Can CD32 playback backup CDs?

[chris]

Lenses of that era have trouble with CD-Rs, and the age of it at this point doesn't help either.

More importantly, CR-RWs have different optical properties and old drives generally can't read them at all.  No such problems with CD-Rs that I'm aware of.

Note the CD³² needs a trademark file written to the disc.  I don't think this is relevant if you're writing an ISO (as it should form part of the image), but if you're trying to create your own bootable CDs then you need to add it (it's on the DevCD 2.1, and MakeCD has the options for adding the file correctly)

[freqmax]

I would only rely on factory CDs to work on older drives. CD-R /RW etc.. is a patchwork.

[Matt_H]

More importantly, CR-RWs have different optical properties and old drives generally can't read them at all.  No such problems with CD-Rs that I'm aware of.

Yes, CD-RWs are in the "almost certainly not to work" category. CD-Rs I've found to be more "YMMV" - they usually work, and I've found they're more likely to do so when burned at low speeds.

[freqmax]

Burn speed is also tricky. It usually true that a low speed is the best BUT usually burners are optimized according to the bell curve.. So a   2x-8x burner may do the best precision at 5x rather than 2x because it's the optimization center in order to handle the extremes too.