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 addition.
In this case the correct syntax for the device is:
dev=devicename:scsibus,target,lun
or
dev=devicename:target,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=devicename: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
.BIREMOTE: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 access SCSI devices via alternate transport layers,
you need to prepend the SCSI device name by a transport layer indicator.
The transport layer indicator may be something like
USCSI:
or
ATAPI:.
To get a list of supported transport layers for your platform, use
dev=HELP:
To make
cdrecord
portable to all UNIX platforms, the syntax
dev=devicename:scsibus,target,lun
is preferred as it hides OS specific knowledge about device names from the user.
A specific OS may not necessarily support a way to specify a real device file name nor a
way to specify
scsibus,target,lun.
Scsibus
0 is the default SCSI bus on the machine. Watch the boot messages for more
information or look into
/var/log/messages
for more information about the SCSI configuration of your machine.
If you have problems to figure out what values for
scsibus,target,lun
should be used, try the
-scanbus
option of
cdrecord
described below.
If a file /etc/default/cdrecord 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
possible (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 command transport by one.
This helps to debug problems
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 process 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.
-silent, -s
Do not print out a status report for failed SCSI commands.
-force
Force to continue on some errors. Be careful when using this option.
Cdrecord
implements several checks that prevent you from doing unwanted things
like damaging CD-RW media by improper drives. Many of the sanity checks are
disabled when the
-force
option is used.
This option also implements some tricks that will allow
you to blank bad CD-RW disks.
-immed
Tell cdrecord to set the
SCSI IMMED
flag in certain commands
(load/eject/blank/close_track/close_session).
This can be useful
on broken systems with ATAPI harddisk and CD/DVD writer on the same bus or
with SCSI systems that don't use disconnect/reconnect.
These systems will freeze while blanking or fixating a CD/DVD or while a DVD
writer is filling up a session to the minimum amount (approx. 800 MB).
Setting the
-immed
flag will request the command to return immediately
while the operation proceeds in background, making
the bus usable for the other devices and avoiding the system freeze.
This is an experimental feature which may work or not, depending on the model
of the CD/DVD writer.
A correct solution would be to set up a correct cabling but there seem to be
notebooks around that have been set up the wrong way by the manufacturer.
As it is impossible to fix this problem in notebooks, the
-immed
option has been added.
A second experimental feature of the
-immed
flag is to tell cdrecord to try to wait short times wile writing to the
media. This is expected to free the IDE bus if the CD/DVD writer and the
data source are connected to the same IDE cable. In this case, the CD/DVD
writer would otherwise usually block the IDE bus for nearly all the time
making it impossible to fetch data from the source drive. See also
minbuf=
and
-v
option.
Use both features at your own risk.
If it turns out that it would make sense to have a separate option
for the the wait feature, write to the author and convince him.
minbuf=value
The #
minbuf=
options allows to define the minimum drive buffer fill ratio for the
experimental ATAPI wait mode that is intended to free the IDE bus
to allow hard disk and CD/DVD writer to be on the same IDE cable.
As the wait mode currently only works when the verbose option
-v
has been specified,
cdrecord
implies the verbose option in case the
-immed
or
minbuf=
option have been specified.
Valid values for
minbuf=
are between 25 and 95 for 25%...95% minimum drive buffer fill ratio.
-dummy
The CD-Recorder will go through all steps of the recording process,
but the laser is turned off during this procedure.
It is recommended to run several tests before actually writing to a
Compact Disk or Digital Versatile Disk,
if the timing and load response of the system is not known.
-dao
Set
SAO (Session At Once)
mode which is usually called
Disk At Once mode.
This currently only works with MMC drives that support
Session At Once
mode.
Note that cdrecord needs to know the size of each track in advance for this mode
(see the
mkisofs -print-size
option and the
EXAMPLES
section for more information).
-raw
Set
RAW writing mode.
Using this option defaults to
-raw96r.
Note that cdrecord needs to know the size of each track in advance for this mode
(see the
mkisofs -print-size
option and the
EXAMPLES
section for more information).
-raw96r
Select
Set
RAW writing mode
with 2352 byte sectors plus 96 bytes of raw P-W subchannel data resulting
in a sector size of 2448 bytes.
This is the preferred raw writing mode as it gives best control over the
CD writing process.
If you find any problems with the layout of a disk or with sub channel
content (e.g. wrong times on the display when playing the CD) and your drive
supports to write in
-raw96r
or
-raw16
mode, you should give it a try. There are several CD writers with bad firmware
that result in broken disks when writing in TAO or SAO mode.
Writing data disks in raw mode needs significantly more CPU time than other
write modes. If your CPU is too slow, this may result in buffer underruns.
Note that cdrecord needs to know the size of each track in advance for this mode
(see the
mkisofs -print-size
option and the
EXAMPLES
section for more information).
-raw96p
Select
Set
RAW writing mode
with 2352 byte sectors plus 96 bytes of packed P-W subchannel data resulting
in a sector size of 2448 bytes.
This is the less preferred raw writing mode as only a few recorders support
it and some of these recorders have bugs in the firmware implementation.
Don't use this mode if your recorder supports
-raw96r
or
-raw16.
Writing data disks in raw mode needs significantly more CPU time than other
write modes. If your CPU is too slow, this may result in buffer underruns.
Note that cdrecord needs to know the size of each track in advance for this mode
(see the
mkisofs -print-size
option and the
EXAMPLES
section for more information).
-raw16
Select
Set
RAW writing mode
with 2352 byte sectors plus 6 bytes of P-Q subchannel data resulting
in a sector size of 2368 bytes.
If a recorder does not support
-raw96r,
this is the preferred raw writing mode.
It does not allow to write
CD-Text
or
CD+Graphics
but it is the only raw writing mode in cheap CD writers.
As these cheap writers in most cases do not support
-dao
mode.
Don't use this mode if your recorder supports
-raw96r.
Writing data disks in raw mode needs significantly more CPU time than other
write modes. If your CPU is too slow, this may result in buffer underruns.
Note that cdrecord needs to know the size of each track in advance for this mode
(see the
mkisofs -print-size
option and the
EXAMPLES
section for more information).
-multi
Allow multi session CDs to be made. This flag needs to be present
on all sessions of a multi session disk,
except you want to create a session that will be
the last session on the media.
The fixation 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 CDs (except for CDplus).
Use only for recording of multi session CDs.
If this option is present, the default track type is
CD-ROM XA mode 2 form 1
and the sector size is 2048 bytes.
The XA sector subheaders will be created by the drive.
The
Sony
drives have no hardware support for
CD-ROM XA mode 2 form 1.
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 SAO mode.
Not all drives allow multisession CDs in 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 contains 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.
-atip
Retrieve and print out the ATIP (absolute Time in Pre-groove) info of a CD/DVD
recordable or CD/DVD re-writable 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.
DVD media does not have ATIP information but there is equivalent prerecorded
information that is read out and printed.
-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
fixated. 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 session 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.
-lock
Load the media, lock the door 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 creating a new
disk. Doing a -dummy test and immediately 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, about 172 KB/s for CD-Audio and about 1385 KB/s
for DVD media.
If no
speed
option is present,
cdrecord
will try to get a drive specific speed value from the file
/etc/default/cdrecord
and if it cannot find one, it will try to get the the speed value from the
CDR_SPEED
environment and later from the
CDR_SPEED=
entry in
/etc/default/cdrecord.
If no speed value could be found, cdrecord uses a drive specific default speed.
The default for all new (MMC compliant) drives is to use the maximum supported by the drive.
If you use
speed=0
with a MCC compliant drive,
cdrecord
will switch to the lowest possible speed for drive and medium.
If you are using an old (non MMC) drive that has problems with
speed=2
or
speed=4,
you should try
speed=0.
blank=type
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.
Not all drives support all blanking types. It may be necessary to use
blank=all
if a drive reports a specified command as being invalid.
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
cdrecord
does it's best if the
-force
flag is used but it finally depends on the drive's firmware
whether the blanking operation will succeed or not.
-format
Format a CD-RW/DVD-RW/DVD+RW disc.
Formatting is currently only implemented for DVD+RW media.
A 'maiden' DVD+RW media needs to
be formatted before you may write to it.
However, as
cdrecord
autodetects the need for formatting in this case and auto formats the medium
before it starts writing, the
-format
option is only needed if you like to forcibly reformat a DVD+RW medium.
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 followed directly by the letter `b', `k', `m', `s' or `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 used to create a CD,
cdrecord
will abort prior to 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
underpowered, 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 process. 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
hardware 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 hardware problems. The FIFO size in this case is sufficient.
ts=#
Set the maximum SCSI transfer size to #.
The syntax for the
ts=
option is the same as for cdrecord fs=# or sdd bs=#.
If no
ts=
option has been specified,
cdrecord
defaults to a transfer size of 63 kB. If libscg gets lower values from the
operating system, the value is reduced to the maimum value that is possible
with the current operating system.
Sometimes, it may help to further reduce the transfer size or to enhance it,
but note that it may take a long time to find a better value by experimenting
with the
ts=
option.
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
manuals 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 interpreted as an label name that may be found in the file
/etc/default/cdrecord (see FILES section).
gracetime=#
Set the grace time before starting to write to
# seconds.
Values below 2 seconds are not allowed.
timeout=#
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 command runs correctly with a raised command timeout,
please report the better timeout value and the corresponding 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 timing 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 present, the simulation is not aborted in case of a buffer underrun.
driveropts=option list
Set driver specific options. The options are specified a comma separated list.
To get a list of valid options use
driveropts=help
together with the
-checkdrive
option.
Currently implemented driver options are:
burnfree
Turn the support for Buffer Underrun Free writing on.
This only works for drives that support Buffer Underrun Free technology.
This may be called:
Sanyo BURN-Proof,
Ricoh Just-Link,
Yamaha Lossless-Link
or similar.
The default is to turn
BURN-Free
off, regardless of the defaults of the drive.
noburnfree
Turn the support for Buffer Underrun Free writing off.
varirec=value
Turn on the
Plextor VariRec
writing mode. The mandatory parameter
value
is the laser power offset and currently may be selected from
-2, -1, 0, 1, 2.
In addition, you need to set the write speed to 4 in order to allow
VariRec
to work.
audiomaster
Turn on the
Yamaha Audio Master Q. R.
feature which usually should result in high quality CDs that
have less reading problems in Hi-Fi players.
As this is implemented as a variant of the
Session at Once write mode, it will only work if you select
SAO write mode and there is no need to turn it off.
The
Audio Master
mode will work with a limited speed but
may also be used with data CDs. in
Audio Master
mode, the pits on the CD will be written larger then usual so the capacity
of the medium is reduced when turning this feature on.
A 74 minute CD will only have a capacity of 63 minutes if
Audio Master
is active and the capacity of a 80 minute CD will be reduced to 68 minutes.
forcespeed
Normally, modern drives know the highest possible speed for different
media and may reduce the speed in order to grant best write quality.
This technology may be called:
Plextor PowerRec,
Ricoh Just-Speed,
Yamaha Optimum Write Speed Control
or similar.
Some drives (e.g. Plextor, Ricoh and Yamaha) allow to force the drive to
use the selected speed even if the medium is so bad that the
write quality would be poor. This option tells such a drive to
force to use the selected speed regardless of the medium quality.
Use this option with extreme care and note that the drive should know better
which medium will work at full speed.
The default is to turn
forcespeed
off, regardless of the defaults of the drive.
noforcespeed
Turn off the
force speed
feature.
speedread
Some ultra high speed drives such as 48x and faster drives from Plextor
limit the read speed for unknown media to e.g. 40x in order to avoid
damaged disks and drives.
Using this option tells the drive to read any media as fast as possible.
Be very careful as this may cause the media to break in the drive
while reading, resulting in a damaged media and drive!
nospeedread
Turn off unlimited read speed.
singlesession
Turn the drive into a single session only drive.
This allows to read defective or non-compliant (illegal) media with extremely
non-standard additional (broken/illegal) TOC entries in the TOC from the second
or higher session. Some of these disks become
usable if only the information from the first session is used.
You need to enable Single Session mode before you insert the defective disk!
nosinglesession
Turn off single session mode. The drive will again behave as usual.
hidecdr
Hide the fact that a medium might be a recordable medium.
This allows to make CD-Rs look like CD-ROMs and applications believe
that the media in the drive is not a CD-R.
nohidecdr
Turn off hiding CD-R media.
tattooinfo
Use this option together with
-checkdrive
to retrieve the image size information for the
Yamaha DiskT@2
feature. The images always have a line length of 3744 pixel.
Line number 0 (radius 0) is mapped to the center of the disk.
If you know the inner and outer radius you will be able to create a
pre distorted image that later may appear undistorted on the disk.
tattoofile=name
Use this option together with
-checkdrive
to write an image prepared for the
Yamaha DiskT@2
feature to the medium.
The file must be a file with raw image B&W data (one byte per pixel)
in a size as retrieved by a previous call to
tattoofile=name
.
If the size of the image equals the maximum possible size
(3744 x 320 pixel),
cdrecord
will use the first part of the file. This first part then will
be written to the leftover space on the CD.
Note that the image must be mirrored to be readable from the pick up
side of the CD.
-setdropts
Set the driveropts specified by
driveropts=option list,
the
speed
of the drive and the
dummy
flag and exit.
This allows cdrecord to set drive specific parameters that are not directly
used by
cdrecord
like e.g.
single session mode, hide cdr
and similar.
-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 compliant drives
as obtained from mode page 0x2A. Values marked with
kB
use 1000 bytes as kilo-byte, 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.
-abort
Try to send an
abort
sequence to the drive.
If you use
cdrecord
only, this should never be needed; but other software may leave a drive
in an unusable condition.
Calling
cdrecord -reset
may be needed if a previous write has been interrupted and the software did
not tell the drive that it will not continue to write.
-overburn
Allow
cdrecord
to write more than the official size of a medium. This feature is usually
called
overburning
and depends on the fact that most blank media may hold more space than the
official size. As the official size of the lead-out area on the disk is
90 seconds (6750 sectors) and a disk usually works if there are at least
150 sectors of lead out, all media may be overburned by at least 88 seconds
(6600 sectors).
Most CD recorders only do overburning in
SAO
or
RAW
mode. Known exceptions are TEAC CD-R50S, TEAC CD-R55S and the Panasonic
CW-7502.
Some drives do not allow to overburn as much as you might like and limit
the size of a CD to e.g. 76 minutes. This problem may be circumvented by
writing the CD in RAW mode because this way the drive has no chance to find
the size before starting to burn.
There is no guarantee that your drive supports overburning at all.
Make a test to check if your drive implements the feature.
-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 reasons.
It is not needed to write disks with more than the nominal capacity.
This option implies
-overburn.
-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.
If used together with the
-audio
option,
cdrecord
may be used to write audio CDs from a pipe from
cdda2wav
if you call
cdrecord
with the
*.inf
files as track parameter list instead of using audio files.
The audio data is read from
stdin
in this case.
See
EXAMPLES
section below.
Cdrecord
first verifies that
stdin
is not connected to a terminal and runs some heuristic consistency checks
on the
*.inf
files and then sets the track lengths from the information in
the
*.inf
files.
If you like to write from
stdin,
make sure that cdrecord is called with a large enough FIFO size, reduce the write
speed to a value below the read speed of the source drive and switch the burn-free
option for the recording drive on.
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 packet 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.
-text
Write CD-Text information
based on information taken from a file that contains ascii information
for the text strings.
Cdrecord
supports CD-Text information based on the content of the
*.inf
files created by
cdda2wav
and CD-Text information based on the content from a
CUE sheet
file.
If a
CUE sheet
file contains both (binary CDTEXTFILE and text based SONGWRITER)
entries, then the information based on the CDTEXTFILE entry will win.
You need to use the
-useinfo
option in addition in order to tell
cdrecord
to read the
*.inf
files or
cuefile=filename
in order to tell
cdrecord
to read a
CUE sheet
file in addition.
If you like to write your own CD-Text information,
edit the
*.inf
files or the
CUE sheet
file with a text editor and change the fields
that are relevant for CD-Text.
textfile=filename
Write CD-Text based on information found in the binary file
filename.
This file must contain information in a data format defined in the
SCSI-3 MMC-2 standard and in the Red Book. The four byte size header that is
defined in the SCSI standard is optional and allows to make the recognition of
correct data less ambiguous.
This is the best option to be used to copy CD-Text data from existing CDs
that already carry CD-Text information. To get data in a format suitable
for this option use
cdrecord -vv -toc
to extract the information from disk.
If both,
textfile=filename
and CD-Text information from
*.inf
or
*.cue
files are present,
textfile=filename
will overwrite the other information.
cuefile=filename
Take all recording related information from a CDRWIN compliant
CUE sheet
file.
No track files are allowed when this option is present and the option
-dao
is currently needed in addition.
TRACK OPTIONS
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 seconds) 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 format.
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 considered 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 samples/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 in big-endian byte order).
However, if the 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 presented 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 size 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
CD-drives with 2 KB sector size to to be used for reading.
-data
is the default, if no other flag is present and the file does not
appear to be of one of the well known audio file types.
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 size is a multiple of 2336 bytes.
-xa
If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are written in
CD-ROM XA mode 2 form 1
format. The data size is a multiple of 2048 bytes.
The XA sector sub headers will be created by the drive.
With this option, the write mode is the same as with the
-multi
option.
-xa1
If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are written in
CD-ROM XA mode 2 form 1
format. The data size is a multiple of 2056 bytes.
The XA sector sub headers are part of the user data and have to be
supplied by the application that prepares the data to be written.
-xa2
If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are written in
CD-ROM XA mode 2 form 2
format. The data is a multiple of 2324 bytes.
The XA sector sub headers will be created by the drive.
-xamix
If this flag is present, all subsequent tracks are written in a way
that allows a mix of
CD-ROM XA mode 2 form 1/2
format. The data size is a multiple of 2332 bytes.
The XA sector sub headers are part of the user data and have to be
supplied by the application that prepares the data to be written.
The CRC and the P/Q parity ECC/EDC information (depending on the sector
type) have to be supplied by the application that prepares the data to be written.
-cdi
If this flag is present, the TOC type for the disk is set to
CDI.
This only makes sense with XA disks.
-isosize
Use the
ISO-9660
file system size as the size of the next track.
This option is needed if you want
cdrecord
to directly read the image of a track from
a raw disk partition or from a
TAO
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 second 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 underrun that would cause a defective copy.
Do not use this option on files created by
mkisofs
and in case
cdrecord
reads the track data from
stdin.
In the first case, you would prevent
cdrecord
from writing the amount of padding that has been appended by
mkisofs
and in the latter case, it will not work because
stdin
is not seekable.
If
-isosize
is used for a track,
cdrecord
will automatically add padding for this track as if the
-pad
option has been used but the amount of padding may be less than the padding
written by
mkisofs.
Note that if you use
-isosize
on a track that contains Sparc boot information, the boot information will
be lost.
Note also that
this option 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 subsequent 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.
Cdrecord assumes a sector size of 2048 bytes for the
padsize=
option, independent from the real
sector size and independent from the write mode.
The megabytes mentioned in the verbose mode output however are counting
the output sector size which is e.g. 2448 bytes when writing in RAW/RAW96
mode.
See
fs=
option for possible arguments.
To pad the equivalent of 20 minutes on a CD, you may write
padsize=20x60x75s.
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
system 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.
This may e.g. be used to find out how much overburning is possible with a
specific media.
-nopad
Do not pad the following tracks - the default.
-shorttrack
Allow all subsequent tracks to violate the Read Book track length standard
which requires a minimum track length of 4 seconds.
This option is only useful when used in SAO or RAW mode.
Not all drivees support this feature. The drive must accept the
resulting CUE sheet or support RAW writing.
-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 subsequent audio tracks
will indicate that the audio data has been sampled with 50/15 µsec
pre-emphasis.
The data, however is not modified during the process of transferring from file
to disk.
This option has no effect on data tracks.
-nopreemp
If this flag is present, all TOC entries for subsequent audio tracks
will indicate that the audio data has been mastered with linear data -
this is the default.
-copy
If this flag is present, all TOC entries for subsequent audio tracks
of the resulting CD
will indicate that the audio data has permission to be copied without limit.
This option has no effect on data tracks.
-nocopy
If this flag is present, all TOC entries for subsequent audio tracks
of the resulting CD
will indicate that the audio data has permission to be copied only once for
personal use -
this is the default.
-scms
If this flag is present, all TOC entries for subsequent audio tracks
of the resulting CD
will indicate that the audio data has no permission to be copied anymore.
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 determine 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 (with `s' appended) as an argument to the
tsize=
option of
cdrecord
(e.g. tsize=250000s).
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 machine. The SCSI target id is
set to 2.
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:
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 priority 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 real-time scheduling.
Cdrecord runs at priority 59 on Solaris, you should run mkisofs
at no more than priority 58. On other systems, you should run mkisofs
at no less than nice --18.
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:
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.cdaudio,
etc:
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 dev=2,0 -vall cddb=0 -B -Owav
and then run
cdrecord dev=2,0 -v -dao -useinfo -text *.wav
This will try copy track indices and to read CD-Text information from disk.
If there is no CD-Text information,
cdda2wav
will try to get the information from freedb.org instead.
To copy an audio CD from a pipe (without intermediate files), first run
This will get all information (including track size info) from the
*.inf
files and then read the audio data from stdin.
If you like to write from
stdin,
make sure that cdrecord is called with a large enough FIFO size (e.g.
fs=128m),
reduce the write speed to a value below the read speed of the source drive
(e.g.
speed=12),
and switch the burn-free
option for the recording drive on by adding
driveropts=burnfree.
ENVIRONMENT
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/default/cdrecord.
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).
CDR_FORCERAWSPEED
If this environment variable is set,
cdrecord
will allow you to write at the full RAW encoding speed a single CPU supports.
This will create high potential of buffer underruns. Use with care.
RSH
If the
RSH
environment is present, the remote connection will not be created via
rcmd(3)
but by calling the program pointed to by
RSH.
Use e.g.
RSH=/usr/bin/ssh
to create a secure shell connection.
Note that this forces
cdrecord
to create a pipe to the
rsh(1)
program and disallows
cdrecord
to directly access the network socket to the remote server.
This makes it impossible to set up performance parameters and slows down
the connection compared to a
root
initiated
rcmd(3)
connection.
RSCSI
If the
RSCSI
environment is present, the remote SCSI server will not be the program
/opt/schily/sbin/rscsi
but the program pointed to by
RSCSI.
Note that the remote SCSI server program name will be ignored if you log in
using an account that has been created with a remote SCSI server program as
login shell.
FILES
/etc/default/cdrecord
Default values can be set for the following options in /etc/default/cdrecord.
For example:
CDR_FIFOSIZE=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/default/cdrecord
that allows to identify 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= 0,5,048m
yamaha= 1,6,0-1-1
This tells
cdrecord
that a drive named
teac1
is at scsibus 0, target 5, lun 0 and should be used with speed 4 and
a FIFO size of 8 MB.
A second drive may be found at scsibus 1, target 6, lun 0 and uses the
default speed and the default FIFO size.
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 conforming 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 real-time 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 medium load on a SS20/502 and even at quad speed
on a Sparcstation-2 which was heavily loaded,
but it is recommended to leave the system
as lightly loaded as possible while writing a CD.
If you want to make sure that buffer underruns 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 privileges 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
disconnect/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 session 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:
If you have more information or SCSI command manuals for currently
unsupported CD-Recorders please contact the author.
The Philips CDD 521 CD-Recorder (even in the upgraded version)
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 session.
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 first line gives information about the transport of the command.
The text after the first colon gives the error text for the system call
from the view of the kernel. It usually is:
I/O error
unless other problems happen. 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 possible 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 message 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 command and the time
that the command really needed to complete.
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.
BUGS
Cdrecord
has even more options than
ls.
There should be a recover option to make disks usable, that have been written
during a power failure.
For creating the experimental packet writing support,
the first implementation of CD-RW blanking support,
the first .wav file decoder
and many nice discussions on cdrecord.