CD/DVD Labelling

I print a photo label directly on the CD/DVD with my old Epson 320 printer. I keep the printer around only to print CD/DVDs.
<Chas>

Like Charles I've got a printer I use just for CD labels, (and occasional other uses), the Epson 260. I've always found the stickons pretty crappy and unprofessional.

Use Lightscribe or the printers mentioned above. Labels can come off and do a lot of damage. I haven't send out discs in ages but still have a box of the same DVD boxes that Blockbuster use and had a basic cover sheet printed for when I used to send them out.

External USB or FireWire Lightscribe printers aren't expensive and well worth it if you need to print a lot of these puppies.

Ask your client?

I know if I was a client, I'd prefer my disc with no labelling, or stickons.

An inexpensive inkjet printer, like an Epson 260 or 280, is adequate for small volume labeling. It takes just over 2 minutes per disc, and you can only load one disc at a time. Dye based ink tends to smear, but Taiyo-Yuden "Watershield" discs will hold up to running hot water. The printer will hold 6pt type and print color photographs in a realistic fashion. AFIK, Epson has never sold a pigment-based consumer inkjet with CD printing capabilities in the US - a licensing problem as I recall.

I used round Avery labels since 1996 or so, and haven't found any cases where the recording or coating were compromised. They do tend to wrinkle with changes in humidity, and can potentially jam slot-feed players like in most cars. Mine were printed with a laserjet, which imparts a certain degree of water resistance.

Edward, my R1800 prints direct to CDs and DVDs (I use Taiyo Yuden). I don't know if you consider that a consumer printer. My R220 also prints to CD but it's a dye-based printer (although I run pigment inks through it).

The Epson Stylus Photo R220 is std CD/DVD label printer in our media office. Just install it on your computer and install the label design software that goes with it. Prints em one at a time and does it well.

There is a type of Cd/Dvd duplicator called Primera that has the printer built-in with the drives and the robot arm. The unit connects to a pc via usb and you run it with their job-scheduling software.

One the other end of the scale, if all you want is a 'bare bones' textual label ( 1 or 2 blocks of 4 or 5 lines of plain readable text ), then look up CASIO's line of CD/DVD labelers (they look like a Brother P-touch but with a long slot in the top where you slide the disk in). These have a little keypad where you key in you label info, save it as a template. You slide your disk into the slot on the top, select Print, and it neatly prints a thermal label. It uses a thermal print ribbon and does about 40 disks per ribbon. You can also connect it to a pc an drive it with the included software. UNFORTUNATELY, it does not come with a 120V power adapter, so if you use it a lot you are bound to burn out the EIGHT AA batteries it uses. So be prepared to use AA rechargeables on this one. But it does a decent job of printing plainly legible lines of text in blocks at the top and/or bottom of a CD or DVD.

If the Epson 1800 is a pigment-based printer, all well and good. It's obsolete, so I can't check the specifications. It's still a slow printer for onesies, which may be good enough for a wedding production.

Lightscribe printers require expensive discs, print in one color (brown) only, and are excruciatingly slow. They are not worthy of consideration. The burners are give-away items.

Thermal printers have nearly disappeared, and for good reason. They are expensive, the ribbons are expensive, and they are prone to skipping due to wrinkles in the ribbon. The media must be scrupulously clean (no fingerprints), even so, the printing is wax and rubs off easily. Even the best thermal printers hold no better than 8 pt type with any consistency. Everything I've said bad about the $4000 thermal printers holds doubly true for the $150 versions.

The Epson R1800 is a pigment based printer. It is physically similar to the R2400 and uses a variant of the K3 inkset. While not "obsolete" it has been discontinued and replaced by the R1900. It's quite speedy compared to my R220 for discs (and everything else). I wouldn't want to print 100 CDs on it, though as manually feeding the discs is slow.

You can also make photoshop templates to allow you to print to CD/DVD from PS rather than use the Epson label making software. Email me if you want what I use for the R220 or R1800.