Why is there static and crackling on my burned cds?

Burn speed can make a difference. Higher burn speeds allow more errors to occur, but usually not to the degree that you’re describing. Try burning a cd at a lower speed (see if you can’t figure out how to do that here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/faq/default.mspx ) and see if that helps.

It could also be the result of low quality cds or a bad burner.

A bad burner sounds like the best bet. I had a dinosaur of a laptop once and tried to burn CDs into iTunes and WMP—because of what eventually was identified as an old CD burner with some problems, every song on every album had that staticky, scratchy, skippy noise over the whole track (although mostly the beginning and end).

I recommend you replace the burner, although if that’s not feasible you could try burning the CD to another computer and putting the music on your computer via flashdrive.

Thanks. I will try your suggestions.

Scratches and imperfections on the original Cd will cause problems, also. Open the files in a sound editor. If you see gaps in the structure, those are scratches. You can delete those gaps and “rejoin” the continuity but it is quite haphazard and doesn’t always work.