It is an ongoing thing with media, never knowing what to buy, especially since the market has been flooded with NO NAME brands. That is what I generally used in the past as I didnt really care much for the quality, mostly burned to play in my car. However, now that 1.5 years has passed since I burned my first spindle of 50 PINE brand, and none of them will play today, I know what brand not to buy.

Ok, of the million brands of CD-R discs on the market, which ones have you used, and which ones have you had the best success with?

Maxwell. It never failed me on any CD-R writting format, audio cd, mp3 disk, dvd, playstation, xbox games.

I always believed Maxell (owned by Hitachi now) to be one of the best. I know a few ppl who have bought alot of Maxell DVD and CD Media, and before getting through the first 25 of a 50 spindle, got 3 or 4 coasters in either case. However, as I have recently discovered, this does not always mean bad quality discs, and I am still willing to try them out and am going to. They are a bit more expensive than alot of others, but if they last longer than my PINE did, I don't mind paying the extra. I also want to try TDK but cannot seem to find them here.

You can always buy them from the net. You should also know that CD-R discs CAN be repaired. If you have things that are valuable you should find places to have them repaired. (or at least try to)


Good luck.

True about the net, but I am not one of those ppl who will buy online to save $5 heh. As far as getting them repaired, luckily these were just music, all of which I have on my HDD so I dont really care, I will be much more careful with important data as these discs cannot be repaired, the dye has completely rotted out in them, or maybe oxidized? .... still trying to learn what happens to them over time.

Thanks for the good luck though

I used to have my backups in no name CDs...now I don't have backups at all.

Maxell also.. they have to be the ones with solid color tops, I've never had problems with those. The only issue w/ CD-R's i've had is the top reflective part getting scratched off, and Maxell seems to stand up against the abuse I put cd's through in my car.

edit, edit: don't buy Verbatim, I bought a spindle once.. and they don't stand up to high temperatures that well.. especially the Florida sun.

My burner is pretty outdated,Every other burn it goes crazy.Its really moody,only completes a successful burn when it wants to. The only cd's my burner seems to commit to,is the TDK Cd-R's.I need a better burner software.

Memorex, usually. I just get them because I've never had a problem with them; as long as it works, consider it sold.

THE SUMMARY OF CD-R MANUFACTURERS:


High quality:

The manufacturers you can trust

Kodak (discontinued)
Mitsubishi
Mitsui
MPO
Prodisc
Ricoh
Ritek
Taiyo Yuden

Medium quality:

These manufacturers are slightly lesser quality, or display varying quality, or there isn't sufficient data to mark a manufacturer as 'high quality'

4M Multimedia Masters & Machinery (actually 4M makes CD-R plants, not CD-Rs)
Moser Baer India
TDK (quality varies a lot)
Sony (Good and bad reports)
Fuji (Good and bad reports)

Low quality:

NAN-YA Electronics
CMC Magnetics


but I would avoid Ritek if you want your discs to last more than a year or 2, they have a very good burn rate with no coasters, but they don't last.

Avoid anything by Postech, they make for Pine, Mitsui and many other no name brands. If you get one, take them all back, they are garbage.