Are all recordable CD brands equal?

[Steve w]

Is there any such thing as a "best" brand for recordable CD's??? Or will any brand do?

[Ronflugelguy]

Originally posted by Steve w
Is there any such thing as a "best" brand for recordable CD's??? Or will any brand do?

Do a seach of this forum on CDR, Steve, and you'll find out there are differing opinions on this subject.

[Sckott]

We've covered this so thick, you could cut it with a knife.

Well, the answer isn't easy. You see, brand-to-brand, the dye, make up and actual company hired to make the CDR for Maxell, TDK, Sony and Polaroid can change month to month. Same way those peaches you buy from the supermarket may be from Chilie from one day, to Georgia for another time. Underlying it all, there's no control a consumer has.

With the exception of:

Taiyo Yuden Blanks (sp) are consistant, also used as Maxell CDR Pro's.
Mitsui Gold - High quality, and very solid.

Just a couple of examples. Sorry, but don't bother being brand loyal. It means diddly. Sony, Maxell and Memorex might use the same damn brand of CDR, then they switch it without warning.

[Grant]

But I think Sony is pretty consitient, whether Taiyo Yuden or they, themselves make the blanks.

Experiment. Buy several types. Find what you think works for you and stick with it. But I think most of us agree that one should not use the Comp USA surprise for serious audio burns.

I'm still not 100% certain that the Fuji blanks I got on a spindle with the screw top are Tayio Yuden-I hope so-but i'm going to start using them. I do notice that their ideal writing speed is 4x. The recommended speed is not listed anywhere on the package.

[Gary Freed]

Hi All,

No I don't work for Staples

But they are currently is curently having a sale on the Sony 50 count
on a spindle CDR's.

Price is $2.99 after rebate - The package says made in Taiwan
as it appears there were many other full price CDR's also labeled
Hecho en Taiwan;)

[Gardo]

Originally posted by Gary Freed
Hi All,

No I don't work for Staples

But they are currently is curently having a sale on the Sony 50 count
on a spindle CDR's.

Price is $2.99 after rebate - The package says made in Taiwan
as it appears there were many other full price CDR's also labeled
Hecho en Taiwan;)

Best Buy has the same sale going on. One rebate per family or household, unfortunately.... The Sony blanks I bought seem to be high quality. Top speed is hard-encoded to 40x, according to Exact Audio Copy.

[Grant]

Originally posted by Gary Freed
Hi All,

No I don't work for Staples

But they are currently is curently having a sale on the Sony 50 count
on a spindle CDR's.

Price is $2.99 after rebate - The package says made in Taiwan
as it appears there were many other full price CDR's also labeled
Hecho en Taiwan;)

Sony has a plant in Taiwan.

[Sckott]

Staples CDRs are branded IBM's, and they're using phthalocyanine dyes. They're very cheap to make.

Grant, those Sonys might be Azo dyes, but around here, the same silver-painted blanks are phthalocyanine.

Lately I've found most Azo dyed CDRs burned slowly (<8X) are more apt to take re-rip tests after 3-4 years. The phthalocyanine, especially the unbranded discs, croak in a year or two.

Azo dyes are easy to spot. When you burn on the Cds, under normal light, you can CLEARLY see the burn. Maxell Pros and Taiyo Yuden (sp) use this.

The light, sometimes gold or greenish metallic finish, phthalocyanine, you can just barely see the burn when it's done.

Verbatim seem to be (corrected) Azo dyes.

http://www.kopyrite.com/cd/theory/cdr_dye.html

My experiences are thus, but when you read the article above, this is FACT: To date there has been no conclusive proof that any of these dye polymers are superior!

So, make redundant backups like the pros do.

[Gardo]

My Best Buy Sonys (2.99 after rebate) report "Type 5: Phtalocyanine: gold" via Exact Audio Copy.

The "gold" part sounds like a good thing, but I don't have any idea what it means.

[Grant]

Originally posted by Sckott
Staples CDRs are branded IBM's, and they're using phthalocyanine dyes. They're very cheap to make.

Grant, those Sonys might be Azo dyes, but around here, the same silver-painted blanks are phthalocyanine.


The Sonys are all either Phthalocyanine or Cyanine.

BTW, I have a spindle of Verbatims that are Phthalocyanine.

[mcow1]

The Maxell CD-R Pros taht I have show Taiyo Yuden - cyanine
The Mitsui Branded show - phtalocyanine : gold
The Fujis come up Taiyo Yuden - Cyanine : blue/green

[Andrew]

I've used Imation from the beginning and haven't made one coaster yet.

[SVL]

Sometimes you can identify the true manufacturer of a blank by using a small utility called CDRINFO (it is free and can be found easily on the Internet). It reads the code on the inner ring of a blank, but no one can guarantee that the code would regularly change as soon as the the production line is changed for the blanks.

[Sckott]

CDRINFO has not proven to be 100% accurate. It can, however, aid in finding some mysteries about certain CDR blanks.