cdrecord - record audio or data Compact Discs from a mas
ter
SYNOPSIS
cdrecord [ general options ] dev=device [ track options ]
track1...trackn
DESCRIPTION
Cdrecord is used to record data or audio Compact Discs on
an Orange Book CD-Recorder.
The device refers to scsibus/target/lun of the CD-
Recorder. Communication on SunOS is done with the SCSI
general driver scg. Other operating systems are using a
library simulation of this driver. Possible syntax is:
dev= scsibus,target,lun or dev= target,lun. In the latter
case, the CD-Recorder has to be connected to the default
SCSI bus of the machine. Scsibus, target and lun are
integer numbers. Some operating systems or SCSI transport
implementations may require to specify a filename in addi
tion. In this case the correct syntax for the device is:
dev= devicename:scsibus,target,lun or dev= devicename:tar
get,lun. If the name of the device node that has been
specified on such a system refers to exactly one SCSI
device, a shorthand in the form dev= devicename:@ or dev=
devicename:@,lun may be used instead of dev= device
name:scsibus,target,lun.
To access remote SCSI devices, you need to prepend the
SCSI device name by a remote device indicator. The remote
device indicator is either REMOTE:user@host: or
REMOTE:host:
A valid remote SCSI device name may be: REMOTE:user@host:
to allow remote SCSI bus scanning or
REMOTE:user@host:1,0,0 to access the SCSI device at host
connected to SCSI bus # 1,target 0 lun 0.
To make cdrecord portable to all UNIX platforms, the syn
tax dev= devicename:scsibus,target,lun is preferred as is
hides OS specific knowledge about device names from the
user. A specific OS must not necessarily support a way to
specify a real device file name nor a way to specify scsi
bus,target,lun.
Scsibus 0 is the default SCSI bus on the machine. Watch
the boot messages for more information or look into
/var/adm/messages for more information about the SCSI con
figuration of your machine. If you have problems to fig
ure out what values for scsibus,target,lun should be used,
If a file /etc/cdrecord.conf exists, the parameter to the
dev= option may also be a drive name label in said file
(see FILES section).
On SVr4 compliant systems, cdrecord uses the the real time
class to get the highest scheduling priority that is pos
sible (higher than all kernel processes). On systems with
POSIX real time scheduling cdrecord uses real time
scheduling too, but may not be able to gain a priority
that is higher than all kernel processes.
In Track At Once mode, each track corresponds to a single
file that contains the prepared data for that track. If
the argument is `-', standard input is used for that
track. Only one track may be taken from stdin.
GENERAL OPTIONS
General options must be before any track file name or
track option.
-version
Print version information and exit.
-v Increment the level of general verbosity by one.
This is used e.g. to display the progress of the
writing process.
-V Increment the verbose level in respect of SCSI com
mand transport by one. This helps to debug prob
lems during the writing process, that occur in the
CD-Recorder. If you get incomprehensible error
messages you should use this flag to get more
detailed output. -VV will show data buffer content
in addition. Using -V or -VV slows down the pro
cess and may be the reason for a buffer underrun.
debug=#, -d
Set the misc debug value to # (with debug=#) or
increment the misc debug level by one (with -d). If
you specify -dd, this equals to debug=2. This may
help to find problems while opening a driver for
libscg as well as with sector sizes and sector
types. Using -debug slows down the process and may
be the reason for a buffer underrun.
kdebug=#, kd=#
Tell the scg-driver to modify the kernel debug
value while SCSI commands are running.
Do not print out a status report for failed SCSI
commands.
-force Force to continue on some errors. This option cur
rently implements some tricks that will allow you
to blank bad CD-RW disks.
-dummy The CD-Recorder will go through all steps of the
recording process, but the laser is turned off dur
ing this procedure. It is recommended to run sev
eral tests before actually writing to a Compact
Disk, if the timing and load response of the system
is not known.
-dao Set Disk At Once mode. This currently only works
with MMC drives that support non raw Session At
Once mode.
-multi Allow multi session CD's to be made. This flag
needs to be present on all sessions of a multi ses
sion disk, except you want to create a session that
will be the last session on the media. The fixa
tion will be done in a way that allows the CD-
Recorder to append additional sessions later. This
is done by generation a TOC with a link to the next
program area. The so generated media is not 100%
compatible to manufactured CD's (except for
CDplus). Use only for recording of multi session
CD's. If this option is present, the default track
type is CD-ROM XA mode 2. The Sony drives have no
hardware support for CD-ROM XA mode 2. You have to
specify the -data option in order to create multi
session disks on these drives. As long as cdrecord
does not have a coder for converting data sectors
to audio sectors, you need to force CD-ROM sectors
by including the -data option if you like to record
a multisession disk in DAO/SAO mode. Not all
drives allow multisession CD's in DAO/SAO mode.
-msinfo
Retrieve multi session info in a form suitable for
mkisofs-1.10 or later.
This option makes only sense with a CD that con
tains at least one closed session and is appendable
(not finally closed yet). Some drives create error
messages if you try to get the multi session info
for a disk that is not suitable for this operation.
-toc Retrieve and print out the table of content or PMA
of a CD. With this option, cdrecord will work with
CD-R drives and with CD-ROM drives.
Pregroove) info of a CD recordable or CD rewritable
media. With this option, cdrecord will try to
retrieve the ATIP info. If the actual drive does
not support to read the ATIP info, it may be that
only a reduced set of information records or even
nothing is displayed. Only a limited number of MMC
compliant drives support to read the ATIP info.
If cdrecord is able to retrieve the lead-in start
time for the first session, it will try to decode
and print the manufacturer info from the media.
-fix The disk will only be fixated (i.e. a TOC for a CD-
Reader will be written). This may be used, if for
some reason the disk has been written but not fix
ated. This option currently does not work with old
TEAC drives (CD-R50S and CD-R55S).
-nofix Do not fixate the disk after writing the tracks.
This may be used to create an audio disk in steps.
An un-fixated disk can usually not be used on a non
CD-writer type drive but there are audio CD players
that will be able to play such a disk.
-waiti Wait for input to become available on standard
input before trying to open the SCSI driver. This
allows cdrecord to read it's input from a pipe even
when writing additional sessions to a multi session
disk. When writing another session to a multi ses
sion disk, mkisofs needs to read the old session
from the device before writing output. This cannot
be done if cdrecord opens the SCSI driver at the
same time.
-load Load the media and exit. This only works with a
tray loading mechanism but seems to be useful when
using the Kodak disk transporter.
-eject Eject disk after doing the work. Some Devices
(e.g. Philips) need to eject the medium before cre
ating a new disk. Doing a -dummy test and immedi
ately creating a real disk would not work on these
devices.
speed=#
Set the speed factor of the writing process to #.
# is an integer, representing a multiple of the
audio speed. This is about 150 KB/s for CD-ROM and
about 172 KB/s for CD-Audio. If no speed option is
present, cdrecord will try to get the speed value
from the CDR_SPEED environment. If your drive has
problems with speed=2 or speed=4, you should try
speed=0.
Blank a CD-RW and exit or blank a CD-RW before
writing. The blanking type may be one of:
help Display a list of possible blanking
types.
all Blank the entire disk. This may take a
long time.
fast Minimally blank the disk. This results
in erasing the PMA, the TOC and the
pregap.
track Blank a track.
unreserve Unreserve a reserved track.
trtail Blank the tail of a track.
unclose Unclose last session.
session Blank the last session.
If used together with the -force flag, this option may be
used to blank CD-RW disks that otherwise cannot be
blanked. Note that you may need to specify blank=all
because some drives will not continue with certain types
of bad CD-RW disks. Note also that cdecord does it's best
if the -force flag is used but it finally depends on the
drive's firmware whether the blanking operation will suc
ceed or not.
fs=# Set the fifo (ring buffer) size to #. You may use
the same method as in dd(1), sdd(1) or star(1).
The number representing the size is taken in bytes
unless otherwise specified. If a number is fol
lowed directly by the letter `b', `k', `m', `s' of
`f', the size is multiplied by 512, 1024,
1024*1024, 2048 or 2352. If the size consists of
numbers separated by `x' or `*', multiplication of
the two numbers is performed. Thus fs=10x63k will
specify a fifo size of 630 kBytes.
The size specified by the fs= argument includes the
shared memory that is needed for administration.
This is at least one page of memory. If no fs=
option is present, cdrecord will try to get the
fifo size value from the CDR_FIFOSIZE environment.
The default fifo size is currently 4 MB.
The fifo is used to increase buffering for the real
time writing process. It allows to run a pipe from
mkisofs directly into cdrecord. If the fifo is
active and a pipe from mkisofs into cdrecord is
do any modifications on the disk if mkisofs dies
before it starts writing. The recommended fifo
size is between 4 and 32 MBytes. As a rule of
thumb, the fifo size should be at least equal to
the size of the internal buffer of the CD-Recorder
and no more than half of the physical amount of RAM
available in the machine. If the fifo size is big
enough, the fifo statistics will print a fifo empty
count of zero and the fifo min fill is not below
20%. It is not wise to use too much space for the
fifo. If you need more than 8 MB to write a CD on
an idle machine, your machine is either underpow
ered, has hardware problems or is mis-configured.
The sun4c architecture (e.g. a Sparcstation-2) has
only MMU page table entries for 16 MBytes per pro
cess. Using more than 14 MBytes for the fifo may
cause the operating system in this case to spend
much time to constantly reload the MMU tables.
Newer machines from Sun do not have this MMU hard
ware problem. I have no information on PC-hardware
reflecting this problem.
If you have buffer underruns or similar problems
and observe a zero fifo empty count, you have hard
ware problems. The fifo size in this case is suffi
cient.
dev=target
Sets the SCSI target for the CD-Recorder, see notes
above. A typical device specification is dev=6,0 .
If a filename must be provided together with the
numerical target specification, the filename is
implementation specific. The correct filename in
this case can be found in the system specific manu
als of the target operating system. On a FreeBSD
system without CAM support, you need to use the
control device (e.g. /dev/rcd0.ctl). A correct
device specification in this case may be
dev=/dev/rcd0.ctl:@ .
On Linux, drives connected to a parallel port
adapter are mapped to a virtual SCSI bus. Different
adapters are mapped to different targets on this
virtual SCSI bus.
If no dev option is present, cdrecord will try to
get the device from the CDR_DEVICE environment.
If the argument to the dev= option does not contain
the characters ',', '/', '@' or ':', it is inter
preted as an label name that may be found in the
file /etc/cdrecord.conf (see FILES section).
Set the default SCSI command timeout value to #
seconds. The default SCSI command timeout is the
minimum timeout used for sending SCSI commands. If
a SCSI command fails due to a timeout, you may try
to raise the default SCSI command timeout above the
timeout value of the failed command. If the com
mand runs correctly with a raised command timeout,
please report the better timeout value and the cor
responding command to the author of the program.
If no timeout option is present, a default timeout
of 40 seconds is used.
driver=name
Allows to use a user supplied driver name for the
device. To get a list of possible drivers use
driver=help. The reason for the existence of this
option is to allow users to use cdrecord with
drives that are similar to supported drives but not
known directly by cdrecord. Use this option with
extreme care. If a wrong driver is used for a
device, the possibility of creating corrupted disks
is high. The minimum problem related to a wrong
driver is that the -speed or -dummy will not work.
There are two special driver entries in the list:
cdr_simul and dvd_simul. These driver entries are
designed to make timing tests at any speed or tim
ing tests for drives that do not support the -dummy
option. The simulation drivers implement a drive
with a buffer size of 1MB that can be changed via
the CDR_SIMUL_BUFSIZE environment variable. The
simulation driver correctly simulates even a buffer
underrun condition. If the -dummy option is pre
sent, the simulation is not aborted in case of a
buffer underrun.
driveropts=option list
Set driver specific options. The options are speci
fied a comma separated list. To get a list of
valid options use driveropts=help together with the
-checkdrive option. Currently only the burnproof
option is implemented to support Buffer Underrun
Proof writing with drives that use the Sanyo BURN-
Proof technology.
-checkdrive
Checks if a driver for the current drive is present
and exit. If the drive is a known drive, cdrecord
uses exit code 0.
-prcap Print the drive capabilities for SCSI-3/mmc compli
ant drives as obtained from mode page 0x2A. Values
marked with KB use 1024 bytes as Kilo-byte.
-inq Do an inquiry for the drive, print the inquiry info
and exit.
-scanbus
Scan all SCSI devices on all SCSI busses and print
the inquiry strings. This option may be used to
find SCSI address of the CD-Recorder on a system.
The numbers printed out as labels are computed by:
bus * 100 + target
-reset Try to reset the SCSI bus where the CD recorder is
located. This works not on all operating systems.
-ignsize
Ignore the known size of the medium. This options
should be used with extreme care, it exists only
for debugging purposes don't use it for other rea
sons. It is not needed to write disks with more
than the nominal capacity.
-useinfo
Use *.inf files to overwrite audio options. If
this option is used, the pregap size information is
read from the *.inf file that is associated with
the file that contains the audio data for a track.
defpregap=#
Set the default pre-gap size for all tracks except
track number 1. This option currently only makes
sense with the TEAC drive when creating track-at-
once disks without the 2 second silence before each
track.
This option may go away in future.
-packet
Set Packet writing mode. This is an experimental
interface.
pktsize=#
Set the paket size to #, forces fixed packet mode.
This is an experimental interface.
-noclose
Do not close the current track, useful only when in
packet writing mode. This is an experimental
interface.
mcn=med_cat_nr
Set the Media Catalog Number of the CD to
med_cat_nr.
Track options may be mixed with track file names.
isrc=ISRC_number
Set the International Standard Recording Number for
the next track to ISRC_number.
index=list
Sets an index list for the next track. In index
list is a comma separated list of numbers that are
counting from index 1. The first entry in this list
must contain a 0, the following numbers must be an
ascending list of numbers (counting in 1/75 sec
onds) that represent the start of the indices. An
index list in the form: 0,7500,15000 sets index 1
to the start of the track, index 2 100 seconds from
the start of the track and index 3 200 seconds from
the start of the track.
-audio If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are
written in CD-DA (similar to Red Book) audio for
mat. The file with data for this tracks should
contain stereo, 16-bit digital audio with 44100
samples/s. The byte order should be the following:
MSB left, LSB left, MSB right, LSB right, MSB left
and so on. The track should be a multiple of 2352
bytes. It is not possible to put the master image
of an audio track on a raw disk because data will
be read in multiple of 2352 bytes during the
recording process.
If a filename ends in .au or .wav the file is con
sidered to be a structured audio data file.
Cdrecord assumes that the file in this case is a
Sun audio file or a Microsoft .WAV file and
extracts the audio data from the files by skipping
over the non-audio header information. In all
other cases, cdrecord will only work correctly if
the audio data stream does not have any header.
Because many structured audio files do not have an
integral number of blocks (1/75th second) in
length, it is often necessary to specify the -pad
option as well. cdrecord recognizes that audio
data in a .WAV file is stored in Intel (little-
endian) byte order, and will automatically byte-
swap the data if the CD recorder requires big-
endian data. Cdrecord will reject any audio file
that does not match the Red Book requirements of
16-bit stereo samples in PCM coding at 44100 sam
ples/second.
Using other structured audio data formats as input
to cdrecord will usually work if the structure of
the data is the structure described above (raw pcm
data format includes a header, you will hear a
click at the start of a track.
If neither -data nor -audio have been specified,
cdrecord defaults to -audio for all filenames that
end in .au or .wav and to -data for all other
files.
-swab If this flag is present, audio data is assumed to
be in byte-swapped (little-endian) order. Some
types of CD-Writers e.g. Yamaha, Sony and the new
SCSI-3/mmc drives require audio data to be pre
sented in little-endian order, while other writers
require audio data to be presented in the big-
endian (network) byte order normally used by the
SCSI protocol. Cdrecord knows if a CD-Recorder
needs audio data in big- or little-endian order,
and corrects the byte order of the data stream to
match the needs of the recorder. You only need the
-swab flag if your data stream is in Intel (little-
endian) byte order.
Note that the verbose output of cdrecord will show
you if swapping is necessary to make the byte order
of the input data fit the required byte order of
the recorder. Cdrecord will not show you if the
-swab flag was actually present for a track.
-data If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are
written in CD-ROM mode 1 (Yellow Book) format. The
data is a multiple of 2048 bytes. The file with
track data should contain an ISO-9660 or Rock Ridge
filesystem image (see mkisofs for more details). If
the track data is an ufs filesystem image, fragment
size should be set to 2 KB or more to allow CR-
drives with 2 KB sector size to to be used for
reading.
-data is the default, if no other flag is present.
If neither -data nor -audio have been specified,
cdrecord defaults to -audio for all filenames that
end in .au or .wav and to -data for all other
files.
-mode2 If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are
written in CD-ROM mode 2 format. The data is a mul
tiple of 2048 bytes.
-xa1 If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are
written in CD-ROM XA mode 1 format. The data is a
multiple of 2048 bytes.
written in CD-ROM XA mode 2 format. The data is a
multiple of 2048 bytes.
-cdi If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are
written in CDI format. The data is a multiple of
2048 bytes.
-isosize
Use the ISO-9660 file system size as the size of
the next track. This option is needed if you want
to read the image of a track from a raw disk parti
tion or on a master CD. In the first case the
option -isosize is needed to limit the size of the
CD to the size of the ISO filesystem. In the sec
ond case the option -isosize is needed to prevent
cdrecord from reading the two run out blocks that
are appended by each CD-recorder in track at once
mode. These two run out blocks cannot be read and
would cause a buffer under run that would cause a
defective copy. Do not use this option if cdrecord
reads the track data from stdin. This option cur
rently cannot be used to determine the size of a
file system if the multi session option is present.
-pad If the track is a data track, 15 sectors of zeroed
data will be added to the end of this and each sub
sequent data track. In this case, the -pad option
is superseded by the padsize= option. It will
remain however as a shorthand for padsize=15s. If
the -pad option refers to an audio track, cdrecord
will pad the audio data to be a multiple of 2352
bytes. The audio data padding is done with binary
zeroes which is equal to absolute silence.
-pad remains valid until disabled by -nopad.
padsize=#
Set the amount of data to be appended as padding to
the next track to #. Opposed to the behavior of
the -pad option, the value for padsize= is reset to
zero for each new track. See fs= option for possi
ble arguments. Use this option if your CD-drive is
not able to read the last sectors of a track or if
you want to be able to read the CD on a Linux sys
tem with the ISO-9660 filesystem read ahead bug.
If an empty file is used for track data, this
option may be used to create a disk that is
entirely made of padding.
-nopad Do not pad the following tracks - the default.
-shorttrack
Allow all subsequent tracks to violate the Read
track length of 4 seconds. This option is only
useful when used in DAO mode. Not all drives sup
port this feature. The drive must be accept the
resulting CUE sheet.
-noshorttrack
Re-enforce the Red Book track length standard.
Tracks must be at least 4 seconds.
pregap=#
Set the pre-gap size for the next track. This
option currently only makes sense with the TEAC
drive when creating track-at-once disks without the
2 second silence before each track.
This option may go away in future.
-preemp
If this flag is present, all TOC entries for subse
quent audio tracks will indicate that the audio
data has been sampled with 50/15 µsec preemphasis.
The data, however is not modified during the pro
cess of transferring from file to disk. This
option has no effect on data tracks.
-nopreemp
If this flag is present, all TOC entries for subse
quent audio tracks will indicate that the audio
data has been mastered with linear data - this is
the default.
tsize=#
If the master image for the next track has been
stored on a raw disk, use this option to specify
the valid amount of data on this disk. If the image
of the next track is stored in a regular file, the
size of that file is taken to determine the length
of this track. If the track contains an ISO 9660
filesystem image use the -isosize option to deter
mine the length of that filesystem image.
In Disk at Once mode and with some drives that use
the TEAC programming interface, even in Track at
Once mode, cdrecord needs to know the size of each
track before starting to write the disk. Cdrecord
now checks this and aborts before starting to
write. If this happens you will need to run
mkisofs -print-size before and use the output as an
argument to the tsize= option of cdrecord.
See fs= option for possible arguments.
EXAMPLES
For all examples below, it will be assumed that the CD-
Recorder is connected to the primary SCSI bus of the
To record a pure CD-ROM at double speed, using data from
the file cdimage.raw:
cdrecord -v speed=2 dev=2,0 cdimage.raw
To create an image for a ISO 9660 filesystem with Rock
Ridge extensions:
mkisofs -R -o cdimage.raw /home/joerg/master/tree
To check the resulting file before writing to CD on
Solaris:
mount -r -F fbk -o type=hsfs /dev/fbk0:cdimage.raw
/mnt
On Linux:
mount cdimage.raw -r -t iso9660 -o loop /mnt
Go on with:
ls -lR /mnt
umount /mnt
If the overall speed of the system is sufficient and the
structure of the filesystem is not too complex, cdrecord
will run without creating an image of the ISO 9660
filesystem. Simply run the pipeline:
mkisofs -R /master/tree | cdrecord -v fs=6m speed=2
dev=2,0 -
The recommended minimum fifo size for running this
pipeline is 4 MBytes. As the default fifo size is 4 MB,
the fs= option needs only be present if you want to use a
different fifo size. If your system is loaded, you should
run mkisofs in the real time class too. To raise the pri
ority of mkisofs replace the command
mkisofs -R /master/tree
by
priocntl -e -c RT -p 59 mkisofs -R /master/tree
on Solaris and by
nice --18 mkisofs -R /master/tree
on systems that don't have UNIX International compliant
realtime scheduling.
Cdrecord runs at priority 59 on Solaris, you should run
mkisofs at no more than priority 58. On other systems, you
Creating a CD-ROM without file system image on disk has
been tested on a Sparcstation-2 with a Yamaha CDR-400. It
did work up to quad speed when the machine was not loaded.
A faster machine may be able to handle quad speed also in
the loaded case.
To record a pure CD-DA (audio) at single speed, with each
track contained in a file named track01.cdaudio,
track02.cdaudio, etc:
cdrecord -v speed=1 dev=2,0 -audio track*.cdaudio
To check if it will be ok to use double speed for the
example above. Use the dummy write option:
cdrecord -v -dummy speed=2 dev=2,0 -audio track*.cdau
dio
To record a mixed-mode CD with an ISO 9660 filesystem from
cdimage.raw on the first track, the other tracks being
audio tracks from the files track01.cdaudio, track02.cdau
dio, etc:
cdrecord -v -dummy dev=2,0 cdimage.raw -audio
track*.cdaudio
To handle drives that need to know the size of a track
before starting to write, first run
mkisofs -R -q -print-size /master/tree
and then run
mkisofs -R /master/tree | cdrecord speed=2 dev=2,0
tsize=XXXs -
where XXX is replaced by the output of the previous run of
mkisofs.
To copy an audio CD in the most accurate way, first run
cdda2wav -v255 -D2,0 -B -Owav
and then run
cdrecord -v dev=2,0 -dao -useinfo *.wav
ENVIRONMENT
CDR_DEVICE
This may either hold a device identifier that is
library or a label in the file /etc/cdrecord.conf.
CDR_SPEED
Sets the default speed value for writing (see also
-speed option).
CDR_FIFOSIZE
Sets the default size of the FIFO (see also fs=#
option).
FILES
/etc/cdrecord.conf
Default values can be set for the following options
in /etc/cdrecord.conf. For example: CDR_FIFOS
IZE=8m or CDR_SPEED=2
CDR_DEVICE
This may either hold a device identifier
that is suitable to the open call of the
SCSI transport library or a label in the
file /etc/cdrecord.conf that allows to iden
tify a specific drive on the system.
CDR_SPEED
Sets the default speed value for writing
(see also -speed option).
CDR_FIFOSIZE
Sets the default size of the FIFO (see also
fs=# option).
Any other label
is an identifier for a specific drive on the
system. Such an identifier may not contain
the characters ',', '/', '@' or ':'.
Each line that follows a label contains a
TAB separated list of items. Currently,
three items are recognized: the SCSI ID of
the drive, the default speed that should be
used for this drive and the default FIFO
size that should be used for this drive. The
values for speed and fifosize may be set to
-1 to tell cdrecord to use the global
defaults. A typical line may look this way:
teac1= 0,5,0 4 8m
yamaha= 1,6,0 -1 -1
This tells cdrecord that a drive named teac1
is at scsibus 0, target 5, lun 0 and should
MB. A second drive may be found at scsibus
1, target 6, lun 0 and uses the default
speed and the default FIFO size.
SEE ALSO
cdda2wav(1), readcd(1), scg(7), fbk(7), mkisofs(8).
NOTES
On Solaris you need to stop the volume management if you
like to use the USCSI fallback SCSI transport code. Even
things like cdrecord -scanbus will not work if the volume
management is running.
Disks made in Track At Once mode are not suitable as a
master for direct mass production by CD manufacturers.
You will need the disk at once option to record such
disks. Nevertheless the disks made in Track At Once will
normally be read in all CD players. Some old audio CD
players however may produce a two second click between two
audio tracks.
The minimal size of a track is 4 seconds or 300 sectors.
If you write smaller tracks, the CD-Recorder will add
dummy blocks. This is not an error, even though the SCSI-
error message looks this way.
Cdrecord has been tested on an upgraded Philips CDD-521
recorder at single and double speed on a SparcStation
20/502 with no problems, slower computer systems should
work also. The newer Philips/HP/Plasmon/Grundig drives as
well as Yamaha CDR-100 and CDR-102 work also. The Plasmon
RF-4100 work, but has not tested in multi session. A
Philips CDD-521 that has not been upgraded will not work.
The Sony CDU-924 has been tested, but does not support XA-
mode2 in hardware. The sony therefore cannot create con
forming multi session disks. The Ricoh RO-1420C works,
but some people seem to have problems to use them with
speed=2, try speed=0 in this case.
The Yamaha CDR-400 and all new SCSI-3/mmc conforming
drives are supported in single and multi-session.
You should run several tests in all supported speeds of
your drive with the -dummy option turned on if you are
using cdrecord on an unknown system. Writing a CD is a
realtime process. NFS will not always deliver constantly
the needed data rates. If you want to use cdrecord with
CD-images that are located on a NFS mounted filesystem, be
sure that the fifo size is big enough. I used cdrecord
with with medium load on a SS20/502 and even at quad speed
on a Sparcstation-2 which was heavily loaded, but it is
sible while writing a CD. If you want to make sure that
buffer underrungs are not caused by your source disk, you
may use the command
cdrecord -dummy dev=2,0 padsize=600m /dev/null
to create a disk that is entirely made of dummy data.
Cdrecord needs to run as root to get access to the
/dev/scg? device nodes and to be able to lock itself into
memory.
If you don't want to allow users to become root on your
system, cdrecord may safely be installed suid root. This
allows all users or a group of users with no root privi
leges to use cdrecord. Cdrecord in this case checks, if
the real user would have been able to read the specified
files. To give all user access to use cdrecord, enter:
chown root /usr/local/bin/cdrecord
chmod 4711 /usr/local/bin/cdrecord
To give a restricted group of users access to cdrecord
enter:
chown root /usr/local/bin/cdrecord
chgrp cdburners /usr/local/bin/cdrecord
chmod 4710 /usr/local/bin/cdrecord
and add a group cdburners on your system.
Never give write permissions for non root users to the
/dev/scg? devices unless you would allow anybody to
read/write/format all your disks.
You should not connect old drives that do not support dis
connect/reconnect to either the SCSI bus that is connected
to the CD-Recorder or the source disk.
A Compact Disc can have no more than 99 tracks.
When creating a disc with both audio and data tracks, the
data should be on track 1 otherwise you should create a
CDplus disk which is a multi session disk with the first
session containing the audio tracks and the following ses
sion containing the data track.
Many operating systems are not able to read more than a
single data track, or need special software to do so.
More information on the SCSI command set of a HP CD-
Recorder can be found at:
http://www.hp.com/isgsupport/cdr/index.html
currently unsupported CD-Recorders please contact the
author.
The Philips CDD 521 CD-Recorder (even in the upgraded ver
sion) has several firmware bugs. Some of them will force
you to power cycle the device or to reboot the machine.
When using cdrecord with the broken Linux SCSI generic
driver. You should note that cdrecord uses a hack, that
tries to emulate the functionality of the scg driver.
Unfortunately, the sg driver on Linux has several severe
bugs:
· It cannot see if a SCSI command could not be sent
at all.
· It cannot get the SCSI status byte. Cdrecord for
that reason cannot report failing SCSI commands in
some situations.
· It cannot get real DMA count of transfer. Cdrecord
cannot tell you if there is an DMA residual count.
· It cannot get number of bytes valid in auto sense
data. Cdrecord cannot tell you if device transfers
no sense data at all.
· It fetches to few data in auto request sense
(CCS/SCSI-2/SCSI-3 needs >= 18).
The fifo percent output is computed just after a block of
data has been written to the CD-Recorder. For this reason,
there will never be 100% fifo fill, while the fifo is in
streaming mode.
DIAGNOSTICS
You have 9 seconds to type ^C to abort cdrecord after you
see the message:
Starting to write CD at speed %d in %s mode for %s ses
sion.
A typical error message for a SCSI command looks like:
cdrecord: I/O error. test unit ready: scsi sendcmd: no error
CDB: 00 20 00 00 00 00
status: 0x2 (CHECK CONDITION)
Sense Bytes: 70 00 05 00 00 00 00 0A 00 00 00 00 25 00 00 00 00 00
Sense Key: 0x5 Illegal Request, Segment 0
Sense Code: 0x25 Qual 0x00 (logical unit not supported) Fru 0x0
Sense flags: Blk 0 (not valid)
cmd finished after 0.002s timeout 40s
the command. The text after the first colon gives the
error text for the system call from the view of the ker
nel. It usually is: I/O error unless other problems hap
pen. The next words contain a short description for the
SCSI command that fails. The rest of the line tells you if
there were any problems for the transport of the command
over the SCSI bus. fatal error means that it was not pos
sible to transport the command (i.e. no device present at
the requested SCSI address).
The second line prints the SCSI command descriptor block
for the failed command.
The third line gives information on the SCSI status code
returned by the command, if the transport of the command
succeeds. This is error information from the SCSI device.
The fourth line is a hex dump of the auto request sense
information for the command.
The fifth line is the error text for the sense key if
available, followed by the segment number that is only
valid if the command was a copy command. If the error mes
sage is not directly related to the current command, the
text deferred error is appended.
The sixth line is the error text for the sense code and
the sense qualifier if available. If the type of the
device is known, the sense data is decoded from tables in
scsierrs.c . The text is followed by the error value for
a field replaceable unit.
The seventh line prints the block number that is related
to the failed command and text for several error flags.
The block number may not be valid.
The eight line reports the timeout set up for this commans
and the time that the command realy needed to be finished.
The following message is not an error:
Track 01: Total bytes read/written: 2048/2048 (1 sectors).
cdrecord: I/O error. flush cache: scsi sendcmd: no error
CDB: 35 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
status: 0x2 (CHECK CONDITION)
Sense Bytes: F0 00 05 80 00 00 27 0A 00 00 00 00 B5 00 00 00 00 00
Sense Key: 0x5 Illegal Request, Segment 0
Sense Code: 0xB5 Qual 0x00 (dummy data blocks added) Fru 0x0
Sense flags: Blk -2147483609 (valid)
cmd finished after 0.002s timeout 40s
It simply notifies, that a track that is smaller than the
minimum size has been expanded to 300 sectors.
Cdrecord has even more options than ls.
Cdrecord currently only warns if the input data will not
fit on the disk. If you don't abort the command you will
get unpredictable results.
There should be an option to write index numbers for audio
tracks.
There should be a recover option to make disks usable,
that have been written during a power failure.
CREDITS
Bill Swartz (Bill_Swartz@twolf.com)
For helping me with the TEAC driver support
Aaron Newsome (aaron.d.newsome@wdc.com)
For letting me develop Sony support on his
drive
Eric Youngdale (eric@andante.jic.com)
For supplying mkisofs
Gadi Oxman (gadio@netvision.net.il)
For tips on the ATAPI standard
Finn Arne Gangstad (finnag@guardian.no)
For the first FIFO implementation.
Dave Platt (dplatt@feghoot.ml.org)
For creating the experimental packet writ
ing support, the first implementation of
CD-RW blanking support, the first .wav file
decoder and many nice discussions on
cdrecord.
Chris P. Ross (cross@eng.us.uu.net)
For the first implementation os a BSDI SCSI
rtansport.
Grant R. Guenther (grant@torque.net)
For creating the first parallel port trans
port implementation for Linux.
Kenneth D. Merry (ken@kdm.org)
for providing the CAM port for FreeBSD
together with Michael Smith
(msmith@freebsd.org)
MAILING LISTS
If you want to actively take part on the development of
ing mail to:
other-cdwrite-request@lists.debian.org
and include the word subscribe in the body. The mail
address of the list is:
other-cdwrite@lists.debian.org
AUTHOR
Joerg Schilling
Seestr. 110
D-13353 Berlin
Germany
Additional information can be found on:
http://www.fokus.gmd.de/usr/schilling/cdrecord.html
If you have support questions, send them to:
cdrecord-support@berlios.de
or other-cdwrite@lists.debian.org
Of you definitly found a bug, send a mail to:
cdrecord-developers@berlios.de
or schilling@fokus.gmd.de
To subscribe, use:
http://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/cdrecord-develop
ers
or http://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/cdrecord-sup
port
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