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Burning CD’s direct from DAT or other audio source

More burning questions about burning.

“I have a CD-RW drive in my PC. To burn an audio CD I must first record my audio to the computer’s hard drive. Is this the standard way it’s done? I’d love to burn directly from my DAT machine. Is there a software package (like Toast or something) that would allow me to do this? What about stand alone CD burners? Do they require burning from a hard drive also?”

There’s a distinction we can make here between what I call a CD burner and a CD recorder. Technically both “burn” discs so the “recorder” term is kind of inaccurate, but it does better illustrate their function. A computer based CD burner does not have audio connections. It only has computer connections (SCSI, USB, etc.). You can only burn discs to these with files that are on your computer. So yes, you must transfer from DAT (or whatever) to the computer hard drive and then burn your disc.

A CD recorder, while technically a burner on the inside, has an interface similar to any tape deck or DAT machine. They generally have both analog and digital inputs and outputs, and they also have the familiar record/play buttons as well as input level controls and other “recorderesque” kinds of features. These are designed to burn a CD from an analog or digital audio source without any computer or hard drive. This would be what you want if you need to quickly make CD’s from DAT tapes.

There have been a few models over the years that do both; they have the recorder interface, but supply a SCSI port for use with computers. Those have fallen out of favor recently because they are pretty expensive and some models had reliability problems. You can also find some models especially suited to duplication. They have a “recorder” interface, but you record to a hard drive. Then you edit and burn as many CD’s as you need directly from the built in hard drive. Some models have multiple CD burners in them so you can make many copies at once.

Beware, however, because there are some other pro’s and con’s to one type versus the other. Some of these have been covered in past issues of inSync (feel free to search the archives), but you should probably have a detailed conversation with your Sweetwater Sales Engineer about what you are doing before you make a decision about which type to buy.

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