Finally It's Here - The Recordable Cd
Sydney Morning Herald
Monday November 25, 1996
MOST of us take our user-friendly CDs and optical disc technology for granted nowadays, and why not? CDs have been around since the early 1980s and many stereo enthusiasts already own CD collections that are worth more than their CD players.
CDs are used widely in the home, in cars, in portables and in computers. They provide consistent high-quality sound at an affordable price and they do not wear out with playing.
CD is reigning champion, having put vinyl LPs down for the count. Cassette tape, although now declining in sales worldwide, has managed to coexist with CD, mainly because cassettes are a convenient, economical and robust medium on which we can still make our own recordings and play them back on a variety of gear - from home hi-fi systems to Walkmans and other portable players and car sound systems. But how much longer can tapes last? Home CD recorders such as the Pioneer Model PDR-05, which Short Circuits is road-testing, already are a commercial reality. The PDR-05 is available in Australia and, according to reports, this recordable CD format, called CD-R, is becoming increasingly popular overseas.
In close-up, the Pioneer PDR-05 Compact Disc Recorder looks and feels like a regular high-end CD player. It comes with infrared remote control and plays regular, off-the-shelf CDs. But with the PDR-05 you can also record your own music on to recordable CD blanks and put them into your CD collection. Functionally, the PDR-05 is the CD equivalent to a high-end cassette deck.
Recordable CD blanks are available locally and sell for around $20 each. A copyright fee, which permits copying for personal use only, is included in the purchase price of the blank disc. This fee does not permit the recorded CD to be used commercially or for broadcasting.
The PDR-05 has regular RCA, analogue stereo line inputs for recording from a system tuner, CD player or cassette deck, for example. Alternatively, direct digital to digital recordings can be made from compatible digital audio sources such as CD players, MD and DAT decks or satellite digital broadcast, using either, coaxial (RCA) or optical connectors. In the digital-to-digital mode the player automatically assigns track numbers and synchronously starts and stops with the required selection which may be a single track or an entire disc.
Standard sampling rates from various input systems are automatically converted inside the recorder to 44.1kHz, the standard for CD. Record level and balance controls are included for recording via analogue inputs and a level indicator is included in the display.
CD-recordable discs are recordable once only. That is, the CD cannot be erased and re-recorded like cassettes. However, the disc may be recorded over a number of recording sessions or removed and returned to the deck, if required, but the disc cannot be played back until it has passed through a process called "finalisation". This is performed automatically inside the deck and involves writing a table of contents similar to those used on prerecorded CDs, for the players to find track numbers, starting points and playing times.
Once the recorded CD has been finalised, no further recording on that disc is possible, even if blank tracks remain on the disc. The finalised disc can be played back normally in the PDR-05 or any regular CD player and exchanged between players, including portables and car systems.
The PDR-05 CD recorder has inputs for analogue stereo and digital recording and also includes Pioneer's Stable Platter Mechanism and Legato Link Conversion S, both of which feature prominently in existing high-end CD players in Pioneer's range. (More details: Pioneer Electronics Australia Pty Ltd, 178-184 Boundary Road, Braeside 3195, telephone (03) 9586 6300 or freecall 1800 338 439.)
Re-recordable CDs, albeit at this stage for computers, are also a consumer reality. In recent weeks in San Francisco, five leading technology companies jointly unveiled a new computer Compact Disc platform called CD-ReWriteable (CD-RW) which allows users to read, write and rewrite computer data on Compact Disc. Hewlett-Packard Company, Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation/Verbatim Corporation, Philips Electronics, Richo Company Ltd and Sony Corporation each contributed to the development of the new technology. The new platform includes specifying modifications to make CD-ROM and DVD-ROM drives compatible with the new CD-RW media.
Philips Electronics says it has already committed to volume shipments of CD-RW drives which will allow users to read CD-ROM discs; to read and write CD-Recordable discs; and to read, write and re-write CD-RW media. Initial list pricing for a drive complete with adaptor card and software has been "targeted below US$1,000". Philips said the first CD-RW products are expected from drive, media and software companies in the first quarter of 1997. More details about Philips products: Philips Consumer Information Centre, telephone Freecall 1800 803 312. The line is open seven days a week.
And as has previously been reported, another new medium, DVD-Video, will be launched in Japan before Christmas with DVD players from Panasonic, Toshiba and Hitachi likely to be the first models on to the market. Releases in the US will follow early in 1997.
© 1996 Sydney Morning Herald
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