Short run CD duplicators?

Lee Brenkman

Lee Brenkman

Junior
Jan 13, 2011
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Oakland California USA
I just got this enquiry from the administrator of a NON PROFIT music school I work with about a CD duplicator.

"Let's see here...

I would expect an absolute maximum of 20 copies per run, probably closer to the 4-8 range most of the time.

I'm happy to hand folks a Sharpie to label the discs by hand.

This would be for class materials: some listening CD's, some data."

I only have experience with the Epson and Primera duplicators which would be over the top for their needs so I'm asking recommendations for units that could do maybe 5 to 10 copies at a time.

I have heard more than one complaint about the Microboards brand of duplicators but have no first hand experience of them either way.

Any suggestions?
 
Re: Short run CD duplicators?

Lee Brenkman said:
I just got this enquiry from the administrator of a NON PROFIT music school I work with about a CD duplicator.

"Let's see here...

I would expect an absolute maximum of 20 copies per run, probably closer to the 4-8 range most of the time.

I'm happy to hand folks a Sharpie to label the discs by hand.

This would be for class materials: some listening CD's, some data."

I only have experience with the Epson and Primera duplicators which would be over the top for their needs so I'm asking recommendations for units that could do maybe 5 to 10 copies at a time.

I have heard more than one complaint about the Microboards brand of duplicators but have no first hand experience of them either way.

Any suggestions?
Click to expand...

I'd skip the Microboards one as well. A church brought one to a festival I was providing for. The screen backlight was dead, it was hard to get the thing to actually route to the right input, and the construction was comparable to an EBay Chinese karaoke machine. Not a pro piece of gear.

Perhaps a surplus tower PC with some inexpensive burner drives is the ticket. There's probably free or cheap software to run it.
 
Re: Short run CD duplicators?

I've done quite a few short run DVD projects for my church. I have an older version of one of these from MegaLynx on Ebay: http://tinyurl.com/6rsgz4h. I've burned 1000+ DVDs so far with no problem. I buy high quality (usually Taiyo Yuden) DVD-R inkjet printable DVDs and use an Epson Artisan printer to print directly on the discs. I buy refillable ink cartridges for the printer. Buying good media makes a difference and the DVD-Rs seem more compatible than DVD+Rs even though everything claims to be compatible with both. There's no compatibility issue with CDs, but I would still buy the high quality media.

We had a Microboards live CD recorder. It was expensive and a piece of junk. It would freeze up regularly during a service.
 
Re: Short run CD duplicators?

Lee Brenkman said:
I just got this enquiry from the administrator of a NON PROFIT music school I work with about a CD duplicator.

"Let's see here...

I would expect an absolute maximum of 20 copies per run, probably closer to the 4-8 range most of the time.

I'm happy to hand folks a Sharpie to label the discs by hand.

This would be for class materials: some listening CD's, some data."

I only have experience with the Epson and Primera duplicators which would be over the top for their needs so I'm asking recommendations for units that could do maybe 5 to 10 copies at a time.

I have heard more than one complaint about the Microboards brand of duplicators but have no first hand experience of them either way.

Any suggestions?
Click to expand...

Forgive my answering your question with a question, but in the world of the Internet and IPods, who uses CDs anymore? Our church has stopped burning CDs altogether and does online distribution. As far as I've heard, no one misses the CDs. Can't your friend post practice assignments on a web page for students to download?
 
Re: Short run CD duplicators?

TJ Cornish said:
Forgive my answering your question with a question, but in the world of the Internet and IPods, who uses CDs anymore? Our church has stopped burning CDs altogether and does online distribution. As far as I've heard, no one misses the CDs. Can't your friend post practice assignments on a web page for students to download?
Click to expand...

If only it were this easy! Even after a technology is obsolete, it isn't dead to the general public (including older people, non-urbanites, etc) immediately, and legacy support is still needed. I can see CD's staying on through request for a few years, even if online is the preferred and primary distribution medium. Just look at how many rural seniors still drive old cars with cassette players, and expect to have missed sermons in that format.
 
Re: Short run CD duplicators?

TJ Cornish said:
Forgive my answering your question with a question, but in the world of the Internet and IPods, who uses CDs anymore? Our church has stopped burning CDs altogether and does online distribution. As far as I've heard, no one misses the CDs. Can't your friend post practice assignments on a web page for students to download?
Click to expand...


Well TJ, at this particular school there is a basic PA system in every classroom and the appropriate cables are available in the office for teachers and students to plug in their own peersonal CD players, iPods, computers or whatever into those systems.

BUT the school also has about a half dozen boom boxes which are in continual use by people who refuse to use any other source to play CDs or CASSETTES for their classes. When one of these POS devices breaks or stops reading CDs I pick up another garage sale cheapie to replace it. I've grown tired of trying to "educate" these "educators" on "new" technology.

CDs are still a preferred distribution method for getting materials to students, at least at this school.
 
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