YAMAHA Corporation, one of the first producers of high speed CD ReWritable drives, will deliver their Compact CD-Recorder CRW70 with the revolutionary Audio Master Quality Recording function for noticeably improved sound quality when recording audio data. This function is already realised in the CRW3200 Series. Users which already bought a CRW70 can upgrade their drives free of charge by downloading the newest Firmware from www.yamaha-it.de.

How does Audio Master work?

Audio CDs burned using standard methods display considerably higher jitter values than CDs which are pressed. The Audio Master feature reduces the jitter values by up to 30% in order to achieve the best possible sound quality on audio tracks on CD-R disks. This results in significant audible clarity in the treble and central range, full bass reproduction and convincing interpretation in terms of space. The CRW70 has its own audio CD burn mode specially for audio CDs.

What is jitter?
A CD-R/RW drive writes music data on a CD in the form of pits and lands. The digital information in the pits and lands is decoded by the scanning unit in the CD-player and played. Various influential factors (e.g. component tolerances, ripple voltage, electromagnetic fields) however prevent the signals of the pits and lands from reaching the CD-player's scanning unit at exactly the right time. This delay is referred to as "jitter".

The following example should illustrate this point: A train is due to depart at exactly 7.30 a.m. It could however leave at 7.29 a.m. or 7.31 a.m. This tolerance range is what is referred to as jitter.

High jitter values are responsible for inaccurate sound positioning, poor bass frequency and unclear sound.

The Yamaha solution
With the Audio Master Quality function in the CRW70, YAMAHA has succeeded in dramatically reducing the jitter value. When the CRW70 is in Audio Master mode, it writes longer pits and lands than when in standard burn mode. Thanks to the variable linear speed, the CD-player reads the CD generated using Audio Master at the same speed although the pits and lands are considerably longer. This means that the percentage of jitter is reduced dramatically in the recording. The memory capacity of a 650 MB or 700 MB medium is thus detector receives more information per pit or land. The jitter factor remains under 20ns, i.e. very low, or reduced by up to 30%. Accordingly, it is easier for the CD-player to read information recorded using Audio Master Quality Recording in the CRW70 with the result that the fault correction feature only needs to be activated extremely seldom. This also applies for older CD-players and in car hi-fi systems. The result: A CD recorded using Audio Master Quality Recording is distinguished by its audibly better sound than an audio CD burned as standard at 24x speed using drives made by other manufacturers and is easily comparable to a pressed audio CD.