Re: (TV) Off-topic (but On-topic post to follow shortly); Tech Q: Hand-writing on Cd-rs

["Rex Broome" <rexbroome@gmail.com>]

On Wed, Apr 16, 2008 at 7:32 PM, Leo Casey <leocasey@comcast.net> wrote:

>
> Full disclosure:  I have always been a firm believer (fool?  :>)  ),
> despite claims
> to the contrary, that writing anything on cd-rs increases the risk that
> the cd-r will
> fail sooner rather than later due to the impact of the chemicals in the
> ink eroding
> the cd-r over time (also believe and have read that applying circular
> 'heat-labels'
> to a cd-r after one burns a cd-r, dramatically increases the risk that the
> life-length of the cd-r will be shortened [rendered un-playable as soon,
> as say, 2
> years] as the paper labels will cause  tiny--- i.e., not able to be seen
> by the naked
> eye-- but fatal cracks in the cd-r  because the glue/paper of 'heat-label'
> shrinks or
> otherwise changes over time.


Paper labels sure do seem to kill the things.  Sometimes the level of
"death" varies from player to player.  I'm not much of a believer in the
ink-fatality thing-- I tend to think the greater variable is the brand of
CDR itself-- buy this has gotten me curious enough to dig out a few of my
oldest CDR's and see how they're doing.  I know for a fact that the very
first one I ever acquired still reads as of last week.

Does anyone else recall the black surface CDR's by Maxell?  My brand new Mac
laptop won't read them at all.  My junker PC at work does so just fine.
Weird.


>
> (I also go to great lengths to avoid buying
> certain jewel cases whose plastic center-spindle are poorly designed, very
> stiff ,
> and have a particular shape.  Again these will cause sooner rather than
> later stress
> cracks in a cd-r,  rendering a potentially rare, un-replaceable recording
> unplayable.)


Exactly that happened to me-- it was the spindle of a double-disc case.  And
the cracks were totally visible within less than a year.  It was a
nightmare... I ran round to all of my friends to whom I'd given copies...
there were cracks in ALL of them.  Luckily none of the discs were completely
trashed, so when between all the copies I gathered up (four or so) useable
copies of all the tracks still existed.  I was damned lucky.

I thought the magic-marker CD enhancement thing was debunked, but I tell you
what is true: Sony copyright protection can be defeated by a small sliver of
tape on the outer edge of a protected disc.  I did it under near-laboratory
conditions, and it worked: without tape, the tracks ripped as garbled
nonsense, with tape they ripped with no error at all.

-Rex
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