Enhanced Audio Cd's - Learn to Make Your Own Enhanced Audio CD
Some may be familiar with the concept of Enhanced Audio CD's. For those that aren't, an Enhanced CD is much like a traditional Red-Book audio CD (the normal format for audio cd's - what you would purchase in a store). The only difference is that, in addition to being able to put your CD into a CD player and listen to music, you can also put the disc in a computer and access more features such as graphics files, more songs, or even create custom navigatable menu's and programs. All this enhances a consumers experience of your media. There is much to be learned about the topic and far more to be imagined as far as what can be done with this format. The best thing to do to get started is to learn how to make the most basic format of an Enhanced CD and place some files on the CD in addition to the CD Audio.
This tutorial will assume you have a basic knowledge with computers and burning traditional audio CD's. The purpose of this tutorial is to raise awareness of the Enhanced CD format and it's uses and teach those who already know how to burn a traditional Audio CD how to utilize the Enhanced CD format to maximize resource utilization on each disc.
1. First you need to acquire the software to create the CD. There are many programs you can use. My usual program of choice is Roxio. I couldn't find a trial or shareware version of Roxio out there but most programs you normally use to burn CD's have the ability to create Enhanced CD's built in, most don't realize or notice and it goes unused until discovered. Musicmatch is another program that has Enhanced CD capability. I found a shareware version available at : Sofotex.com
2. Each program is a little different as to how you have to create an enhanced CD - a short reference to the help file should tell how to open an Enhanced CD session. Most programs, once you start an Enhanced CD session, should support a basic drag and drop interface and are divided into to segments.
a. Audio Files (for normal CD Audio)
b. Computer FIles (additional files to be stored on the CD)
3. Once you have opened an Enhanced CD session, the next step is to select the files you want to play as normal CD Audio. Drag and drop these to the corresponding CD Audio section of your session.
4. Select the file(s) to be added as computer files (i.e. graphics. add. music, etc.) and drop them to the resepective section for computer files in your session.
5. If you wish the CD to play automatically when the CD is inserted into the computer, you must construct and add a Autorun.inf file. This is basically just a text file with a couple labels and some commands to run files. I will give an example of a basic Autorun.inf which will run a program called startme.exe.
******* Autorun.inf **********
[autorun]
open=startme.exe
******* End of file ***********
It is crucial that this file be named Autorun.inf in order for the computer to recognize that it must be run upon insertion of the disk without any user input. startme.exe can be substituted for another executable file or the file name of a graphics file or another file. If the substituted file is not an executable file (.exe, .com) whether or not it will autoplay will be dependent on that computers current file associations to tell it what program to use to open the file. The Autorun.inf file must be dropped into the computer files section.
6. Once you have your files placed in the proper sections of Audio files and Computer files and you have your Autorun.inf file added to the computer files section, you are ready to burn your first Enhanced CD. Burn the cd just as you would any regular Audio CD.
A few things to mention about Enhanced Audio CD's.
Enhanced audio CD's are a little different in the way they are burned. They are burned in two sessions. The first session is to burn the audio in Red Book Format. The second session is to burn the Computer files.
Once you get the hang of how to make a basic Enhanced Audio CD, you are ready to step up your presentation of your materials. To create custom menu's there are many programs available to you. 3D-Studio is a popular program that allows you to create a 3D world that users can navigate and experience the additional content visually. Flash Macromedia MX is another excellent program to use that you can add custom menu's and graphical interfaces with. You can download a free trial version of both pieces of software from Macromedia's Web Site
This should get your foot in the door to the world of Enhanced CD's. Once you know the basics, what you can do with this media is limited only by your imagination.
Labels: audio cd, autorun.inf, create, enhanced, format, music, play, roxio
posted by Chetan Palrecha @ 12:22 AM
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