I remember when writing discs for Sony's PS1 and Sega's Dreamcast, some folks (myself included) had to use CDRW media, and could only use it the first burn. Erase & rewrite would make it unreadable in the systems, just like normal CD-R media often was. Some CD-R media with the darker blue dye worked marginally better than the typical cheap green dye discs as well.

sunkindly wrote on 2025-10-25, 17:29:

I recently acquired an NEC CDR-80 from 1988 and a Matsushita CR-523-B from 1992. They're both caddy drives.

They read a Myst CD just fine but when it comes to burned discs they instantly get a read error.

Anyone know of a particular format / disc that these early drives prefer? I've tried ISO9660 at 1x and 2x as well as naming the volume something short with Verbatim and Sony CD-Rs but no luck.

Look for CD-Rs that have a darker green / blue dye than others. Specifically there's some distinction in the dye that I haven't been aware of until now where there are two types, theres Phthalocyanine and Cyanine. The latter is more compatible with older players, while the former is longer lasting and apparently better for faster writers & drives.
A good article: https://www.cdrom2go.com/blog/cd-r-dye-colors-explained

My advice is to look for Taiyo Yuden discs, which I found following advice on this forum and they've worked great with pretty much all older players - not as good as pressed CDs but far more compatible than all my other CD-R media. I went for some cheap silver ones and regret that somewhat, wish I'd got branded or inkjet printable type ones because the CD-R dye scratches off easily from the top so the discs don't hold up well.

It's of course more complicated than that because apparently TY don't make media anymore and haven't since 2015:

Apparently CMC in Taiwan now make the discs that are called Taiyo Yuden, they may not be as good? CMC are the only game left in town for newly produced discs though, so it might be better to look for old stock.
The distinction for older player compatibility seems to be Cyanine & darker dye colour. It might also be worth looking at Azo discs which I'm keen to try out, which are also probably CMC if newly produced 😒: Re: Old CD-ROM drives and CD-Rs & Re: Old CD-ROM drives and CD-Rs - try Taiyo media

I'm going to pick up some of the recommended disc types on here: https://www.cdmediaworld.com/hardware/cdrom/cd_quality.shtml
I have one of the TDK CD-R74 discs and it's a dark blue and apparently cyanine dye. Since people have less use for CD-Rs these days you can pick up what were once premium CD-Rs sold as unused old stock fairly cheaply.

Thanks for the info y'all. Looks like I have some dedicated research / reading to do through those threads and that website. Pretty interesting stuff so far, seems like quite the rabbit hole that I hadn't considered existed!

I have a 4x Mitsumi that reads Verbatim CD-R discs. Has a silver/light green colour underneath.

IME CD-Rs work much more reliably on older drives than CD-RWs, at least for newer media. had a pack of vintage Yamaha CD-RWs from 1998 and all of my older drives (pre~1992) would read them fine, albeit veeery slowly after the first rewrite. my new pack of Verbatim CD-RWs are very hit or miss, and any non-CDRW drive refuses to read them after the first rewrite. seems like a YMMV situation. ive personally switched to using DVD-R drives in my systems if i anticipate using discs; just seems more consistent to me with less fiddling. also do note that the lasers in the drives get weak after 30+ years, so you may need to adjust a potentiometer for it to read those discs

The dyes used in old cdr disks had a stronger opacity on phase change, but took longer to accomplish it, often needing writing no faster than 4x speeds.

THESE DAYS the dyes are less opaque, but transition at a MINIMUM write speed of 4x.

The best discs I ever used were blue bottom verbatim discs.

Written at 1x, things could be read in even the crankiest drives.

The old blue bottom discs were beautiful sapphire blue.

wierd_w wrote on 2025-10-30, 02:46:

The best discs I ever used were blue bottom verbatim discs. […]
Show full quote

The best discs I ever used were blue bottom verbatim discs.

Written at 1x, things could be read in even the crankiest drives.

The old blue bottom discs were beautiful sapphire blue.

I've heard nothing but good things about the original deep blue AZO discs, seems like the best ones would be the 74min track pitch variant but I don't think there's many of those around anymore

Strangely, my cheapest and nastiest discs (I remember, they were Fornet) worked best in random CD players, they were 74 min though. There are a few drives with features that can lenthen or shorten the recording ... Plextor Gigarec on:
Plextor Premium
Plextor Premium II
Plextor PX-W5224A
At x0.9, it can make an 80min into a 72min
They are NOT CHEAP

Matth79 wrote on 2025-10-30, 13:54:

Strangely, my cheapest and nastiest discs (I remember, they were Fornet) worked best in random CD players, they were 74 min thou […]
Show full quote

Strangely, my cheapest and nastiest discs (I remember, they were Fornet) worked best in random CD players, they were 74 min though. There are a few drives with features that can lenthen or shorten the recording ... Plextor Gigarec on:
Plextor Premium
Plextor Premium II
Plextor PX-W5224A
At x0.9, it can make an 80min into a 72min
They are NOT CHEAP

Gigarec alters the data pit length it would probably make things worse since on an 80min CD burned to 74min both the track pitch and pit length would be out of spec