Why can't I copy music files from PC onto CD?

[iloverhubarb]

Oh god surely this should be simple.
Kind mumsnetter has already explained how to copy photos from PC onto CD-R. It worked, thought I had it all sussed.
So, I followed same process to copy music files, either MPEG-3 or MPEG-4
ie I copied files to the D:\ drive. Once they were there, I burned them to the disc.
Just tried playing the disc, speaker nearly blew, just got a horrible noise/crackle. So something happened but it certainly hasn't worked.
Can anyone help? PC bought in about 2005, I'm using burning SW included then, and CD player is even older, but it plays music which a friend has recorded onto same format CD for us no problem at all.

Thank you very much if you can shed any light.

[BadgersPaws]

You've probably made a data CD and not an audio CD. So the music is on there, but it's written in a format for a computer to understand (e.g. MP3) rather than a stereo.

Pop a normal audio CD into your computer and look at it using Windows Explorer, then repeat with the CD you've just made. You should see a difference. The music CD might show a few files but not with MP3 extensions, your CD will probably show up the MP3 files.

So you need to convert the music from Mp3 format into something that a CD player understands. And how to do this will differ according to what software you use.

iTunes can do this very easily, instructions are here: //support.apple.com/kb/ta38263

Other software can no doubt do it too, it's not that tricky a task. You'll want to go looking for options regarding burning an audio CD.

It's worth pointing out here, in case this is what you are doing, that this is not an ideal way to copy a CD. Music in MP3 format is what is known as "lossy", it's not perfect. When the computer records the CD it kind of says "OK, the music is this, but if I make it like that the files will be smaller and your ears won't be good enough to notice the difference". So if you then copy that music out to a CD then it's not quite as good as the original CD. There are ways to make a perfect copy of a CD, and again that varies according to what software you use.

[iloverhubarb]

Thanks so much BadgersPaws, I'm nearly there now. You were quite right that I wasn't making an audio file - have now successfully copied a couple of tunes from an itunes playlist and they play on the CD player.

Remaining problem. Friend has made recording of his band, and emailed it to us. We've copied to our music folder (it's an Mpeg-4 file), and it plays fine on the PC - also copied into an itunes playlist, it plays either way. But when I try to burn this file to the CD in same way as the others, I get a message 'can't locate the file'. It tells me to play it so that itunes can locate. I do, it plays, but I just get the same error message. Any ideas?

Very grateful for your patient explanation. much appreciated

[BadgersPaws]

How did you copy the file to the music folder?

And it plays perfectly happy within iTunes?

Within iTunes right click on a song that you've burned to CD without a problem and then right click on this problematic song. Select Get Info for both and what is the value shown for "where" for both files?

[iloverhubarb]

ok I'm there now. Get info showed problem file in mymusic folder and not below this in itunes folder.

Several copies are sitting in itunes from previous attempts to copy across, but I won't try to understand.

Anyway copied file again into itunes library then across into playlist and now it finds it and burns. So thanks again for handholding.

[BadgersPaws]

You may very well not be doing this but...

When you say you "copied file again into itunes library" never just drop the file into c:\somethingorother\mymusic\somethingelse using Windows Explorer. Always open up iTunes and drag the music into the iTunes Window. That will make sure that iTunes correctly adds the music to the library and can find and play it without trouble.