CD Recorder


I want to buy a CD recorder, but have heard that some are more reliable than others. Anyone care to share their experiences as far as operational ease, features and in particular reliability? Also, do some make a better quality copy than others?
bioman

Showing 1 response by garfish

CD-R reliability-- that's a tough one. What it boils down to is "you pays your money and you takes your chances". I've owned/used 5 CD recorders:
1. Pioneers 739-- excellent sounding copies, very versatile and pretty easy to use with good manual. No reliability problems in 2+ years . My daughter liked it so much I gave it to her.
2. Pioneer 609-- a single well recorder (not dubbing) and too big a hassle to use, IMO. Returned it.
3. Pioneer Elite W37-- almost identical to the 739, and loaded with features. It malfunctioned right out of the box, and build quality was disappointing for what they call their "Elite" series-- returned it.
4. Phillips CDR 885-- made nice copies, but malfunctioned after just two; flimsy appearing build quality-- I returned it.
5. I'm presently auditioning a Marantz Professional CDR500 dual well dubbing recorder and like it a lot. The build quality is much better than the Pioneers or Phillips, IMO, but then it costs more (MSRP $850, best street price about $675.). This is my choice as "best" of those I've tried. An A'Gon friend has this recorder too, but it's in the shop for repair-- however, he thinks he may have caused the problem. The Marantz manual is not at all clear on how to set Record Level for compilations, but otherwise it's easy to use--their Tech Support was very helpful with this. All functions have worked well so far, but I've just done 3 CD-Rs. I also like the professional features, and plan to purchase this machine. Good Luck. Craig