20. Burn a CD/DVD  BEFORE YOU BEGIN 19 Move, Copy, or Delete a Document or Folder
 SEE ALSO 85 Create (or Burn) a Custom Audio CD
Most modern Macs come with drives that can burn CD-ROMs, and many can also burn DVDs. If you have such a drive, you can take advantage of the modern physical method for transferring documents from one computer to another: writable optical discs.  KEY TERMS Burn To write documents to an optical disc (a CD-R, CD-RW, or DVD-R). CD-R Writable compact disc. A CD-R can be burned once, and after that its contents cannot be changed. A CD-R or CD-RW can hold 650 or 700 megabytes of data, depending on the format. CD-RW Rewritable compact disc. A CD-RW can be burned multiple times, usually up to a few dozen times. DVD-R Writable digital versatile disc. A DVD can hold 4.7 gigabytes of data and generally costs significantly more than a writable CD. Data on a DVD is heavily compressed, making the format much more complex than that of a CD. Some DVD formats, such as DVD+RW and DVD-RW, can be written to more than once. Burn Folder A special kind of folder that can be used to set up a collection of items to burn onto a disc. When you insert a writable disc, you can associate it with an existing Burn Folder to immediately burn its contents to the disc.
Floppy disks used to be the medium of choice for storing or transferring data. With the advent of the iMac, however, floppy drives vanished from the Mac in favor of external Zip drives and other competing forms of auxiliary storage, as well as the newly popular method of transferring files over the Internet. Although this provided much of the same functionality as floppies did (without the 1.44-megabyte size limitation), many people still had a need for a way to store large documents, as well as to create better media for installing software. Writable CD and DVD drives, with their versatility and inexpensive media, have stepped into that niche in the computing world. Mac OS X makes the process of burning a CD or DVD straightforward. You insert a blank disc, move documents to that disc in the Finder, and then drag the disc's icon to the Trash to burn the documents onto it. You can also use Burn Folders to create collections of data that can be set up before you insert a writable disc, and that can be easily burned more than once. 20. Burn a CD/DVD 
| 1. | Create a New Burn Folder
These first three steps are optional. If you have a CD-R or DVD ready to burn, and you don't need to burn the same collection of files repeatedly, you can skip to step 4.
A Burn Folder is a way to create a saved collection of items that you can burn multiple times to make many identical copies of a disc. In the Finder, choose File, New Burn Folder . A new folder appears in the current Finder window (or on the Desktop), marked with a "Burn" symbol on the folder icon and with a name of Burn Folder . A Finder window showing the contents of this empty folder also appears. You can see from the dark and shiny header bar on the navigation pane that this is a special kind of folder: It's a container for items to burn onto a disc, complete with a Burn button at the top.
Rename the Burn Folder to give it a name descriptive of its contents. When you burn a CD or DVD using this folder, its volume name will be that of this Burn Folder.
| | 2. | Add Items to the Burn Folder Drag items into the Burn Folder to set up the collection of data to be burned. Use folder hierarchies and customized folder window presentations however you like; the way the contents of the Burn Folder appear is the way they will appear once burned onto a CD or DVD. You can close the Burn Folder window and come back to it later; its contents are preserved just as with any folder. NOTE Note that as you drag items to the Burn Folder, the curved arrow on your mouse pointer indicates that you're creating aliases rather than dragging the original items. This ensures that the original items won't be moved or lost in the process of burning the disc. When the disc is burned, complete copies of the original items are written to the disc, not just aliases. | | 3. | Burn from the Burn Folder
When you're done adding items to the Burn Folder and ready to create the disc, choose Burn Disc from the File menu or from the contextual menu that appears when you right-click or Control +click the Burn Folder's icon, or by clicking Burn in the header bar of the folder's Finder window. You are prompted to insert a blank disc; a dialog box reports the minimum size of the disc to hold the contents of the Burn Folder.
| | 4. | Insert a Blank CD or DVD Many Macs have an optical drive with a tray you must eject before you can insert a disc. Press the Eject key on the keyboard, place the blank disc in the tray, and press Eject again to close the drive. Most newer Macs, such as PowerBooks, newer iBooks, the Mac mini, and the iMac G5 have slot-loading drives. On these Macs, simply insert the disc into the slot and press until the drive pulls the disc in. Unless you're burning from a Burn Folder, Mac OS X automatically tries to mount the disc. When it finds that the disc is blank, the operating system presents you with a dialog box that asks what you want to do with it. For CD-R discs, you can choose whether the disc is intended for documents or for music. To create a disc for music files, select Open iTunes from the Action drop-down list. You can then use iTunes to burn a music CD that can be played in any CD player, or an MP3 CD that can be played on modern MP3 CD players. To create a disc for documents, choose Open Finder (the default) from the Action drop-down list. If you mistakenly choose the wrong application, just eject the disc and insert it again. NOTE Another choice you have is to click the Ignore button. If you do this, the blank disc is not mounted for burning and does not show up anywhere in the system; you must use the Eject key to get it out. The Ignore option is available so you can have a blank disc in the drive before you begin a task such as burning a CD or DVD from the Finder, iTunes, or Disk Utility, and thus save having to be prompted to insert one. If you are burning from an existing Burn Folder, Mac OS X automatically prepares to burn and presents a dialog box asking for a disc name presenting burning options. Skip to step 7 if this is the case. If you are not burning from a Burn Folder and have simply inserted a new blank disc, Mac OS X places the disc on the Desktop (with the name Untitled CD ) and opens a Finder window similar to the one you see if you're working with a Burn Folder. (Burn Folders and mounted blank discs work the same way in the Finder.) A Burn Folder representing the blank disc is also automatically added to the Finder's Sidebar. NOTE Refer to 85 Create (or Burn) a Custom Audio CD for more information on creating audio CDs and DVDs. | | 5. | Add Items to the Disc You can now fill the disc with documents. Drag items into the disc's Finder window or onto the disc's icon as you would a Burn Folder or any mounted volume. Organize items in folders the way you want them to appear each time you or anyone else inserts the disc; if you try to put more data on the disc than it can hold, you will get an error message. (As with a Burn Folder, the items you drag to the blank disc are just aliases, not the originals or duplicates.) TIP You can change the name of the blank disc volume just as you would rename a folder, by clicking its name and typing a new one, anytime until you burn the disc. NOTE Make sure that you have enough space on your startup disk to allow the system to create a disk image of all the data you put on the blank discup to 700MB for a CD or 4.7GB for a DVD. Mac OS X creates copies of the documents to be burned, in a special temporary location on the startup disk, and will eject the disc if not enough free hard disk space is available. | | 6. | Burn the Disc
When you're happy with the contents of the disc, it's time to burn it. In the Finder, click the Burn symbol next to the disc's icon in the Sidebar, or click the Burn button at the top of the blank disc's Finder window if it's open; alternatively, drag the disc's icon from the Desktop to the Trash can icon (which becomes a Burn symbol while you're dragging the disc).
| | 7. | Confirm the Burn A dialog box prompts for some final burning options. First, specify a disc name, which can be different from the name of the disc as it appeared while you were building its contents. Then, choose the burn speed, which can range from slower but more reliable speeds ( 4x ) to faster but potentially more unreliable speeds ( 24x ); it's generally safe to use the fastest speed available, but if you encounter errors, try slower speeds. Also, select the Save Burn Folder To check box and specify a folder name if you want to save a Burn Folder of the disc's contents, in case you want to burn more copies of the same disc in the future. When you're ready, click the Burn button. (You can also choose to Eject the disc, discarding all the changes you've made.) NOTES Be aware that Windows PCs sometimes cannot read a volume name longer than 16 characters ; keep your disc name concise and descriptive if you intend the disc to be used on different kinds of computers. While you have a writable disc mounted, if you have Fast User Switching enabled (see 112 Switch to Another User ), other users who are logged in at the same time as you won't be able to access the optical drive or the disc in it. You must either burn or eject the disc before other users can use the drive. (If you don't have Fast User Switching enabled, other users won't be able to be logged in at the same time you are.) The disc will now be burned; this process can take several minutes, including the verification process after the burn is complete (which you can skip if you want, by clicking the Stop button that appears in the Burn progress dialog box). After the burn is complete, the disc is mounted in the Finder (or in iTunes, if it's a music CD), and can be accessed like any other CD-ROM or DVD. After the disc is burned, a Burn Folder with contents identical to the disc's is saved on the Desktop, if you so chose; you can burn another copy of the same disc by skipping back to step 3. | NOTE Some software, such as open-source operating systems like Linux and FreeBSD, can be installed from CD images that you download for free. Before you can install the software, however, you must create an actual CD-ROM or DVD using the disc image that you have downloaded. Similarly, you can make a duplicate of an installation CD or DVD (for safekeeping) by creating a disk image of the original disc. Use the Disk Utility application (found in your Utilities folder) to create a new disk image. Insert the CD or DVD, then choose Images, New, Image from <disc name> . Disk Utility then creates a .iso disk image file from the disc's contents. Choose Images, Burn to select a .iso disk image file to burn onto a new CD or DVD. Be sure to have a blank CD or DVD-RW disc handy! (Mac OS X supports the DVD+RW format as well, but less enthusiastically.)
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