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cuddles
19-02-2018, 13:14
I wonder if some folks on here with greater knowledge and experience can offer up advice.
I've got a problem playing CDrs through my CD player. It's a Myryad MC100 and about 18 years old. Commercially released CDs play perfectly, it's only when I play mix CDrs that I encounter problems.
They start playing fine but after about 15 minutes in the sound starts to break up - the nearest I can describe it is it sounds like tons of fluff on a stylus. I was wondering if the actual disc is deteriorating but visually there is no sign of fade or rot. They were recorded on a variety of laptops and PC's and allowing for some recording failures I can play most of them OK on my laptop, but I'd rather have a proper player to use in my music room.
So I've a couple of questions really - are CDrs inevitably doomed to degrade after a number of years despite being stored in optimum conditions and are there certain CD players that will tackle CDrs without any trouble. I know people will say to transfer them but I'm not adverse to getting a new player if there is a super duper no disc to tough machine out there.
Thanks for looking.

Edward
19-02-2018, 13:39
I sometimes find that a CDR plays just fine on a particular player and then after some years does not play as easily on that player. Sometimes I find by copying that disc onto a new CDR using a computer will then play just fine on the player.

As CDRs are so cheap it is an easy thing to try.

YMMV of course.

Sent via Tapatalk

Sherwood
19-02-2018, 13:58
I wonder if some folks on here with greater knowledge and experience can offer up advice.
I've got a problem playing CDrs through my CD player. It's a Myryad MC100 and about 18 years old. Commercially released CDs play perfectly, it's only when I play mix CDrs that I encounter problems.
They start playing fine but after about 15 minutes in the sound starts to break up - the nearest I can describe it is it sounds like tons of fluff on a stylus. I was wondering if the actual disc is deteriorating but visually there is no sign of fade or rot. They were recorded on a variety of laptops and PC's and allowing for some recording failures I can play most of them OK on my laptop, but I'd rather have a proper player to use in my music room.
So I've a couple of questions really - are CDrs inevitably doomed to degrade after a number of years despite being stored in optimum conditions and are there certain CD players that will tackle CDrs without any trouble. I know people will say to transfer them but I'm not adverse to getting a new player if there is a super duper no disc to tough machine out there.
Thanks for looking.

Yes, CDR discs are unreliable and should never be used for archiving important material. They are a cheap way of making compilations for the car cd but always expect them to fail at some point: they will. I was an early adopter and bought an early burner and a batch of "gold" cd blanks back around (1997 +/-). They were great for burning compilation cds and audio books for long journeys around Namibia where I lived from 1998-2001. Audio-cassettes were OK in the house, but literally melted if left in the car for any time. The tape stretched so much that there was not enough tension to turn the reels. The CD's lasted a bit longer in that environment but even stored a in cool dark environment, I found the dyes deteriorated after a short time.

There are archival media available but these are more expensive (e..g DVD-RAM and M-Disc).

Geoff

struth
19-02-2018, 14:04
due to how they are burnt, they mostly dont last more than 5 years and often less. you get the odd disc that does tho. personally i believe they strain the laser so dont use them

Shovel_Knight
19-02-2018, 14:12
Yes, CD-Rs do deteriorate quite quickly. And if you use a permanent marker to label them, it will often eat right through the disc...

Macca
19-02-2018, 16:02
. personally i believe they strain the laser so dont use them

You're joking of course.

cuddles
19-02-2018, 16:13
Thanks for the replies guys - pretty much confirms my fears :(

Sherwood
19-02-2018, 16:22
Thanks for the replies guys - pretty much confirms my fears :(

If there are music files that you cannot replace by any other means, I have had some success in recovering files with the freeware EAC package. Can take a while with some files though.

Geoff

Yomanze
20-02-2018, 10:11
Many CD transports have a low tolerance to reading CDRs and CD-RW, interestingly an old Philips swingarm will play them no problem due to a very high tolerance design. Can’t say I’ve had degradation issues, but then I always burned at quad speed max.

As mentioned another way around it is to re-rip the CDRs and use M-Disc media.

cuddles
20-02-2018, 10:28
Many CD transports have a low tolerance to reading CDRs and CD-RW, interestingly an old Philips swingarm will play them no problem due to a very high tolerance design. Can’t say I’ve had degradation issues, but then I always burned at quad speed max.

As mentioned another way around it is to re-rip the CDRs and use M-Disc media.

That's interesting Neil. I think Marantz use the Philips mechanism - I'll see if I can borrow my mates player.

Sherwood
20-02-2018, 10:37
Have you tried to play your dodgy discs in a pc or to copy them using EAC?

Geoff

cuddles
20-02-2018, 10:44
I think that would be my 'all else fails' position :(

Sherwood
20-02-2018, 10:48
I would suggest that you try this first. This will give you an idea of whether the discs are past the point of no return!

Geoff

Edward
20-02-2018, 10:52
What is the original source you used to create the CDRs? Perhaps just start again from those if you still have them.

alphaGT
20-02-2018, 11:53
CDR’s do not last, I’ve got a bunch I made about 15 years ago and they have all died, will not play at all. But as mentioned there are some made for archive purposes, and are expensive. I find that even new CDR’s will play well in some decks, and not well in others. Early CD players wouldn’t play them at all. Once they start to go, there is nothing that can save them. I’m afraid the industry lied to us on that front. I use Minidisc to practice my bass, they last and last! But they claimed you could record over them a million times! False! About 20 times max.

Russell

jandl100
21-02-2018, 07:38
Interesting about CDRs, I didn't realise they have a limited shelf life. I have quite a few going back 15 years or so, I guess, and I haven't come across a problem yet. In these days of streaming I don't play them much at all, so there may be nasty surprises awaiting me if/when I do try to use them.

Re: minidiscs. I find they can jam after a few years, I've had a few problems in my collection of 600 or so.

alphaGT
21-02-2018, 14:05
Re: minidiscs. I find they can jam after a few years, I've had a few problems in my collection of 600 or so.

I’ve seen so many of the less expensive Minidisc decks die, I’ve had two of them crap out on me. But I bought an expensive pro unit from Sony, rack mounted, very nice, and it still operates like new. I’ve had no discs jam? One or two had the metal cover get bent and wouldn’t operate. While I do have 20 or 30 that I’ve recorded albums onto, I rarely ever play them, it’s mostly a tool to learn songs now. Back in the day, every member of the band owned a deck, and I would record our practices onto a disc and we would pass it around, so we could critique our performance. Very practical. I also had an indash unit in my car! I loved that and used it every day.

Russell

Yomanze
23-02-2018, 08:19
As with all of these things the media, the burner and the configuration dictates how long they last. Burning one of those CDRs in cheap “cylinders” at 16x in a cheap burner isn’t going to last as long as say an internal LiteOn burner at 4x speed with JVC CDRs.

Sherwood
23-02-2018, 08:53
As with all of these things the media, the burner and the configuration dictates how long they last. Burning one of those CDRs in cheap “cylinders” at 16x in a cheap burner isn’t going to last as long as say an internal LiteOn burner at 4x speed with JVC CDRs.

In my experience, the biggest factor is the chemistry of the CDR. I have always burned discs (both audio and data) at the minimum speed in order to minimise recording errors. Even then, in the early days (20 years ago) I would have a very high burn failure rate. I forget the disc brand back then but the cdrs had a shiny gold surface and a blue green write side. I am guessing that they used cyanine dyes which I have found to be quite unstable. I also recall that the non write side was very prone to damage. Even a small scratch or abrasion would lead to flaking of the coating and a visible "hole" that could best be seen as light penetration from the write side. I can't recall exactly how much each disk cost but I seem to recall a figure between £1 and £2 each depending on the quantity purchased. Despite all this, it was great fun being able to make compilation cds for the car for those long uneventful trips!

Geoff

Pete The Cat
24-02-2018, 09:38
I found that Philips CDRs were more reliable than other brands but after a prolific period of burning them ten to twelve years ago I'm now finding failures arising.

Extending the topic slightly, DVDR was a disaster in my experience. Occasionally when the family had filled the Sky hard drive I would try to record a programme onto DVD just for my own viewing. I used Philips discs and tried two Philips recording machines as well as both the DVD+ and DVD- formats. The fail rate on burning / finalising must have been about 50%. Then afterwards when it came to watching them there would be a fail to read rate of another 50%. Obviously the industry didn't want to facilitate counterfeiting (!) but it might as well not have brought that product to market at all IMHO.

Pete

GrahamS
24-02-2018, 11:28
due to how they are burnt, they mostly dont last more than 5 years and often less. you get the odd disc that does tho. personally i believe they strain the laser so dont use them
My late father believed that his TV reception was worse at peak times because there were more people watching, which diluted the signal......:)

alphaGT
24-02-2018, 18:24
A friend wanted to archive some videos of his band’s performances from VHS tapes. I found these DVDR’s made by Mobile Fidelity. They clAimed they would last 300 years! I can’t back that up, but apparently he has had no failures that i know of. They were rather expensive at $10 each.

Russell

cuddles
24-02-2018, 18:48
Well, a result! I've borrowed my mate's Marantz player and I can report that it seems to play the CDr's I've tried so far all the way through. I'll try a couple more tonight but it seems that the discs aint dead yet ;) It looks like I'll be getting a new CD player soon.

Sherwood
24-02-2018, 18:58
Well, a result! I've borrowed my mate's Marantz player and I can report that it seems to play the CDr's I've tried so far all the way through. I'll try a couple more tonight but it seems that the discs aint dead yet ;) It looks like I'll be getting a new CD player soon.

Even though they play now they are "slowly dying". Why not rip them to FLAC whilst they are still readable. A 1tb disc in inexpensive and will store almost 3,000 albums on flac format.

Geoff

cuddles
24-02-2018, 20:38
Yeah - looks like the way forward. I should do it while there's life left in them!
Thanks for all the replies guys.

Edward
24-02-2018, 20:49
Even though they play now they are "slowly dying". Why not rip them to FLAC whilst they are still readable. A 1tb disc in inexpensive and will store almost 3,000 albums on flac format.

Geoff

+1

Also worth ripping all the home DVDs to MP4 (or whatever) Very simple process.

Yomanze
01-03-2018, 09:25
Well, a result! I've borrowed my mate's Marantz player and I can report that it seems to play the CDr's I've tried so far all the way through. I'll try a couple more tonight but it seems that the discs aint dead yet ;) It looks like I'll be getting a new CD player soon.

...ah this is inspiring me to get a 'swingarm' project on the go, I just love a player that you can plonk anything into and it plays.

Tim
01-03-2018, 10:12
Yes, get those CDRs ripped to FLAC or something lossless toot sweet, EAC is a good ripper for error correction.

Stratmangler
01-03-2018, 10:19
EAC is a good ripper for error correction.

EAC does not error correct.

Tim
01-03-2018, 10:23
What does it do then Chris - had some awful discs that others won't rip, but it will?

Should I have said Error Recovery then? ;)

Stratmangler
01-03-2018, 10:48
What does it do then Chris - had some awful discs that others won't rip, but it will?

Should I have said Error Recovery then? ;)

EAC reads the discs accurately, that's all.
It performs multiple reads of the disc its ripping, and does running comparisons of the data, bit for bit. If there are problems reading a disc it will read it many multiples of times.
If it can't get identical data reads after so many attempts it will ID the point where it failed as possible data failure, and then move on.
The EAC website is worth reading.

http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/