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There are many types of drives that take cds. Many people are unaware of the many important differences in cd/dvd drives (often called optical drives)and how they are to be used. Generally there are drives that do not burn (or create CDs) and there are the ones that do.
The speed of a drive is measured by its speed compared to the origional Cd rom drive, for example, a cd-rom drive with 32x (thirty two speed) is 32 times faster than the origional. The same applies to a dvd drive, the speed is measured compared to the speed of the origional, for this reason the speed of a cd-rom is not the same speed on a dvd rom with the same number. A cd-rom rated at 16x is slower than a dvd-rom at 16x.
Many CD and DVD drives have the ability to create (or "BURN") their own CDs or DVDs. It is possible to create any type of disk from a music CD, to a data disk, or a DVD movie.CDs and DVDs generally have 2 types of disks they can burn on. The 2 types are cd-r disks (or dvd-r), which when data is burned to the disk it can not be erased, this is what is usually used for music and movie disks. The other type of disk is a cd-rw disk (or dvd-rw) which is a rewritable disk, that can be erased and reused. Many people use these as large storage disks for files and programs.
CD/DVD burners also have 2 formats in which they can burn. The formats are the + (plus) and the - (minus or dash) format. Unfortunately, the difference in 2 formats has caused some problems, some dvd/cd players (and burners)are only compatible with one format. If a disk is burned on a + burner, your friends - player may not read the disk. For this reason, there are also different types of cds/dvds which are made specifically for a + or a - format.For example a DVD-r disk is made for a minus format, however a DVD+r is made for a plus format. When buying disks for your burner you must make sure that your burner supports either a plus only, a minus (or "dash")only, or both types of disks.