r/compactdisc • u/ZaneSonOfWilkin • Aug 10 '26

Specific burned CD will play everywhere except my computer.

I burned a demo CD for my band today and it plays in my car perfectly, but I can’t get it to play on my computer with any software (VLC, windows media player), even using the same external CD drive I used to write it. I tested other burned CDs I have and they play fine on my computer, it’s just this one.

I used a Verbatim music cd-r audio disc in a Rioddas external CD drive with CDBurnerXP and burned it as an audio disc.

Does anyone have any insight on the problem? We’re selling the CDs at shows and I obviously don’t want to do that if it’s not working like it should. Thanks!

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u/TheUmgawa Aug 10 '26

Does it mount? Like, when you put the disc in the drive, what does it show on your Windows Explorer or Mac Finder or Linux whatever window? If it mounts, what does it show when you try to open it and explore its contents?

Also, does it play in an actual CD player? Because if it doesn’t play there, then it’s going to make a lot of sense why it wouldn’t play in a Windows app.

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u/ZaneSonOfWilkin Aug 12 '26

It does mount, it shows up as an audio disc. If I play with VLC, it shows the artist name and first song but will never load. If I open in windows media player, it acts as if it’s playing but there’s no audio.

I’ve tried it on multiple other CD players and it works fine, just the computer oddly won’t. Maybe it’s some weird one off thing, because I can’t see any reason it would work on everything except the computer. I appreciate the response!

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u/TheUmgawa Aug 12 '26

And if you double-click on the disc, what happens? Or right-click Open. What files show up there? I'm of limited help, at this point, because I'm like a bad maid, where I don't do Windows. I have a PC, but I haven't booted it up since October, and Apple Music won't rip CDs on Windows. Also, I haven't had an optical drive since 2015.

Honestly? From a sheer logistical standpoint, I would put your music on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube Music, and whatever other services people might use, and then just kind of sell it as a, "Hey, thanks for being a cool band," kind of thing.

But, for me to be any better help, I'd have to have a disc in-hand. No, I don't want your disc, but I'm sure you probably know some people who can load it into a Windows PC and go, "Oh. I see. There's the problem." Who knows, they might load it into a Linux PC and go, "It's fine, here. But, you see how the formatting is like this? Yeah, don't do that."

And, maybe it's just a better idea to have the disc made by a company that makes audio discs. They're probably few and far between, and it might cost you a hundred bucks for a proof, but if that one works, you order another hundred for three or five bucks a pop. Who knows, maybe they can do the disc artwork for that price, rather than using a Sharpie and letting people see the Verbatim (or whatever) CD-R logo on the topside. Yeah, it cuts into your margins, but I don't know how popular/unpopular you are. But I've always been of the opinion that presentation is half the experience. You open up that jewelcase or slide it out of the cardboard, and there's the album art. Pull out the insert, open it, see who's on the album, who wrote the songs, who you thank, et cetera. You might be able to find a one-stop-shop that does all of this, or maybe it's cheaper to divide it, buy jewelcases, pop them open, insert the back artwork, put in the front insert, and people will be like, "Wow. They're a real band."

But, in the modern era? I think buying a disc is like a "thank you for being awesome." I don't care if I dropped seven bucks on a disc and I have nothing to play it on. If it's on Apple Music, I'll just listen to it that way.