Is the 'X' on cd-r's a marketing ploy for $$$$?

[alber]

Does it really matter what the cd-r says, like 12X is this supposed to mean it's only good for 12X burning or less? I've succesfully burned 12X cd's at 16X without any problems, so what's the deal? Is it so people buy the higher marked 'X' for more money although a cheaper and lower marked 'X' would do just fine?

[HAL9000]

I've wondered that for a long time. A friend of mine has a pile of 8x CD's yet and he does them at 16x as well.

[Jenni]

I seriuosly doubt that they change something every time a faster burner comes out. The 8x blanks are probably just from when 8x was king of the hill.

[HAL9000]

Mind you, now that I look at some blanks on our shelves, they state "16x certified". That just means they will work fine at 16x, it doesn't mean they won't work in a 24x writer.

[Gintaras]

I burned old SKC x2 CD-R @ x16

And with "Audio" or "Data" CD-Rs same story: did anyone burned music CD on CDR without "For Music Only" that didn't play on CD player?

[glc]

I have found that just about any CD-R will burn at the max speed of the burner, but CD-RW won't - the "x" rating on those is usually as fast as they will burn. I have a box of bulk unbranded unrated silver/blue cdr's made by Verbatim that will burn at 12x even though they were made back when 6x was the fastest drive out. I tried running a 4x S&F cdrw the other day in a 10x rated cdrw drive, and 4x was all it would go. I also have some unrated S&F cdrw's that wont go past 2x.

[PardeGT]

I bought some tdk and also some music tdk. I can't remember now how it went: either the data wouldn't do music or the music wouldn't do data. I think it was the case that the tdk data's wouldn't play mp3's in my car stereo but the tdk music cdr's would. Now the tdk data cdr may play music fine in a different player I don't know. My stereo is a high end pioneer and usually pioneer's aren't too fussy on what media is used.