Dymo DiscPainter (www.discpainter.com, $279, ink cartridges $39.99) is a cool little printer that has but one chore: print terrific, colorful images and text or whatever you want directly on any inkjet-printable CD or DVD. Say good-bye to trying to get those printed CD/DVD labels to stick flat or align properly, or to using a marking pen to mark your CDs or DVDs. Say hello to creating a CD or DVD with your design from scratch or using one of the professionally designed templates. Then print that design directly on the front of the CD or DVD--just like the ones you buy.

Dymo DiscPainter includes Discus for DYMO software, which gives you full control over the layout and design you print on your discs. The possibilities are endless and limited only by your imagination. Choose a background from the display of solid colors or patterns, or use one of the included cool and wild templates. Either way, you’ll have a CD or DVD that’s personalized your way.

If you’ve burned an audio CD of favorites, party or other mixes, why settle for a simple list of songs and/or artists’ names scrawled on the disc, envelope or case? Jazz up your label with photos of the artists or album covers in a single, thumbnail or collage format. Any photos you use are arranged in layers, so you can choose which photo is in front of which other photos(s), and you can also adjust the transparency of the photo(s) to produce a professional and pleasing background or watermark effect.

Make the text plain or fancy by using the included curved text, outline, shadow or other text effects. Use whatever fonts you have available on your computer to create the look you want. Hundreds of text colors are available, and a full set of CD and DVD symbols are included to give your disc that professional look. Video DVD discs come to life with frames from your video tracks printed on the front of the disc and the DVD case. If you’re making a gift video, a printed disc gives it that special touch, especially when using your words, photos, clipart decorations and such. Save your designs for later editing or re-printing.

The software also provides the tools for printing (on your regular printer) front and back jewel box covers and booklets that can be inserted in the front cover. We were especially impressed with the capabilities of the included software and its ease of use for creating disc artwork and case covers. The DiscPainter supports printing on 4.75 or 3.25 inch inkjet-printable disks but not the business card type of CD.

Printable discs are identified by their white front coating, which is designed to hold the ink and help make it water resistant. Disc printing can be done on hub or non-hub printable CDs or DVDs. Inkjet-printable CDs or DVDs are more expensive than non-printable versions, costing 20+ cents/disc. Not all printable CD/DVDs have the white surface; ones with a silver surface are available but don’t produce printing as bright or saturated as the white-surfaced ones, and the printing isn’t as resistant to smudging.

The DiscPainter can produce print, photos and graphics at draft, normal (600 dpi) or best (1200 dpi) quality using any of nine levels of ink density, giving you more precise control of the appearance of your disc. The unit can also print directly from Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, QuarkXPress or SureThing editing software, allowing you to produce your design using programs you may already be familiar with.

Printing is done using DYMO RadialPrint technology, which spins the disc while printing on it. Depending on the amount of disc coverage and the print quality, a disc can be printed in as little as one minute. When we printed discs with full ink coverage, normal quality and default ink density, it took just shy of two minutes to print each disc; printing at Best quality took about 3 minutes. The DiscPainter supports printing multiple copies and beeps when it’s ready for the next disc. The unit uses a single multi-color cartridge, which DYMO says will print about 100 average discs.

The silver printer fits neatly on your desk, measures 5.5 x 4.25 x 10.75 inches and weighs 2.5 pounds. Included with the printer is the power adapter, a USB cable, a print cartridge, three inkjet-printable CDs and the Discus for DYMO design software.

Except for what we thought was a relatively high price, our experience using the DiscPainter was very good. The printer itself is super simple to use: lift the cover, put the disc on the spindle and close the cover. That’s it. The included layout software really shines and was fun and easy to use. We placed photos, text and other graphics on the screen, moved them around until they looked the way we wanted, and were very happy with the results. Then we printed several discs to keep and some to give away. These discs are fun to have and neat to give.

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