD-R624W Bundle

A hardware installation booklet has been included with this package;
look to it for installation of the SCSI card and CD-Recorder. Also, if
you are new to installing software on your PC, be aware that you will
probably have to restart the computer in between each installation.

To install the software, make sure your SCSI card and CD-Recorder
are already connected. Insert the CD-R624W disc into your CD-ROM
or CD-R drive.

To install SEK’D Red Roaster, run the set-up file for Red
Roaster. To access it, go inside the Software Folder, to the Install
Folder, to the Red Roaster-E folder. There will be a program called
“Setup” in that folder.

Cdr624w\Software\Install\Red Roaster-E\Setup

Cdr624w\AudioCatalyst Installer

Introduction to CDR Technology

CDR (Compact Disc Recordable) media can store up to 74 minutes of
stereo audio, or up to 650 megabytes of data. CDR media can only
be written on once, so the CDR authoring software allows you to
design your CD completely before you burn it. Since the CD must
contain a directory of what is on it, and since that directory is on the
write once media also, all of the information must be burned to the CD
at the same time. Recording the information to the CD is done in a
Session.

While audio CD players will only recognize the first session on the
CD, many CD-ROMs will read multiple sessions. A CD with more than
one session is called a Multi-Session CD. So, if the first session of a
data CD only contained 200 megabytes of data, you could record
another session after it which could contain close to 450 megabytes.

(It won’t be quite that big because of the extra space taken by the
new directory.) Remember though, older CD-ROMs may not search
for extra sessions.

With your CD-R624W package, you have software capable of
recording either data or audio CDs. Here’s a brief description of the
capabilities of each format:

Audio CD - This is the standard CD format you can use in your audio
CD player. You can have up to 99 tracks of audio. The audio tracks
must be recorded in stereo at the CD standard of 16bit, 44.1kHz.
Audio players will not search for multiple sessions, so everything for
the audio player must be burned in the first session of the disc.
SEK’D Red Roaster is provided on your software CD so you can
record, edit and process your audio, then assemble and burn your
masterpiece to a CD.

Red Roaster Tutorial:

Set-up & Acquiring Audio

There are two movies on the CD-R624W that will walk you through
many of the features of Red Roaster. If you look in the CD-R624W
CD-ROM, you’ll find a folder labeled AVI_Movies. That has the two
short videos. However, we are still providing this tutorial to help you
through your first session, step-by-step.

ISO-9660 - Originally specified for DOS CD-ROM use, the ISO­9660 now has multiple variations for DOS, Windows 95/98, and
Macintosh. While more features are available in the later Windows
95/98, the original DOS format will be compatible with machines
without Windows 95/98. Since most Macintosh computers can read
Windows CDs, this is also a great way to store cross platform material
such as JPEGs, HTML, or even word process, spreadsheet, or
graphic files. Adaptec EZ CD Creator is provided on your software
CD so you can assemble data CDs to back up your important
computer data, or assemble your own multimedia CDs.

So to review, CDs can either be written as an audio CD or data CD.
Each time information is written to the CD, it records the directory and
the target material all in one session. Audio CD players will only
recognize the first session, but if you wanted to write multiple data
sessions to a CD, most CD-ROMs will read them.

When you first start up your program, you will see the toolbars,
but no track layout yet. The first thing you need to do is create

a VIP ( VI rtual P roject). To do that, click on the first button. A set-up
menu will appear.

The main functions we need to
focus on here are the number
of tracks, sample rate, and the
name of the VIP. Here, we
want to make sure we are set to
a sample rate of 44.1kHz
(shown as 41000 in the menu)
since we’re planning to record
to a CD. Also, be sure to give
the project a name you’ll
remember.

A word about the Tracks
setting: It is important to know

that “tracks” are actually stereo tracks, not mono. So, if you select 1
track, then you are getting stereo. Selecting 2 tracks gives you 2
stereo tracks, making more detailed editing easier, but reducing the
track viewable height size once we get to the editing screen.
Typically, I use the “2 Tracks” setting to give me more flexibility when
fading from one track to the next.

Once you’ve set up your VIP, it’s time to record some audio.
To do this, click on the record button in the top tool bar.

This is where you will
want to monitor your
input levels. Click on
the button labeled
“Monitor” (located
underneath the level
meters) to hear what is
coming into your
sound card input, and
to view the levels on
the monitor level.

This screen gives you more options to customize your recording
setup, although most of the settings should work fine as is.

If you have multiple sound cards in your PC, you will need to select
which card the input is coming from. On the left side of this menu just
below center is the sound card selector. Make sure it has the correct
sound card input.

To start recording, click on Record. To stop, click on Stop. When
you stop, Red Roaster will show you a screen where you can decide
if you want to keep the recording, or delete it and do it again. If you
like it, click on “Yes”. If you want to do it again, click on “Delete” and
record again.

The Recording screen will remain there in case you want to record
more tracks. This is handy for importing many individual tracks in the
same sitting. If you want to record more tracks, click record and you’re
recording again. If you’re done, click “OK”.

Once you’ve recorded your audio, the display shows the audio clips
in the track screens. Now that your audio is in the VIP, it’s time to start
editing the audio. But before we do that, let’s do the right thing and
save where we’re at. It’s good advice for any kind of work on the
computer. Save frequently and often.

Editing/Processing

Now that we have our waveforms on the screen, let’s do some basic
editing and processing. We’re only going to get into the basic editing
here... the SEK’D Red Roaster manual will take your through the
advanced stuff.

The first thing you’ll want to do is select Universal Mode for the

cursor. This button gives you different editing functions
depending on where you click on the audio. If you click in the top half
of the track, you are moving the play/record cursor and selecting
regions of audio to manipulate. If you click on the bottom of the
audio, you can select the entire block of audio and move it wherever
you wish.

Very basic edits can be made simply by
selecting the block of audio by clicking in
the bottom half of the audio block. Five
handles appear in the corners and top of
the audio block.

The handles at the bottom of the block move the starting/ending
point of the audio. This is a good way to get rid of dead space before
and after the tracks.