CD Burning in Windows XP

There are many reasons why you might want to burn files to a CD in Windows XP, it's a good short term backup medium or it can be useful if you want to send files to a friend. You could send a USB key or use the internet, but the internet can be slow, especially if you want to use the equivalent capacity of a CD and USB keys are a lot more expensive

Windows XP has some basic burning capabilities built in, enough for us to copy some files to a CD that can then be sent to a friend.

We start with the Windows Desktop with a folder of files to copy onto the CD. There is a Windows Explorer window open at My Computer. You can see that the CD drive has an icon that includes the letters CD-R to show that it is a writable disc. You may also see CD-RW, which refers to discs that can be reused several times. Double click on this icon to see the contents of the drive - nothing for the moment.

Left-click on the folder on the Desktop and without releasing the button, move the mouse over the Explorer window. Let go of the button to copy the folder to a special temporary folder where Windows stores the files that will be copied onto the CD.

The folder appears in the Explorer window and it is slightly faded. This means that the files have not been copied yet.

In the left hand column are the CD writing tasks. If you change your mind about the files, left-click on the Delete temporary files option and start again.

When you are happy with the files, left-click on the option Write these files to CD and the CD Writing Wizard will appear.

Give the CD a name in the first text box. It is possible to tell the wizard to close automatically after it has finished. For the purposes of this demo we didn't set this option but it can be a timesaver. Click on Next and Windows will start writing the files to the disc.

It is a good idea not to do anything with the computer while this is happening. If the flow of information to the CD drive is interupted it can make the whole job fail, wasting the disc.

When it has finished the disc will automatically be ejected from the computer. The wizard will offer to write the same files to another disc, which is useful if you want to share the same set of files with several people. If not, click on Finish to close the wizard.