All these years, the prints on the CDs from renowned recording labels gave you a substantial amount of complex; however, with LightScribe, professional quality disc printing and disc labeling has become yours. Thanks, HP.

Hewlett Packard’s LightScribe Direct Disc labeling technology has caught up sooner than expected into the consumer market. A staple for the personal computers right now, the LightScribe-enabled PCs can be availed through HP’s distribution channels globally. However, that’s going to solve the problems for those who would like to go for a new PC; what about existing PC owners willing to avail the technology?

For them, there are the aftermarket DVD writers installed with LightScribe capabilities. The manufacturers are BenQ, LaCie and Philips apart from HP themselves; the CD-R discs are coming from HP and Verbatim, with the list soon to pull in Imation, Philips, Memorex and TDK.

Now question remains: Who, so far, have incorporated the LightScribe technology? Almost every optical disc drives manufacturers, from the CMC Magnetics Corporation and Cyber Link Corp. to Hitachi-LG and Mitsubishi. Other names include Moser Baer India Limited, Roxio, Nero and Toshiba-Samsung.

A few features of LightScribe disc-coating technology:

• Increases labeling speed by 50%.

• Compatibility with faster media with an existing LightScribe-enabled drive.

• An even combination of creativity and embedded convenience.

• Silkscreen quality.

• Grants at-hand freedom for combining complex text designs and graphics.

The Procedure:

• The data side is burnt as in a normal disc.

• The disc is flipped over.

• The same laser is used to burn a label in a precise and iridescent manner.

• It’s the same laser used for burning the data.

Disc Printing process

Advantages:

• Precision: The laser delivers a precisely-controlled light energy that writes following a circular writing system. The writing is done by incorporating a visible chemical change in the dye coating.

• More saving: No printer required; therefore, no adhesive labeling or marker needs to be used.

]]> http://mediaduplication.wordpress.com/2008/08/22/lightsribe-%e2%80%93-disc-printing-technology/feed/ 0 mediaduplication Disc Printing process http://mediaduplication.wordpress.com/2008/07/16/cd-piracy-hits-music-industry/ http://mediaduplication.wordpress.com/2008/07/16/cd-piracy-hits-music-industry/#comments Wed, 16 Jul 2008 07:05:55 +0000 mediaduplication http://mediaduplication.wordpress.com/?p=25 ]]>

It doesn’t astonish us nowadays knowing that mp3 is one of the most common search parameters on Internet. Being wired being the common definition now of being alive, the practice has caught up fast and is growing in an alarming rate. Together with easily available CD burning hardware, CD-ripping software and p2p file sharing protocols, CD piracy is now a common trend supported especially by the teenagers and young adults, who are not financially, stable enough to afford legal music. Who is to blame?

• Music Industry and CD piracy

While clichéd opinions are galore (“it’s the people who do it and not the soft-/ hardware”), many are blaming the music companies for putting up an atrocious price for every album released. However, movies do not suffer this drastically; they are priced cheaper and people don’t seem to enjoy the same movie for more than once. Music, on the other hand, is an evergreen phenomenon to the follower of a particular genre; it becomes better with every listen. One may pose a question regarding such a perennial thing – “Then how does it hurt to pay once for years of entertainment?” but fact remains that building a music collection is a passion; if one has to buy every album he/she likes, the passion would run dry within sometime. Again, it points towards the atrocious prices of the music CDs.

The Music companies thought a lawsuit is enough to bar the most popular p2p sites from returning to action; what they didn’t realize is you cannot stop people from copying the legally purchased music. All right, copy-control was introduced to fight the symptom, but there are also present the computer whizzes.

CD duplication

• How to curb CD Piracy

“It’s a monumental problem; banks won’t even let music companies inside the doors. And I was laughed out of every investment house in America. Everyone wants to see where it’s going.” – says Miles Copeland (Founder, Copeland Group).

Supporters of CD piracy still threat the music industry or the entertainment business as a whole and curbing the ability for copying music/video even for personal usage from a legally purchased album or VCD is not appearing the right solution. Shall reducing the price further for music CD curb CD piracy then?

Not exactly, for there exists a group to whom the fun is to procure without paying. Someone proposed stopping the production of blank CDs, but even that’s an absurd idea. So the next option remains is to introduce a technology (much more advanced than the usual copy-control) for protecting CDs from getting copied. For ordinary copy-protected discs often don’t work on portable/car/DVD- combo players. So how about making them real inexpensive? If an album comes for a dollar (that’s right, for there shall be no printed sleeves, artworks or jewel box), it shall be the best way to make a whole generation go the right way.

While the music industry worldwide is losing their sleep on the issue of illegal CD duplication, the scene at New Zealand speaks something else. The proposal is to alter the existing copyright laws (granting fair use rights). In other words, it’s making CD piracy legal.

Let’s hear what Michael Glading (New Zealand chief, Sony Music) has to say about it.

“At the end of the day, you’re sending a message that it’s okay to copy, and that is going to kill our business.”

Fair use rights, no doubt, are a plus point to the US consumers who enjoy making a certain number of copies of legally purchased audio/video for personal usage. But New Zealand and UK have no such rights; it is even illegal at these two places to rip a CD for playing the same in an iPod.

But none is going to buy two different copies of the same CD for home and for the car; the New Zealand government understood that part and is going to change the existing copyright laws. But what happens if a person has not bought legally a composition and claims the original copy to be lost? It’s perfectly all right in that case to use a copied version of the same. The music industry is currently afraid of such incidents.

• What is CD piracy?

Contrary to the popular belief, copying a CD or DVD for personal usage is not an act of piracy; selling these copies without the explicit consent of the copyright holder for the work is. Digital technology has added fuel to the fire, but one cannot blame CD piracy entirely upon it. The policy the music companies practice can be held responsible up to an extent; unless the prices are kept low (especially in the third world countries), CD piracy can’t be stopped completely.

One may also blame the advent of broadband Internet connections. Together with P2P file sharing technology, CD downloading has also become a common phenomenon. Agreed that P2P enthusiasts do it only for the love of music, but the artiste loses his/her money. Therefore, this is CD piracy as well.

• CD Piracy Vs Legal Download

There have been blames going to the atrocious price for audio CDs; researchers have found the missing link between a thriving CD piracy market and the legal music industry. But what went unmentioned is downloading music also gives people an adrenalin rush; a large number of people are currently a victim to it. So, it seems that it’s possible to accomplish both the results at one go – making available downloadable music at a nominal price. The concept of legal download has earned accolades because of a number of reasons:

• Since downloadable music is just about the music i.e. there stays nothing like the printed sleeves, the media or the jewel box to incur the cost, prices are bound to come down, encouraging more people to buy compositions legally.

• In today’s fast world, keeping one’s musical collection arranged in a proper format is time consuming; on the other hand, it’s much easier to keep them arranged in a mp3 player.

The only glitch that lies here is to lock the music i.e. it cannot be stored on a media unless the license code is provided. We hope that technology shall soon become able to provide that as well.

Business Card CD

We know how versatile CD duplication technology has become in the past few years. Creating personal music or video CDs or storing important data is where it all got started from; the trend has extended itself to the creation of CDs that can be used as business cards. The process is a simple one; your designer formulates how your digital representation shall look and sound; once that’s finalized, it’s time to make multiple copies (as per your need) of the same. That’s CD R business cards duplication in a nutshell; for further details, please read on.

Business card duplication process

CD-R business cards are either molded or cut; the first variety can store near about 50 MB of data in a dimension of (80 X 59) sq. mm, while the latter, is renowned for delivering additional flexibility and can be given any desired size, depending on the amount of data that shall go in.

From the simplest to the most sophisticated and complicated, CD R business cards duplication procedures make use of hardware and software that goes beyond the usual CD burner that we are so used to. Hi-end CD copiers fit the bill nicely; they are attached through the SCSI port of a computer. But they only suffice for small quantity business card replication; therefore, CD R business cards duplication companies have now opted for the stand-alone tower copiers for moderate quantities. These do not require a computer to operate and can burn multiple copies in a single session. However, for large-scale CD R business cards duplication, CD duplication companies prefer automated CD copiers with input and output spindles and robotic arms.

Advantages of hiring a professional CD R Duplicator

CD R business cards duplication is a tiresome process that can well eat into your patience if you are trying it at home. Besides, your money shall be lost if any of these digital media turns out to be defective. With a professional CD R duplicator, you do not require worrying about all these factors; settling the deal means you are going to receive fully functional copies of CD R business cards. For, if there is a defective output, it’s the responsibility of the digital business card replication professional to replace it and provide one with zero-error. Besides, you won’t require investing and blocking your money over costly equipment.

CD DVD duplicators in USA

Whoever thinks it’s just an attempt to camouflage piracy is wrong; media replication goes way beyond that especially if there is something to do with multimedia and studio works. Of course, there’s no denial to the fact that the seedy infest royally the CD duplication industry, but as it is said, they are the seedy ones and not the honest concerns that come forth as the messiahs of data storage. With that much of wisdom, now we may have a look at the media duplication sector.

Separating the best from the better

To do that, one needs to scrutinize thoroughly the quality of the service provided as well as the turnaround time; often, the CD duplication (or DVD duplication) companies are found clustered together in the pages of websites that work as a common platform between service buyers and sellers. One thing that a person need not worry about if choosing from such a roster is credibility; these kinds of websites do that scrutiny part on the service buyer’s behalf to reinforce as well their own goodwill.

Who can benefit

Apart from them in the music, film and software industries, DVD duplication and CD duplication services have also solved data backup and storage related problems for multimedia professionals, accountants and photographers; the CD duplication services have also satiated the sudden whims of the couple who got married all in a sudden and wanted to send the marriage videos back home to friends and relatives. It’s for everyone and everything including the former videocassette manufacturers who want to retain in a digitized form their entire database.

Choosing the quality of service

The rule of thumb for any CD/DVD duplication company is to keep available all equipment directly or remotely related to the media duplication. That brings into account everything between standalone tower recorders to the most commonly available one-at-a-time CD/DVD writers, the whole motto being revolutionary refinements through reliability and simplicity. And if the media duplication service provider offers added features, then it’s a mark denoting increased flexibility.

The Technological Advantages

A stand alone tower can replicate or make copies less than half the time taken by normal CD Duplicators. The new Japanese technology based on multiple tower integration is by far the best and affordable.

Media replication Business in US

Apart from the big names in the field who are bagging millions of dollars worth of contract every month, there also remains a market dominated by smaller duplicators. But small doesn’t depict dishonest; there are these honest businesses and that’s why frauds get the chance. The smaller duplicators are, however; are experiencing a steady growth of recent and what’s more impressive is they are mostly picked by people looking forward to compact one-to-one sort of deals. Their armaments include copiers and units that house a max of four recorders. The 4X EIDE/ATAPI recorders have turned inexpensive and as a result, they are currently pushing into the corporate market.

Where to find one?

A visit to Respond can make you reach a plethora of CD duplication, Blu-ray duplication, VHS duplication and DVD duplication professionals with whom, you shall be confident about where your money is going. Over 3 million consumers have found their preferred media duplication service providers at Respond after landing up at nowhere with the regular CD/DVD shops. If interested, you may also go through the entire roster of offers that are between (and beyond) media duplication and soft/hardware or anything that might stay inter-connected with the media duplication industry.