[ The PC Guide | Systems and Components Reference Guide | CD-ROM Drives | Compact Disk Formats ]

The table below is a basic compatibility reference chart for the various CD formats. Each column in the chart is a CD format, and each row in the chart is for a specific type of CD drive. The table should be read by looking at the left-most column for a type of drive, and then looking across the row to see which formats the drive will usually support. This table is a guideline only, since any specific drive can have differing capabilities depending on what the manufacturer decides to allow it to support.

Notes:

• CD-R and CD-RW are included in the table, although they technically aren't "formats" of course--they write disks using the other formats listed. CD-R disks are supported by most drives as long as the CD-R created is in a format that the drive would read if it were a pressed CD. Some drives can be finicky about some types of CD-R disks, however. Each drive is rated as either "Single" or "Multi", with the former meaning only single-session disks are supported and the latter meaning multi-session disks are supported (which of course implies single-session is also supported).
• For CD-DA, each drive is specified as to whether it can play CD-DA or extract it in digital form.
• "Some" means that some of these drives support the format, and some don't.

Next: Recordable CD (CD-R)

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