You can easily write CD/DVD in Microsoft Windows at home or at office provided you have InfraRecorder which offers some powerful features to burn CD/DVD free of cost.
InfraRecorder is an open source CD/DVD burning application special for Windows 7, XP and Windows Vista users. It supports dual layer DVD also. Using InfraRecorder you can create video and audio CDs which supports .wav, .wma, .ogg, .mp3 and .iso file formats. You can convert discs into ISO image files and you can write those files.
To download InfraRecorder and read more visit infrarecorder.org
To read information on a CD the CD-ROM passes a laser beam over the track and when the laser passes over a flat area in the track then the beam is reflected directly to an optical sensor on the laser assembly. The CD-ROM interprets this as 1. And when the laser beam passes over a bump the light is bounced away from the optical sensor and the CD-ROM recognizes this as 0. The platter area or land reflects the light back to the laser assembly while the bumps reflect the light so that it doesn't bounce back.