A comparison is presented between the physical processes operative in single white dwarfs and
the physical processes operative in white dwarfs with donor star companions. The physical properties
and accretion physics of the hot accreting components in close interacting binaries is presented.
The N/C abundance anomaly seen is ∼10% of cataclysmic variables and the presence of
absorption lines due to heavy elements in suprasolar abundance are discussed. A synthetic spectral
analysis of the FUSE spectrum of the old nova RR Pic reveals reveals an accretion disk with
i = 60◦, Mwd = 1.0M⊙ and a high accretion rate of 10−8M⊙/yr. New evidence from the FUSE
and IUE spectra of the symbiotic system CQ Dra suggest it is a triple system consisting of a red
giant and a cataclysmic variable companion. The hot component in the symbiotic system, RW
Hya, consists of a white dwarf with a surface temperature of 160,000 K with log(g) = 6.5 and no
evidence of an accretion disk.