Speedup cp command?

[Richard Owlett <rowlett@cloud85.net>]

I'm copying Debian distribution DVDs.
I used
  cp -R /media/cdrom0 /media/richard/myrepository/dvd_1

It gave me what I wanted [*N.B.* I did not want dvd_1.iso]
It was SLOW.
The man page for rsync suggested that it could do it faster.
Can it?
If so, what is correct syntax to get the same result as the 
command above?

TIA