Yamaha CRW4260 currently being tested?

[Chris]

Is the Yamaha CRW4260 currently being tested? If not are there plans to do so? The reason I ask to find out whether I should wait or purchase something else. What would be the most reliable easiest to use machine?

[joules]

Making master CD's on erasable/modifiable media is not a very good idea, who knows what might happen !

I for one will not be thinking about investing in this media, as there is some security in the fact that a write once CD can only be corrupted by physical damage, and as I send sealed packages for duplication, and a parallel copy to the client for verification. I can be sure that the master I have sent is correct, and if any mistake occurs it is out of my hands.

An interesting story;
Last year I sent a live album for BMG for duplication in Spain, to be called 2 weeks later by the A&R dep't asking if it was correct that there is 30 sec of silence between tracks. Later I found out that the 4 days work we had done in editing and crossfading the audience, to make the CD sound like one continuous concert, had been undone by the Spanish duplication plant.
For ease of track access I had placed the applause in the pre start gap. for some reason the Spanish guys had taken it upon themselves to further treat the master (which was only to be cloned) and had decided for better noise performance to enter digital silence in the pre start gap The major problem here was that this was only noticed after the production of 20,000 CD's, and somone was responsible for the loss of these.

The point being, If the master CD was re-writable then the plant could copy the bad CD over the top and say the CD was sent like that, and I would have a difficult battle on my hands regarding who pays for 20,000 CD's. I thaught myself lucky I didn't send it on Exabyte!

For this reason dont hold your breath on CDRW!

Logically,
Joules

[Simon Wheaton]

Don't the Yamaha CRW machines also burn normal CDRs! You don't have to burn just to CDRW!

Also, wouldn't it be a good idea to always get a reference CD from the plant before they go ahead and press thousands of them?

[joules]

This is a good point and a valid argument to put to Digi to hurry them along! as Chris pointed out to me in a follow up e-mail. and as most manufacturers in the future will probably take the CDRW route then Digi will probably be forced to support them!

I still however belive as MLCD is a CD mastering application then as probably most masters go to the plant on write once media, and demo runs are also on write once media, as are long term backup archives, then dont expect Digi to go running after the CDRW band wagon, as it will mean quite a re-write of the app itself and rigorous testing of a new type of device.
True it would be nice to make one investment in a CDRW drive for backup, and be able to use it for CD production also.

As for the reference CD from the plant. All that is handled by the record company, this is why I send them a verification copy, but in the south of Europe these type of companies are a little less than compitent.
My point being that had the master gone on anything other than CDR (U-Matic/1610, Exabyte or CDRW) I would have had a battle to prove the goof wasn't mine!

[Bedrock]

Digidesign reccomends the Yamaha 400. From my research this was the most reccommended drive out there. Only one problem. They stopped making the 400 and now make the 4260. The exact same drive, except rewritable. I was told, in uncertain terms that this drive would be included on the next update. I sure hope so cause in the maentime I'm using JAM, a competitors version. A lot faster, but with a few less bells and whistles. I have a strong feeling this drive will be included but I don't know when. I wish they would hurry. They usually come thru IN TIME.

[ProdInfo]

Well, yes and no. Yamaha stopped making the old version of the CDR 400, but they just released the new version, the CDR 400AT, which uses the same mechanism as the 4260. And yes, we are working on support for the 4260. We hope this will be very soon, but you can never be sure before the software actually exists whether or not it will work.
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COMPATIBILITY ANNOUNCEMENT: MLCD 2.0 SUPPORTS YAMAHA CDR400AT
Yamaha has released a new CD recorder, the CDR400AT which is supported by MasterList CD 2.0, (no update is required). This CD recorder has_identical_functionality to the Yamaha CDR400, but uses a newer mechanism for increased reliability. The CDR400AT is available worldwide now, with US list prices of $459 (US) for the internal model, and $529 for the external model.