Why are audio CDs burned from iTunes skipping?

Factual Questions
1

I have successfully burned audio CDs from iTunes in the past, on this very computer, but now I am having problems.

I am burning a CD of music that I purchased through iTunes. I highlight the playlist, I select Burn, and then when it’s done, I pop the audio CD into my CD player, and it skips. The skipping/stuttering is bad enough to make the CD unplayable.

So far I have tried reducing the burn speed to the lowest possible (1x) and turning off all real-time virus protection and monitoring, and I’m still getting the problem.

Windows XP, iTunes 9. Virus protection software is currently Microsoft Security Essentials, for what that’s worth.

2

IME this happens when you rip or burn and you get little moments of 100% cpu usage for some reason.

3

Have you tried a different CD player?

4

It happens no matter what CD player I use.

drachillix, I’ve had Task Manager open while doing this and I don’t see anything maxing out the CPU.

This is frustrating, because I recently bought a couple of albums via iTunes with the idea of burning them to CD so I could listen to them in the car. If I’d known this was going to be an issue, I just would have bought the actual CD from Amazon or something.

5

Sounds like:
a) A bad CD burner or
b) Bad discs

to me.

6

Could also be a bad cable to the burner, or maybe just a dirty laser.