How do I best print artwork to blank CD?

February 15, 2009 10:29 AM

What are my options for printing album artwork direct to CD without dropping a boatload of cash.

CDs are my preferred way of listening to music, but I'm starting to drown in a sea of blank CDs with scribblings in Sharpie. I recently joined emusic and figured it'd be cool to put the album jpeg that comes with the download on the CD. Research so far has uncovered relatively limited options:

1) Lightscribe - not what I'm looking for: want color
2) Epson Stylus inkjet printers - this'd do I guess, but I'm not overjoyed at buying such a huge contraption to print such a small surface. And OMG their ink is expensive.
3) Printing CD labels and sticking them on - not thrilled about this option either as my car CD changer doesn't play well with discs of increased thickness.

So I guess I'm looking for a small printer that'll print direct to CD (I already use inkjet CDs as their surfaces are more durable than the shiny ones). I'm imagining that if this works out, I'd consider doing it on 100+ CDs, so cost and print speed are also variables to consider (I thought maybe printing a 1"x 1" image rather than the whole disc could be a solution).

I'm running dual boot Ubuntu and XP Pro on a Thinkpad X40 if it makes any difference.

This question has been asked before 2 years ago, so I'm checking in for up to date suggestions.

posted by forallmankind to computers & internet (8 comments total)

You can also use a variety of Canon printers for CD printing: the wrinkle is that Epson holds the US patent, so you'll need to remove a detachable panel, buy a CD tray, and fiddle with the region settings on the printer. The dedicated printer option ain't cheap.
posted by holgate at 10:53 AM on February 15

A printer that is designed for printing onto CDs will run you a thousand bucks. It is not recommended to paste stickers onto CDs with the album art printed on them because it can damage some drives.
posted by who else at 10:57 AM on February 15

I have the Epson r260 which does this fine as well as being an excellent photo printer. Buying generic inks rather than the vastly overpriced Epson consumables makes it hurt a lot less too.
posted by merocet at 11:04 AM on February 15

I have the Epson RX700 that I paid less than $200 for I think and I love it - I bought it almost primarily because it will print directly on CDs. I, too, use eMusic and do exactly what you've suggested with the album art all the time.

I see that the RX700 has been discontinued and replaced with the RX680 which is being offered at a steal ($109 w/rebate) through the Epson website, except that it is out of stock right now. Maybe you can find one elsewhere.

Yes, the cartridges are pricey (whose aren't?!) but I find that they last a fair amount of time.
posted by ourroute at 12:00 PM on February 15

I thought most cheap inkjet printers could print onto CDs/DVDs these days - my dad had a el cheapo $70 color inkjet photo printer that had a little attachment that allowed printing onto discs, but he ditched it for a black and white laser so I couldn't tell you the model. You have to get inkjet printable media (the type that has a sort of rough white coating on the top side), but they don't cost any more than regular media and are available anywhere writable optical discs are sold, even drugstores.
posted by DecemberBoy at 12:16 PM on February 15

Oh, and having bought CDs from DIY CD-R record labels (mostly experimental/noise), they all seem to use the stick-on labels, so that appears to be the standard for that segment of writable media users, anyway.
posted by DecemberBoy at 12:21 PM on February 15

I bought an RX700 a while back just to print on discs; got at least 200 discs done before I needed to buy ink, but my labels were designed to be ink-saving: at least 40% white and the other colors pale and sometimes lowered opacity. So, way less than a buck a disc… If I only needed text on the disks, well, MUCH better.

I did them in a batch, and none since, so I don't know if ink drying out would be an issue if I only did a few discs every few weeks. But I also have a Stylus 88 from last year and the ink-drying issue seems not to effect it, so it seems like Epson's into fixing things, FWIW.
posted by dpcoffin at 1:59 PM on February 15

thanks for all the suggestions - knowing that there's a patent issue is a great help understanding why these devices are so thin on the ground.
posted by forallmankind at 10:22 AM on February 21