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Easy - Fast - Digital Playlist Burner
Direct Tutorial Links - Playlist Manager - CD Ripper - Playlist Burner
Drew's CD Writer/Burner Tutorial
This CD Writer is an added Option.
If you didn't already buy it, please email us to find out about it at CS@DAK.com

Here's a sophisticated but easy to use CD Writer will create perfect Audio CDs with no hassle and no complex programming. Forget multifunction burners that are only partially made for standard Audio CDs. You won't have to wade through a ton of unrelated features. We simply burn perfect Audio CDs with no extra complexity, period.

I've added a CD Burner option because even though your computer came with Burner Software, it's often too complicated and does so many other things that it's hard to focus on just the controls you need for burning Audio CDs. After all, you want to burn Audio CDs, not backup data, burn data discs, burn your family pictures or even make MP3 CDs. For audio CDs you don't care about buffers, number of folders deep, Joliet or not, etc.

What you do care about is

1. Finalizing/Closing your CDs. If you don't do this, your CDs won't play on your Car and Home CD players. So, I've put the Finalize check box right up front and I've PRECHECKED it for you so you don't have to. (You can of course uncheck it if you wish.)

2. Set Your Burner Burn Speed. Most CD Writers/Burners should run at about 1/2 their maximum burn speed so that the CDs will play on older CD players. We've put the Burn Speed Selection up front too. And for most CD writers, you can select the speed you want to burn. But finding the speed setting in most burner programs can be complex. So I've put ours right up on the screen where you can get at it.

Both of these functions are probably available in the burner software that came with your computer, but as I've said, finding them can be a pain. And we don't want to be in a position where we can't help you copy your music. So by standardizing on our new burner, we can make sure we are all on the same page, making terrific sounding digital music from now on.

PLUS
How many Burners let you:

1.Move Tracks up and down so if you haven't already set the play order you can instantly and easily put the tracks in any order you want.

2. Playlist Loading. Yes, you can use the standard M3U Playlist that you learned about in the Playlist Manager to load the tracks you want to burn in the order you want to burn them.

Honestly nobody's burner makes your sound better or worse. It's all digital and it will all sound great. The big difference is the ease of use. And I think you'll find our burner is the best ever (and easiest) for making Audio CDs of your favorite music.

Oh, one more important consideration. Many other burner software programs take over your computer and 1) become your default burner and even player. And 2) don't allow other burner software to operate.

The DAK burner is unique. It won't alter the way you use your other burner at all. It won't have any effect on the rest of your system. It will simply help you burn flawless audio CDs for you from now on.

Quick Index
Of Major Functions
Click Buttons For Details
OK, Let's get started.


The Writer/Burner Main Screen
DAK's unique Playlist Audio CD burner will make your CD burning fast and easy. It's super easy to use. And we've only put the features you need to burn audio CDs to keep it fast and easy. And of course to provide flawless digital copies of your music on CD.

Here's what to do. Arrow 1. Just click the CD Writer Tab to Access the optional CD Burner/Writer.
Arrow 2. Choose to Add a File, a Folder or a Playlist to get the tracks you want to burn into the program.
Arrow 3. You can delete tracks from the burner (not from your computer), move tracks around or clear all the tracks with these 3 quick use buttons.
Arrow 4.When you're ready, just click the Write It Now button.
Arrow 5. As you load tracks you'll see how much room on the CD you've taken as you go. Still got room? Add more tracks. Out of space, remove tracks. That's it. Burning CDs is all easy from now on.




Putting Tracks In Your Program So You Can burn Your CD (1 ADD File)
It's really easy to put tracks into the program to burn a CD. There are 3 ways to do it.
Way 1 is by choosing individual Files. Way 2 is by choosing folders. And, Way 3 is by choosing Playlists. Here's how to choose a file. Plus if you've already loaded some files, or a folder or a playlist you can always add more files by clicking this Add File Button.

Arrow 1. Click Add File
Arrow 2. Navigate to the folder where the file is and Click or Double Click the file/track you want to load.
Arrow 3. The track will show up in the File Name Box
Arrow 4. Click Open and it will load into the Burner Program.

Just repeat this for each individual file you want to load.

NOTE: If you want to load MP3 files, open the box below Arrow 3 to select MP3 and then you can load MP3 files. They will automatically be converted to standard Wave/CDA files when you burn the CD. It's automatic. You don't have to do anything.

Note 2: You can mix MP3 and Wav files when you load them into the Burner Program. IT will automatically convert them all to Wave/CDA files for standard audio CDs with no problems at all. Again, you don't have to do anything. It's all automatic.


Putting Tracks In Your Program So You Can burn Your CD (2 ADD Folder)
You don't have to load your files 1 at a time. You can select an entire folder of tracks to load. For the most part you'll probably store your albums in folders so it's a simple matter to load an entire folder or two, then use the remove button to remove any of the files that either you don't want or won't fit on the CD you want to make.

To Load a folder:
Arrow 1. Click the Add Folder Button
Arrow 2. Choose .Wav or MP3 as the file type you want to load. As stated earlier, you can load BOTH .Wav and .MP3 files into the Burner Screen. But you have to load Only .Wav or Only .MP3 at this point.
Arrow 3. Navigate to the folder you want to load the tracks from.
Arrow 4. Here's the track loading dialog box. Here's where you select the folder you want.
Arrow 5. Click the OK button.
Arrow 6. Click the Find Matching Files (this means the files/tracks in the folder that are either .Wav or .MP3.

Finally, You'll use the X at the right top to close the dialog box. It doesn't close on its own.

Putting Tracks In Your Program So You Can burn Your CD (3 ADD Playlist)
Playlists are the powerful industry standard to power the Playlist grouping and order of tracks you play using jukeboxes and players on your computer. They are used everywhere.

But I think we are one of the first, if not the first to let you use them for loading Tracks to be burned. It's super fast. Very easy and remember after they are loaded you can still add and remove tracks to the compilation so that your burned audio CD will be exactly the way you want it.

Arrow 1. Click the Add Playlist button.
Arrow 2. Select the M3U playlist you want to open
Arrow 3. You'll see it in the file name box, just like you would a file.
Arrow 4. Click Open and you're set.


M3U Playlist Example
I just wanted to remind you that just clicking a Playlist Icon will launch your Windows Media Player or whatever the default player is on your computer. It plays only the songs you've selected in exactly the Order You've selected them. So it's very, very powerful. Now you can harness this power that's been around for some time, not only to play your tracks but to load the unique DAK Playlist burner too.


It's All About Track Order
Remember, you sure don't want to wait till the 7th track to hear the overture. And it's the same with every other type of your music. Windows will try to alphabetize all your tracks and now with DAK's CD ripper with Preserve Track Order, DAK's Playlist Manager with Preserve Track Order, and this burner, you're not a slave to Windows Indiscretions any longer. On the left is the way Windows will sort your tracks. On the right is the way your tracks will be sorted and burned with your DAK system.


Remove Tracks.
Change your mind? No problem. Highlight any track and just click the Remove Button.


Rearrange Track Order
You'll probably already have your tracks in order after you use the Playlist Manager. But if not, we've provided an easy way to arrange your tracks any way you want.

Arrow 1. Highlight the track you want to move then just click the Move Up or Move Down buttons as shown.
Arrow 2. Here's the track that's being moved. You can move it one place or as many spaces as you wish.
Arrow 3/4 You can see that Track 15 was here and I'm just showing you by the numbers that the track I'm moving (15) was between these two tracks before.

So as you can see, moving tracks couldn't be easier. After all you do want your CDs to have the tracks in the order that you want, not some alphabetical order imposed by Windows.


How Many Tracks Can I Put On MY CDs?

So how much music will fit on a CD? The standard is about 72 minutes. Yes you can get 80 minute CDs, but after you burn them they may not run everywhere. So, LIMIT YOUR CDs TO 680 MEGABYTES and you'll always be fine.

How do you know?

It's easy with the DAK burner.

Arrow 1. You can see the graphical bar representation that shows you when you are getting full.
Arrow 2. This arrow shows you exactly how many megabytes you've already loaded. In this case I've got 589 Megs, so I can sill add another 100 Megs if I want to. But with CDRs only costing about $0.15-$0.20 it's not a big deal.

Arrow 2 Note: LIMIT YOURSELF TO 680 MB. That's 72 minutes. If you go over this, not all home and car CD players will play the disc.

NOTE: WHICH CDRs should you buy? Just buy standard data CDs. Don't buy the more expensive audio CDs, they are mostly made for the external CD burners that require some preformatting. You don't need it or want it, so buy a stack of any name brand you recognize and you'll be fine.

Arrow 3. This just shows the capacity of this particular disc. You really only need to look at Arrows 1 and 2 as you load in your tracks.





OK, You've Picked Your Tracks, Let's Burn Your CD.
Just Click The Write It Now Button and You'll bring up the easy to use Write Dialog Box.


The Easy Write Burn Screen.
The whole reason for this burner was to make it easy for you and to make flawless CDs for you to take with you from now on.

Arrow 1. When you launch this screen the program will poll and test your drive. You'll find this pull down window showing all the burn speed capabilities of your drive.

NOTE: If you see multiple burn speeds here, we recommend using about 1/2 the Max speed for making your audio CDs. In this case I'd use 16X or 24X.

Arrow 2. You can play CDs that aren't Finalized/Closed on a computer but not on any other CD player. So We've prechecked this box for you. If you're only going to listen on your computer, you can uncheck it if you wish.

Arrow 3. This is a progress meter. There's nothing for you to do but it will tell you what's going on every step of the way.

Arrow 4. Click the Write Button to actually write the CD.

This is the super easy way to burn perfect CDs. And the only 2 options that you need are right here, front and center so you can access them.


See It burn.
If you're interested, here's the actual writing info. Nothing for you to do. It's just interesting to see what's writing and how far along the process is.
Finalizing The CD.
You checked the Finalize Box, so here you can see that

Arrow 1. The progress bar is showing 100%
Arrow 2. The Operation Box is showing Finalize CD.

Again, nothing for you to do, just more info so you can know and understand what's going on.


Which CD Writer To Use?
Some computers have more than 1 CD writer. Don't be confused. Many have a CD writer and a DVD player. You only use this Dialog box if you have 2 writers.
Arrow 1. Click Recorder
Arrow 2. Select the writer you wish to use.

CD ROM Drive Control
When you are writing CDs, if there are other people using your computer, you may want to Lock the Tray or you may want to refresh a drive. You really don't ever have to do either, but I don't share a computer with anyone. So if you do share, it's up to you.

That's it. Happy burning. It's fast. It's simple. And now we can all be on the same page in case you ever have any questions.


. . .Drew




Tutorial Review Please.
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