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I have original CD which I use to teach Aerobic Classes. Every time I play them on the gym they get some scratch, so I make a copy of original and play copy instead. I keep original for a copyright purpose.

The problem is that on gym's equipment the copied CDs' jump, skip track, stop, in general they do not play the same as original. It is not a problem when I play copied CD's at home or in my car but only when play them very laud in the gym. This is general problem and gym's managers always say that it is going like that with copied CD

Playing original CDs only is not an option because they get so many scratches after a few sessions that they out of use anyway.

At the moment I use CDex under windows to copy Audio CD.

Is there anyway to avoid problems like that or to copy CD with higher precision?

Oliver Salzburg
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tomasz74
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3 Answers3

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If the reason that the CDplayer at the gym has a problems with your CD is that it is a poor quality copy then you can try to get a better result by burning it at a lower speed. I have had this problem in the past, but that was when CDburners where just new. x1 burned CDs worked in all players. x4 burned (requiring a $1500 SCSI burner for those huge speeds) failed in some players.

However I never had that problem with modern burners, and there is at least one other possibility: A CD-R reflects less light than classic pressed CDs. If you have an old player then it is possible that a CD-R simply does not reflect enough light for its reader. You can try a few different 'colours' of CD-R, in the hope that you find a better match.This is mostly trial and error and there might not be any burned CD which will work with the gyms CD player. (Note I wrote CD-R, avoid CD-RW for this).

Which leaves you with these options:

  1. Try to 'improve' the CDs by burning slower or using a CD with different dye.
  2. Get an other player device to plug into the amplifier at the gym. (e.g. a small MP3 player if it has a plug, or a 'radio out' device if it has an antenna)
  3. Replace the CD player.
  4. Spent a lot of money on original CDs. (Meh, but I guess it needs to be listed for completeness sake).
Hennes
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You should really extract CDs at very low speed like 1-2x and burn them with 1x-8x speed. If you extract or burn at 52x or higher, you'll create loads of errors on the copy which is okay for digital data (due to error correction data and tracks), but a problem for older CD players because their laser head cannot move fast enough to read the error correction data in time.

Exact Audio Copy is a software that is quite famous in the 00s that can do this extremely well.

billc.cn
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It is very common to have a pause/skip of approximately 2 seconds between tracks. It is caused by the way most recording software writes audio tracks, and depending on the software you use, it can be configured to be recorded gapless.

However, it doesn't seem to be your problem, as complain of tracks skipping, stopping, etc.

The material used to make recordable CDs is not the same material than the one used to produce original audio CDs. On most modern players, this is not a big issue, but on some older models of CD players, or on players that are used during long periods repeteadly (like a gym), the laser reading the surface isn't capable of reading CD-Rs very well.

My suggestion is either buying a portable CD player, or even better, buy a cheap MP3 player, depending on where you live it is really VERY cheap (you can buy one for 8 dollars in where I live), or even put the MP3 files on your smartphone. Then use a cable like this one to connect the device to the sound system.

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That Brazilian Guy
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