Burning CDs and DVDs
If your Mac has a CD-RW drive or an Apple SuperDrive in it, you’ve got yourself the world’s most convenient and elegant backup system. It’s just like having a floppy disk drive, really—except that a blank CD holds at least 450 times as many files, and a blank DVD holds about 3,350 times as many!
You can buy blank CDs very inexpensively in bulk ($30 for 100 discs, for example) via the Web. (To find the best prices, visit http://www.shopper.com or http://www.buy.com and search for blank CD-R.) Blank DVDs are much more expensive, but not ridiculously so, considering their capacity. At this writing, the Apple Web site, for example, sells them at $30 for five—and prices are sure to come down.
To use one for backup, transporting files, or mailing files, insert a blank CD-R, CD-RW, or DVD-R disc into your Mac. (If you have a slot-loading Mac, simply slip the disc into the slot. If your Mac has a sliding CD/DVD tray instead, open it first by pressing the button on the tray, or—if you have an Eject key in the upper-right corner of your keyboard—pressing it for about one second.)
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