CD drives for burning audio disks

[catcando]

I remember a Yamaha drive that burned the audio onto a CD in such a way, that if the audio was 500MB, that the drive spread it out over the 700MB available for the disk. I think it recorded at a constant speed, rather than the increasing speed, as normal, maybe the CRW-F1. They are no longer available, so what is the best CD drive for burning audio disks?
I am sure someone knows of the modern equivalent to the Yamaha.
Also, as both a friend and I must be thick, as neither of us can get EAC working properly, even after reading a couple of the setup guides, if someone has an idiots guide they would like to provide, it would be much appreciated.
Thanks

[browellm]

I don't see the point of spreading it across the disc. It doesn't even sound like Red Book standard.

[Alexxus]

What difference does it make whether it's spread on the entire surface or not? I've burnt audio CDs on regular computer grade CD writers ever since they became available and never had any problem with it. So far I have not encountered a CD player that will not play them.

What problems did you have with EAC? I found it quite intuitive. The early versions required a bit of work to calibrate the CD reader/writer, but nowadays it's straightforward, it does it's own calibrating and then you pop in the CD and chose the sort of rip you want. What did not work for you?

[googleborg]

Just use any dvd burner drive you can pick up for £10-20 or so, pioneer, sony, asus - some are even the same ones just re-badged and you can fiddle the firmwares on 'em. The yamaha iirc burnt wider pits/lands, a totally useless 'audio master' feature as far as I can tell, very much a USP thing, 'constant speed' probably refers to 'constant angular velocity' (the disc spins at one speed) or perhaps constant linear velocity (the same amount of disc surface passes over the lens regardless of the position being read/written). I think. You can happily burn discs at full throttle, super low burning speeds are a throwback to the old days where more often than not the CD could burn wrong because all the computers were crap, hence plextor CD burners (and that yammyhar one) with 8MB caches and that, now drives have 1 or 2MB and I've not made a single coaster (dead CD/DVD good only for putting cups of tea on) for years.

Likewise all the CD players i've used have accepted my burnt CDs, CDRW is another matter though and apparently much less friendly.

EAC is quite simple to use yes, but it does have extensive options to fiddle with, what are you getting stuck on exactly?

[Chumpy]

I agree that everything I have tried is fine, though as intimated above, e.g. some CDRWs are not 'liked' by e.g. some Naim CDPs.

[MrSammy]

I remember a Yamaha drive that burned the audio onto a CD in such a way, that if the audio was 500MB, that the drive spread it out over the 700MB available for the disk. I think it recorded at a constant speed, rather than the increasing speed, as normal, maybe the CRW-F1. They are no longer available, so what is the best CD drive for burning audio disks?
I am sure someone knows of the modern equivalent to the Yamaha.
Also, as both a friend and I must be thick, as neither of us can get EAC working properly, even after reading a couple of the setup guides, if someone has an idiots guide they would like to provide, it would be much appreciated.
Thanks

The Yamaha's were very good at overburning and making non Red Book standard CDs that were longer than 70 minutes of Audio. A lot of people used to copy protected CDs that had systems based on dodgy tracks that a normal writer could not burn.