I don't think the test prior to burn has anything to do with checking for bad media. I think it's a timing test to see if the overall system can feed data to the CD drive fast enough to keep the buffer filled. A data underrun (CD runs out of buffered data) can screw up the burn. I think the only way to catch bad media is to read-check the new CD. I had an earlier version of Adaptec Easy CD creator that had a "verify" function. I can't find it in the newer version that came with my lasted CD burner. Does anybody here know where it's hidden? I have Version 3.5c Jude