What do you Burn?

Sounds like a personal question but I am actually referring to a burning media, rather than any other substances (legal or illegal). Today I received my order from SVP of 150 blank CD-Rs and 50 blank DVD-R discs. Although I am going to focus solely on compact disc media for this post. For as long as I can remember, I have always purchased TDK discs as my preferred choice. Although in recent months I have perhaps deviated from the righteous path. Taking blank Sony discs home from work to build discs for clients, perish the thought. However, it was always a case of making do with what was available. Let me take you back some ten years when I first built a computer with CD writing capability. At first, like most people I experimented with discs from Staples, which were an inferior brand. However my Dad bought me a pack of both CD-R and CD-RW discs. I ended up having theses and using them for a while, even up to the start of University in 2000. However, it was when I bought my Mesh and got more regular Internet access, that I decided on trying a box of ten CDs (with cases in those days) from Dabs. It changed my buying habits forever and I have never looked back.

In July 2002, (the same time I started blogging over at T3G:2 ) I purchased a TDK Cyclone CD Writer drive, a match made in heaven. My friends thought I was crazy to spend up to 50p for a disc when most of them bought unbranded (or cheaper label) discs for a quarter of the price. This was not a major issue for me. The main issue was reliability and the ability for my audio CDs to last forever. I have never had a disc turn into a coaster in the three years I have been using the combination of disc and writer, more so in my new machine. So a few weeks ago, for the first time in perhaps as much as eighteen months, I had to order some fresh plastic. For too long I had been waited to find the odd blank CD lying around somewhere. It was time to order some more and to my surprise, the discs were relatively cheap. Well much cheaper than in my peak burning period, when I would write at least two, if not three CDs every week. However there was a problem. SVP were out of stock, but I filled out a form to be notified by e-mail when they had some back in stock. This was on a Sunday morning a few weeks ago, (10th I believe). Late on Friday afternoon last week (15th) I received the e-mail I had been waiting for, placing my order on that same evening and received my order in full this afternoon in the office. Not bad, considering it is the final week before Christmas. What to burn first? Well there is so many possibilities. Firstly that all important update to the Christmas album, and then let us not forget archiving all my mp3s albums onto DVD, then all my video clips and music videos. The list of "My Stuff" is endless, as you can imagine. At least I have somewhere organised to place all theses discs now, if they end up in the car or in my room.