2006-09-06 23:27:16 · 3 answers · asked by bharatk 1 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Other - Science
Because you ACTUALLY burn the layer of the disk using the laser beam of the CD. You burn a hole to make a zero, and you do not burn the hole to make a 1.
(addition: the layer is "soft" material. The laser burns a round hole for every bit to be set to 0. The new blue laser has a smaller wavelength, and hence can burn 4 times as many holes as the conventional red. You can see them using a microscope.)
2006-09-06 23:30:52 · answer #1 · answered by just "JR" 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
interestingly, in French people say "to engrave a CD", and that's really wrong, because no engraving takes place.
in R only CDs or DVDs, holes are indeed marked (rather than burned).
but in RW (rewriteable) discs, the laser changes the state of the matter in the local area, and no burning takes place.
personally I prefer to say "to record", which has the advantage of remaining valid whatever the technology ;-)
2006-09-07 08:30:10 · answer #2 · answered by AntoineBachmann 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I thought they were actually "bumps" and "grooves" in the cd.
Anyways, check out this site it tells you all about the process. Quite interesting.
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/cd-burner1.htm
2006-09-07 06:35:28 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋