Premastering

Premastering is the stage of production in which the data is organized as it will be on the final CD-ROM disc. The primary activity is building the logical structure that allows your application to locate and retrieve data from the disc. Premastering involves the following steps:

Physically interleave audio and images as required by your application

Build the logical structure required by the file system/operating system

Build the final disc image

Block the data to mastering facility requirements

Store the data on a medium acceptable to the mastering facility

Note:

Windows with Multimedia doesn't currently directly support interleaving data (such as audio and images) on a disc. You can, however, use interleaving if your application requires it for performance reasons and can handle the de-interleaving. If interleaving is required, it is important that the facility premastering your disc understands and can accommodate your application's interleave format.

If you decide to do your own CD-ROM premastering, the equipment required can cost $40,000 or more. Companies such as 3M sell premastering systems to produce an exact disc image of your data. This image can be stored on optical disc, DAT, or 9-track tape, and sent off to a mastering plant for final production.

If you don't want to invest in the equipment, many companies are available to do the work for you. Contact them directly for information on the range of services they offer, the cost, and the preferred transfer medium—usually 9-track tape, DAT, or some form of optical media such as WORM (Write Once, Read Many).