Can you add further material to a partially used disc?

don't know about DVD, but CD you can, if you write it in multiple session format. if it's a music CD, however, it probaby won't play in anything but a computer drive.

Can you add further material to a partially used disc?
Are some discs playable only on computer drives? I would like to use them in a CD Walkman, for instance.

There's no guarantee. Just try it, it's hit or miss.

same with DVDs. i've made one that plays on some players, but not on others.

Re: Can you add further material to a partially used disc?

As they said...
Depends on the player.
Some players will play them some won't.
I have found that the older the drive the more tolerant to CD-Rs they seem to be. Modern ones unless they're specifically designed to do so seem to have problems because their tolerances are so much tighter in an effort to cut costs.

Can you add further material to a partially used disc?
Good Lord, Heliotrope! Your answer sounded exactly like an op-ed article I just finished reading on medical insurance - we're getting squeezed in every direction - narrower and narrower tolerances, - out go the misfits - if it doesn't match perfectly, fuggedaboudit!

Anyway, my first concern is making the backup discs. Then I can really start digging into making my own music collection and putting my paintings and photos on disc. That will be fun (and a lot of mental challenge; I'm not basically very tech-y) and I'm really looking forward to it.

While there is a limit to the amount of data any disk, optical or otherwise, can store, untill that limit is reached and a writable disk is full, additional data may be added to the disk up to its capacity so long as the disk is not "closed" or "finalized". Frequently, a disk which has not been closed/finalized will not function to expectation when run on any drive other than the drive which burned it. Once closed/finalized, the disk should (but not necessarilly will) be recognized by and function satisfactorily on any drive supporting the format protocol of the disk in question. Many non-computer optical disc drives (game consoles, stand-alone CD/DVD players/burners, Walkman-type devices, etc.) will have difficulties - even fail to recognize - disks incorporating mixed content, such as music files, graphics files, and/or text files.

Some stand-alone optical disk devices will have a "preference" of sorts for a particular brand of optical media, many will have problems with "bargain brands", RW media, whether CD or DVD, often fails to perform satisfactorily in stand-alone devices, and some stand-alone DVD devices will have a "preference" for either DVD +R or DVD -R, performing more reliably, sometimes only, with one or the other type of media. Some older DVD devices may have difficulty with, even fail to recognize, dual-layer media.

About the only solution is a combination of research and experimentation; you can get a fair idea of whats up with various types and brands of media and devices by chasing down reviews. In the end, what comes down to what works for you, with your gear and circumstances, is what works for you, given your gear and circumstances; you've pretty much gotta do the physical experimentation yourself to find out what that might be.

I wouldn't bother, experience has taught me that there is a high chance (if you click the wrong button) that the TOC (Table of Contents) will be over written and you could loose any data stored prior to the new additions. To keep things safe, burn once, close seasion, store disk. They are so cheap now that theres no point doing otherwise.