In your situation, mixing directly to the CDr is probably going to yeild the best results. An additional analog tape stage will most likely just add more tape noise. Perhaps you should try both and go with what sounds best to you.

The thing with CD-R mixdown is that it can be unreliable. Most, if not all CD-R recorders I have encountered don't read or rather don't monitor off the CD-R, they monitor the input signal. So if there is a problem burning and/or the blank CD-R has defects or turns into a coaster, you won't know about it until way after the mix is done. I use CD-R as a mixdown and usually don't have a problem, but I have had problems in the past and I will never again rely on it as a sole method to capture a mix. I use two CD recorders, DAT, cassette, and 15-IPS R2R. The cassette and R2R are more for my reference.

Hi Ray,
Does that Tascam have an "optical out" ?? If it does, I recommend mixing right to cd. This is the way I do all my stuff and it works great every time.
As the guys said, you can encounter problems with anything you use so just see what works best for you. An optical out will give you a perfect digital transfer however!

Mike

Thanks ya'll.

I'm still pretty green at all this, and I've read quite about different formats for mixing down, bur rarely do I read about using a cd-burner.

Thanks again for the advice.