February Tip of the Month

Why Won't My CD Player play the Audio CD I Made on My CD-RW?

There are actually many reasons for this. These reasons include the following:

Not all CD Players will play CD-Rs or CD-RWs. If you have an older CD Player or CD-Rom, it may be too old to read CD-Rs and CD-RWs.
CD Players that use multi-disk turntables (either horizontal like a 3 CD-changer or vertical 200 CD-changer) will most likely not read CD-Rs and CD-RWs.
Some car stereos will not read CD-Rs and CD-RWs.
Did you convert the file? If you've ever looked at an audio CD, you'll notice that the extension on the files is "cda". Regular CD players will not read MP3s and other computer-generated audio files. If you've downloaded a lot of MP3s from the internet, you'll need a converter. These are available on the Internet for download. Many are free. MusicMatch offers one (Jukebox - free) that will allow you to convert MP3 to WAV to CDA and the reverse.

If you want to play MP3s, then we suggest buying an actual MP3 player. Since they are fairly new to the market, prices are still a little high. Prices range from $85 to $300. The cheaper players probably won't have any (or very little) memory, so you won't be able to play many songs. You'll put more money into the expandable RAM and pay more in the long run.

If you believe that you have a hardware problem and need our help, bring your CPU to M & M Programming, Inc., 110 North Spalding Avenue, Lebanon, KY.

See Previous Tips of the Month!