Computer Column.(Column)

Byline: Craig Crossman

Oct. 24--Making your own CDs and DVDs with a computer is old news. But making them look as good as the ones you buy is another story. In lieu of the ugly marker, which we used to scrawl upon the disc its contents came the CD label. These are first inserted into a printer and afterwards are stuck directly onto the disc. This rather inelegant solution is rife with problems. If you don't stick them centered exactly in place, what you wind up with is a lopsided mess that can actually cause the disc to malfunction as it spins. Plus it just looks bad.

To help solve this problem, some printer models have appeared that let you print directly onto the disc using CDs and DVDs that have a printable surface. And while these do a really decent job and can produce discs that rival the appearances of professionally mastered media, they can be somewhat difficult to use. Most require a special insert into which you mount the disc and require some extra setting up before you can get to the matter of printing, which can become tedious, especially when you want to print more than one.

And while the attempt to make a paper printer that's capable of printing CDs is an admirable one, it's an afterthought at best. Why not invent a CD printer that's specifically designed to print CDs and DVDs from the start. Dymo has.

Dymo is introducing a brand new type of printer that's made to print onto printable optical media. The Dymo DiscPainter is a little desktop USB 2.0 CD/DVD printer that will produce a full-color, 600 DPI image in about one minute. 1200 DPI images can be completed in around three. These faster printing speeds are realized in how the DiscPainter prints. Instead of the typical back and forth movement used by a conventional paper printer, the DiscPainter uses Dymo's new RadialPrint that literally spins the disc as it prints onto it.

The DiscPainter is capable of printing to matte or glossy printable discs and it can print those images on the entire printable face of the disc, from the outer edge to the inner hub. Users can also select from nine ink density settings.

To print a disc, simply insert the disk and as you see it spin through the clear ...