SS won't transfer to CD-R

[Karl Myer]

I am trying to understand an experience I am having Transferring an audiobook. I Imported into SonicStage an audiobook on 7 CD's, converting each to 48 kbps. SonicStage put each uploaded CD in a separate Group/Album because I named them differently: "Paradise Lost CD1/7", "Paradise Lost CD2/7", etc. Then, I Transferred those 7 Groups/Albums from My Library to MD. Then, on the MD, I changed the Groups from 7 (corresponding to the 7 CD's) to 12 (the poem's 12 Chapters). Then I completely Deleted the Imported Groups/Albums from My Library with the Remove Albums dialog box, also checking-off the "Delete this music file from the computer" checkbox. Then, I Transferred the 12-Group MD version back into SonicStage's My Library. To my surprise, it showed up in My Library in its original 7 Albums/Groups configuration instead of 12. Can anyone explain this phenomenon?

My reason for doing all this is: I have been repeatedly unsuccessful Transferring ATRAC3plus tracks and groups/albums, Edited in SonicStage, to CD-R. I suspect it might be because I am Dividing tracks in My Library after Importing. Maybe, I was thinking, if I Edit them on the MD, then Transfer them back into SonicStage, they might Transfer to CD-R successfully. I definitely want the Edits, both to Groups and Tracks, whether the version be MD, CD-R, CD-RW, or computer's hard drive. I want them all the same, in fact. By the way, how MiniDisc's attributes stand out in this situation! -- very versatile and friendly compared to these other finicky and obtuse media. And your archived copy can be Edited over the years at your discretion.

CD's I Import and don't Edit in My Library Transfer fine to CD-R.

CD's I Import and Edit in SonicStage do Transfer fine to CD-RW, but not CD-R.

Sonic Stage goes through the whole Create-CD process (Convert, Transfer, Write). When finished it displays a Box confirming the CD Creation process was Successful. The CD-R physically looks like it has been written-to but will not play in my Sony DNE330 CD Walkman, which is new and works fine with MP3 CDs, ATRAC3plus CD-RW's, audio CD's -- and ATRAC3plus CD-R's not Edited in My Library. The CD Walkman just 'hammers' intermittently half a minute trying to Read the CD-R, then shuts off. Nor will SonicStage list the CD-R's contents when inserted into the computer's CD drive. It will Write to it again though as if blank, leaving the same written-area on the CD-R after the Convert-Transfer-Write process, then display the Successfully Created message again.

I would greatly appreciate any help with this perplexing problem.

Edited March 29, 2007 by Karl Myer

[Syrius]

If you're creating an audio CD, you can convert those 48 kbps files to wav (will sound like crap, but GIGO) using HI-MD renderer, and put an audio CD together with Nero or WMP.

[Karl Myer]

CD's I Import and don't Edit in My Library Transfer fine to CD-R.

CD's I Import and Edit in SonicStage do Transfer fine to CD-RW, but not CD-R.

Problem solved!

The situation deteriorated until no CD-R's I created, on SS or Media Player 9, could be read or played on any player. But, imports into SonicStage from MiniDisc, saved as files to an external hard drive and loaded into another computer, created perfect CD-R's.

So, the culprit was the CD writer. I didn't suspect it because:

It did create some (albeit a small percentage) CD-R's successfully.

It successfully created CD-RW's.

The computer is only 9 months old.

The CD writer always went through its whole writing process and gave a "Successfully Created" message at the end, and the CD-R's physically looked like they had been written to.

I always suspected the media -- 7-year-old Maxell CD-R blanks -- just because they were the only not-new link in the chain.

I took the computer in for service at Best Buy today. Thank you for your help, Syrius.

Edited April 7, 2007 by Karl Myer