A Compact Disc (CD) is a type of optical disc. It is flat and round, and is used to store digital data. It was first used to store music and other sounds (and is sometimes called an "audio CD"). The sound on a CD is played using a compact disc player. It was developed by Philips and Sony.
Later, Compact Discs were made that could be used to store computer files in the same way as audio compact discs. These are called CD-ROMs (Compact Disc Read-Only Memory). The computer reads the disc using a CD-ROM drive. Another use is to store MPEG videos cheaply; these CDs are called VCDs (Video CDs) and are especially popular in Asia. For example, in Indonesia they are used instead of the more expensive DVD. The quality of a VCD is about the same as a VHS tape.
The diameter of a normal CD is 120 mm. The middle hole in a CD is about the size of a five cent coin (about 1.5 cm). The person who decided the size was Dutch and used the size of an old Dutch coin (old because the Dutch now have switched to the Euro), called a "dubbeltje", or dime. A CD usually holds a maximum of 74-80 minutes of sound or 650-700 megabytes of data. CDs can be manufactured to hold up to 99 minutes of audio, or slightly under a gigabyte of data, by making the tracks smaller. Discs with more than 74 minutes or 650 MB are non-standard, and some CD players can't play them.
Some CDs are smaller; they are 80mm in diameter. They can store about 30% of a normal disc.
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