Do a Google search for CD and DVD burning with Mac OS X or read magazine articles on the subject and you're sure to find references again and again to the expensive, commercial program, Toast. Certainly, Toast can accomplish most burning tasks but why spend $80 or more when Mac OS X's built-in programs and freeware programs can do the same tasks just as well. In this tutorial, I briefly explain how to burn media and data disks with free software for Mac OS X 10.5 and 10.4.

Before starting to burn data or media CDs and DVDs, you must, of course, purchase blank media, and it's important to know that the media you use makes a difference. For perfect burns every time, always use good quality CDs and DVDs. The extra money you may have to spend for quality media will actually save you money over cheap CDs or DVDs that end up as coasters. When buying blank media also consider the speed of your drive. Try to buy CDs and DVDs that are capable of burning at the fastest speed of your drive. Although you can always burn at a slower speed, and sometimes it might be advisable to do so, why not use your drive's full power.

Media CDs & DVDs

When you purchased your Mac, you probably also got Apple's iLife program. This suite of applications provides several options for burning your own media CDs and DVDs.

1. Audio CDs - Use iTunes. Set your iTunes preferences for audio or MP3 burning, select a playlist and click the Burn button. If you will be using the CDs on older CD players, it's probably best to burn the CDs at slower speeds (4x or lower).

2. Photo CDs - Use iPhoto. Highlight a photo album and select Burn Disc from the Share menu. If you don't own iPhoto, another free alternative is Kodak's EasyShare photo cataloging program.

3. DVD movie - You've created a great movie in iMovie and you want to burn it to a DVD. Export the movie to iDVD and either burn it directly to a DVD or save it as a disk image and burn the disk image to a DVD with Mac OS X's Disk Utility program.

Data CDs & DVDs

You've downloaded some great new freeware programs and created hundreds of new documents that you want to burn to CDs or DVDs. Here are some simple ways to back up all that data.

1. Finder burn - Insert a blank CD or DVD into your burner and drag and drop the files you want to burn onto the CD or DVD icon. Drag the icon to the Trash and Mac OS X will burn the data to the disk before ejecting it.

2. Burn folder - Create a Burn folder in the Finder and drag files into the folder. Click the Burn button on the burn folder's window and Mac OS X will burn copies of the original files to a CD or DVD.

3. Disk Utility - Copy all the files you want to burn to one folder and use Disk Utility to create a disk image of the folder. Burn the disk image to a CD or DVD with Disk Utility.

4. Freeware - Search MacUpdate for "burn" and you'll find several free disk burning programs. Two that I've used and like are Burn and LiquidCD.

As you can see, burning disks in Mac OS X (Leopard and Tiger) can be easy and inexpensive. So buy some good blank CDs and DVDs and burn away.