What kind of Mac is recommended?
(1999/10/04) If you’re about to buy a computer system and are seriously thinking about buying a CD-R, here are some things to keep in mind. (See the next section if you’re interested in Mac hardware instead of an IBM PC.) CPU: buy a mid-range Pentium-class machine or better. In general it’s a good idea to buy a fast machine, since systems tend to be outdated after a year and obsolete after three or four. A ‘486 is a *minimum* configuration for a CD-R system; a Pentium gives you some breathing room. Pentium II and above is more power than you need, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Motherboard: for SCSI, anything with PCI slots is fine. For IDE, anything above UDMA/33 is overkill. See section (5-15) for configuration notes and a warning about certain bus-mastering drivers. SCSI: the SCSI interface remains a popular choice for CD recorders and CD-ROM drives, though improvements like UDMA/133 are changing the way people build high-end computers. Whether it’s built into the motherboa
Any Mac of Quadra 700 or higher capability with a reasonably fast disk should be suitable for 2x writing. All PowerMac-class machines, and probably most Mac clones, should work fine. PowerBook users should proceed with caution on machines earlier than the 3400 and G3 models. Any of the SCSI recorders should work. Verify with the vendor of the software you plan to use that the drive you have in mind is supported. Don’t try to use an IDE drive on the Mac (some Macs have internal IDE hard drives, but none of the software supports a CD recorder connected to that interface). Block-by-block copies are the best way to create discs. If your pre- mastering software has to assemble files and build an ISO filesystem on the fly, you will need a high-end PowerMac. The above hardware may still be suitable for on-the-fly mastering, but as a general case, building a prototype image to a disk or disk partition will be safer. Using the “simulated cut” feature available on Toast and other software is als
