If anyone has any advise I could use some help.

At our church we just started to make CDs. We bought a CD recorder but it only makes the masters in the WAV format. I don't mind but some of the services run longer than 80 minutes so it would take more than one CD. It is very inconvenient to try and swap them in mid service.

I would then convert the tracks into MP3 using ITunes. Before using ITunes several people told me that they could not play the CDs. I am not sure if they could not play tracks that were in the MP3 format or if they could not play them when I used Windows to burn the new CDs.

We went out and bought another recorder that makes the masters in the MP3 format but unfortunately I can not move the tracks over to ITunes. Do to the prior problem of people not being able to play the CDs I am a bit concerned if I use another program to make copies. Another problem for me is that we have three services a week. When they are in the MP3 format I can put all three services on to one CD.

I need some way to put the tracks from 3 CDs on to my computer and then create a new CD for the congregation members.
If anyone has any suggestions I would really appreciate it.

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I'm willing to say with confidence that the problem with some people not being able to play back the CDs was because they were in MP3 format; not all stereos (car or otherwise) support this format. On the other hand, computers and some DVD players do - maybe you can suggest they try to play the CDs on that?

Personally, I use Nero for all my burning and converting (re-encoding) needs. I find the user interface of Nero pretty simple, and the built-in audio editor is simple enough to learn to use and bring together different tracks. Can't help much with the iTunes stuff, because I've avoided it all together.

As for the CD-Rs not being greater than 80 minutes, I'm afraid there is not much else that can be done besides putting on MP3 tracks. It's sucks big time.

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Thanks for the info AADP.
I am fairly certain most of the people only had cd players not MP3 players but I did not see what they had.

I have not heard of Nero. I only used ITunes because someone suggested it to me and said it was free.

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there is alot of burning software that is free just goto www.download.com and search. As far as itunes, if i remember correctly that will only be played with a quicktime player (its by apple) special encoding on them.

Also after you convert to mp.3 try burning as data and not a music cd 😉

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If you're making a MP3 playable CD, burn as DATA.
If you're making a music playable CD, burn as MUSIC.

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As of now I have 3 mp3 CD masters every week. This is because the recorder formats the existing master Cd if I turn the system off or eject the CD.
So before I can make a CD to someone else I need to save the 3 CDs to my computer before I burn the new one. Because of this I need a place to store them. Do I just make a file anyplace and dump them there before I burn a Data CD? Then use the Windows software to burn the new CD?

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Since I switched to using ITunes the only ones that complained about not being about to play the CDs were people that I knew did not have an mp3 player. I am not married to that program. I do like how easy it is to use.
When I stick a WAV formated CD into my drive it asks if I want to convert it to MP3. (I can set it up to just do so and not ask me any more.)
I then go to the ITune program and and the date, author, title and edit the number of tracks. I really like how ITunes does this as it remembers and pulls in my last info if I ask it to. This saves a lot of typing for me. And over the course of a week I may have 60-70 tracks of info to edit.

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After listening to your comments (and the ones from another forum, it looks like I will have to use DVD's, record the masters in WAV and then convert to MP3 so as to get the whole week onto one CD.

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Tried the dvd. Neither of our machines recognized the disk.

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When you're burning in "MP3" format using iTunes, all it's doing is throwing MP3 files onto the CD (just another format of audio file), and formatting the CD in a way that special (usually newer) CD players can read. Most CD players will say something on them about being able to read MP3 CDs. That being said, if many of your services are 80+ minutes long, maybe CDs aren't the best bet? If you wanted to get really high-tech, you could always offer them as podcasts/just host the MP3 downloads on the church website, if applicable.

Honestly, I'm fairly high-tech and I don't have a CD player that reads MP3 CDs. Your best bets are to simply burn it as a standard audio CD, burn it to two CDs, or find alternate means of distribution.