I want to buy some blank CD's for my CD burner.  What kind should I buy?

Blank CD's come in two styles: CD-R and CD-RW.  CD-R stands for CD Recordables while CD-RW stands for CD Re-Writeables.  We would suggest using just CD-R's.  CD-R's are relatively inexpensive and appear to be more reliable that CD-RW's.  We would only suggest buying CD-RW's if you are sure you know that you want to create a rewriteable CD, but you can refer to page 5 of the Roxio CD Creator manual for more information about which type of blank CD you might want to use.  

You can find the Roxio manual in the "Manuals" folder inside the "Publications" folder on your school's server.  You can find the Publications folder by double-clicking and opening My Computer and looking for the P: network drive. Double-click and open up the P: drive and you will find a folder titled Publications, which is the folder we created to post documents.

Another issue is that you can buy CD-R's on a spindle of 25 to 100, but they do not come with any kind of CD case, usually called jewel cases.  If you need jewel cases, you can either buy the CD-R's individually with jewel cases or you could purchase the jewel cases separately.  

The final issue with blank CD's is the speed at which they will copy material.  The speed of the CD is usually referred to as 8X or 12X or 24X.  The larger the number, the faster the blank CD can record material  There are "slow" blank CD's that record or write at 8X (maximum write speed) that are inexpensive, but those older blank CD's will have problems with the faster CD burners we have in our OmniTechs that write or record to CD's at around 24X.  In fact, if you use a blank CD that has a maximum record speed of 8X and try to "burn" or record a CD at 16X or 24X, the "burn" will probably fail and you will have to start over.  We would suggest that the blank CD's that are purchased should be able to sustain a record speed of  24X or faster.

Our recommendation is to purchase CD-R's that have a maximum record (or write) speed of 24X or faster.  Please note that write or record speed is different than the read speed which is sometimes listed with CD's.  We are concerned with the write or record speed of the blank CD.

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