Top 5 external CD burners for audiophiles?

[audioman]

I see many manufacturers focusing on blue ray dvd and slimline junk burners. I think and beleive sone of the earlier bulkier bigger burners were made better and built to last. What was the happy medium golden age of ultimate cd burning technology, audiophile quality and long term use component longevity. Ive read that some pixtar pioneer memorex were supposed to be good. What are and were the best quality external cd burners that would give you audiphile quality sound and long term longevity and durability that can read and burn any kind of cd ever made cd- cd+ cd-+ cdrw- cdrw+ dual triple quadruple with scribe etching if that makes a positive difference feature. Thanks for your help.

[lordsmurf]

You probably won't like my answer.

I've always used "audiophile" as a pejorative term. It's mostly people that think themselves experts (but are not), and tend to hear things that don't exist. Having worked in the video industry, often in areas closely tied to music (ie, music videos especially), it was not uncommon for everybody from engineers to execs to not know WTF a self-described "audiophile" was blathering on about.

The truth is that a CD is a CD. The idea that you can hear 1's and 0's is ridiculous, especially those that insist certain brands of media or drives "makes a difference". (Even the idea of "vinyl is better/warmer than CD" is nonsense, it's al about mastering, but that's another conversation.) It's like a religion to those people -- nevermind facts, science be damned, they know "the truth". When I imagine an audiophile, I swear it's fat (or skinny) geek with a tinfoil hat and crazy eyes.

The best quality burners are simply burners that burn well to quality media.

That means Pioneer or LiteOn.
Maybe Plextor. Overrated, over expensive, but not bad.
Even LG is not too shabby, good readers..
Samsung is the main drive that's poo-poo'd, as the drives never least, reading sucks, though burning is often decent.

These days, no CD burner exists.
DVD is mostly Samsung or LG. Those, of course, burn CD.
Blur-ray is Plextor, LiteOn and Pioneer. And BD burns DVD and CD.

As with DVD recorders and capture cards, chipsets matter. And I believe the same chipset is present in Pioneer, NEC and LiteOn. I don't think they're straight rebadges, just very similar.

Avoid slim burners.

You won't go wrong with something like these:
- https://www.amazon.com/LG-Electronic...042e83e22ee862
- https://www.amazon.com/Asus-Serial-A...f038d7847d7267

I have one of each of those.
The Asus is a good reader/ripper, decent burner.
The LG is a strong reader, nice burner.

Use Taiyo Yuden inkjet CD-R: https://www.amazon.com/JVC-Thermal-P...3e16022c29869b

[sanlyn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lordsmurf

You probably won't like my answer.

I've always used "audiophile" as a pejorative term. It's mostly people that think themselves experts (but are not), and tend to hear things that don't exist. Having worked in the video industry, often in areas closely tied to music (ie, music videos especially), it was not uncommon for everybody from engineers to execs to not know WTF a self-described "audiophile" was blathering on about.

The truth is that a CD is a CD. The idea that you can hear 1's and 0's is ridiculous, especially those that insist certain brands of media or drives "makes a difference". (Even the idea of "vinyl is better/warmer than CD" is nonsense, it's al about mastering, but that's another conversation.) It's like a religion to those people -- nevermind facts, science be damned, they know "the truth". When I imagine an audiophile, I swear it's fat (or skinny) geek with a tinfoil hat and crazy eyes.

The best quality burners are simply burners that burn well to quality media.

"Audiophile" debate aside, the quality of an audio recording depends on processing, not on burning. A burner either imbeds those 0's and 1's correctly or it doesn't. Whether the resulting "sound" is noisy or low-fi is immaterial as far as the burner is concerned. If the disc is defective, layers split apart later, etc., has nothing to do with audible quality -- the disc either plays or it doesn't. Burners don't have a "sound quality" characteristic any more than the disc itself does.

Analog vinyl does sound deeper than digital, which sounds denuded to me. There's not much to argue about. Digital rounding, cutoff, jitter, and DAC anomalies are always present, just as tracking distortion, etc., is always present on vinyl. But if you can't hear it don't worry about it.