CD Deterioration

[Greenwich_Man]

What do you think on the subject of CD Deterioration - there's a lot of talk about the need to copy CDs every few years - so as to stop the music from deterioration. Do you back up all your music to hard disk (and what format do you use)?

Do you believe it? - and are present CDs better than they used to be?

 

[hammill]

I have been buying CDs for about 25 years. They all still work.

 

[matthewpiano]

In over 2000 discs I've had about 25 succumb to corrosion, mostly early BBC Music Magazine cover discs that were pressed at PDO in Blackburn.

 

[pete321]

They obviously they can suffer over time, no matter how careful you are with them. The qulaity of the actual disc varies, e.g. gold discs will give better results. Plus, won't a CD players laser deteriate over time? Then it's ability to read through scratches & scuffs can be affected. Any I buy now get ripped to lossless straight away and then put into storage, all my music except SACD & DVD-A being played via my PC & DAC.

 

[Anonymous]

i have made load of cdr audio recordings and about 25% of these copys suffer
from some kind of dropout after a couple of years this either causes them to sound like crackle on
lps or they refuse to play at all ..

 

[Anonymous]

ideally to prevent cds from derterioration you should

store them away from light

keep them in at atmosphere of less than 35% humidity

keep them at a constant temperature of 14.5øC

do not play them

of course if you dont anticpate keeping them over 1000 years then id ignore all that accept theyll only last 100 years play them as often as id like and damn the consequences

 

[Greenwich_Man]

Thanks folks for all your responses

I think I will copy my most treasured to my hard disk - and hope for the best on the others

And the ones I made from LPs - I will keep the files on my hard disk so I can make new copies when the disc needs replacing

 

[ElectroMan]

I think the advice to make fresh copies of CDs and DVDs every few years is mainly concerned with writable discs, as the process of 'burning' them is different to how commercial discs are made, and inherently means CD-Rs etc are less stable.

There was a problem with some laserdiscs years ago, known as 'laser rot', although I believe this was to do with the type of adhesive some manufacturers used to glue two the discs together (laserdiscs were actually two disc stuck together)!

It would also be prudent to back up your hard disk ...