How many new disks have done this? Do these same disks behave similarly in other players? If it's a handful or more I'd highly suspect that it's something going on with the player. I'd take some of those disks to the dealer and see how they do in his/her demo unit. Even with products as great as that occasionally they aren't perfect. Possibly the laser got a good bump during shipping and needs to be re-aligned.

There are numerous products that will improve tracking on a digital disc. You can read any of the past Stereophiles (Recommended Components issues would be best) to find one or two products to try. Most of the internet only audio review magazines have multiple advertisements for CD treatments.

Two very cheap cleaners are simple dishwashing liquid and warm water and a squirt of Pledge AntiStatic furniture cleaner. Use the least amount of either product that ges the job done and use a microfiber towel to wipe the surface of the disc. Using the dishwashing liquid wet the disc and apply just a drop of cleaner to the disc surface then wipe with the towel in a direction that goes from the center of the disc outward in a straight line. Do not wipe the surface of the disc in a circular motion. Rinse the soap off the disc with warm water and then dry with a microfiber towel, again wiping in straight lines. If you try the Pledge a few drops will clean a disc and you wipe with a microfiber towel in straight lines until the disc is clean.

A friend got on line and found a plastics cleaner that was developed for the windscreens on racing autombiles and the like. He was extremely pleased with the results for about a $25 investment.

All that said, I would pay attention to the advice given above. A few discs that mistrack might be expected from any player. However, more than an occasional disc mistracking should be an indication something might not be right with your player or you should be paying more attention to the CD labels you are buying and avoiding certain manufacturers.

This reminds me of an old desperate trick. But DO NOT DO THIS, as I suspect it is a very bad idea. When I was a kid/young teen my CDs (this was the early to mid 90s -- I'm not very old) would get unplayable and skip from lending them to friends and general neglect/abuse etc. We would coat them with toothpaste and then rinse them off. It actually worked a suprising number of times. In retrospect, it isn't like we compared this with soap or even a water rinse, so I doubt the paste served much of a purpose. But...kids. Again, I wouldn't try this today.

Judicata-

What the toothpaste was doing was acting as a mild abrasive and buffing out the scratches by removing the smallest amount of the plastic surface. When doing that make sure to wipe using straight lines from disc center to the edge. It's a great trick for fixing damaged discs, but I don't believe what this gentleman is dealing with is disc damage.

Get Novus #2 clear plastic scratch remover.

Scratches disappear like magic. I learned this from a guitar maker who used it to polish his french polish.
It works great on Cds

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used it to polish his french polish.

wild stuff! polish for polishing polish!

I think mrlowry is on the right track (so sorry). Whenever I've had a problem with an optical disc, I schlepp it around to different players to test it. In practically every case, it was my old unit. Now I'm using a Marantz Universal Player and all those "troublesome" discs I had in the past are playing brilliantly.

Ok, enough with the cleaning already. The next thing - make sure the transport is absolutely level. Not necessarily as easy as it sounds.

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Ok, enough with the cleaning already.

Ya think?

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make sure the transport is absolutely level.

Say what? Then how do CD players work in a car, and portables etc? It's obvious you have no idea how CD players work, so I'll give you a brief overview:

The CD spins and the data - not music! - is read into a memory buffer. If anything goes wrong during reading, the player reads again and compares the checksums etc. Once the data is known to be correct, it is clocked out of the buffer at a rate set by a stable crystal oscillator and sent to the D/A converter. Thus, vibration and absolute transport position are irrelevant to playback quality. At least they are in this universe!

--Ethan

Of course I wasn't referring to players with buffers, you big duffus, I was referring to home audio players (that aren't immune to problems associated with non-level transport or vibration). Anyone who believes vibration isolation is not critical for the home CD Player is way out in left field.

CD players without buffers?

From Wikipedia:

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By the early 1990s, CD player memory buffering allowed skip-free performance

Now who's the big "duffus?"

If you're pretending to be stupid you're doing an excellent job. If all CD players were immune to vibration, which I gather is your position, then vibration isolation would be fruitless, no? So would ensuring the transport is level. Apparently you didn't get the memo.

It's tough dealing with Ethan, isn't it. It's not that he's not true to his beliefs and experiences. He's solid with them, which is good and commendable.

However, his 'kit' or box of experience is just a tad 'off' when it comes to the average audiophile's group of experiences. I get pissed with him at times, but I also refuse to believe he is a bad or disingenuous person. That would be untrue, as far as I can tell.

There is a barrier in his head, is my guess, and it has to do with not recognizing or not seeing the points we raise, here. A different set of origins and different set of experiences and a different set of inherent values, weighting, and judgement system. But I'm sure you see this too.

However, we sometimes can't take it when he butts in and tells us things we know as being true and solid-are not. At the age of nearly 60, I think it is going to be mighty difficult to get him to change his spots. To the grave-it will be. I always hold out hope, but it does get taxing after a while.

I haven't gone into the thread I started very often, the one on demagging or induction heating of CD's. There are psychologically unaware or socially inept Nimrods walking around in there with the social equivalent of shotgun/hammers and they are just waiting to slam/point them at anyone or anything that questions or threatens their living and working value system, as some truths do threaten their very 'way of being'..which is fundamental to their internal stress and existence levels. And they are entirely unaware of it. Which makes them all the more dangerous-to themselves and all that is around them.

"There are psychologically unaware or socially inept Nimrods walking around in there.... waiting to slam/point them at anyone or anything that questions or threatens their living and working value system..."

One gets used to this sort of thing after while. As Charles Manson once astutely noted, "You can't kill kill." Looking on the bright side, it can all make for an enjoyable web experience, and it certainly helps if one enjoys a bit of the old Whack-a-Mole.

Until you get some rabid Randiites on your tail you just don't know how hilarious this all can get. I guess you could say I count my blessings hahaha.

Alas, I try not to too severe with folks 'cause you just can't tell who out there's on their meds, who's off their meds, who's a veteran, who recently had a brain aneurysm and so forth.

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Alas, I try not to too severe with folks 'cause you just can't tell who out there's on their meds, who's off their meds, who's a veteran, who recently had a brain aneurysm and so forth.

Another classless post, well done!

And speaking of folks who are off their meds, hi Frank!

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Of course I wasn't referring to players with buffers.....

Oh my, buffer-less CD players. Great knowledge!

I take it you agree with my argument concerning level of the CD transport. Excellent.

For kicks, I took the top off my disc player and it still let me play discs.

It has a switch that turns off the lights for the display, and there was no visible light scatter from the laser assembly.

I did, however, let out all the factory air. Sounds about the same, though...whew!

Have you guys tried looking inside your players while they play?

Maybe there is brand to brand variation.

Were you wearing your infrared goggles?

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Were you wearing your infrared goggles?

With a variable light transmogrifier, of my own design!

Maybe my light tweak gets in and cancels out all the stray laser light. The wondrous thing never ceases to amaze me. I mean, what CAN'T it do?

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For kicks, I took the top off my disc player and it still let me play discs.

It has a switch that turns off the lights for the display, and there was no visible light scatter from the laser assembly.

Don't tell Geoff.

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Don't tell Geoff.

Don't look now, guy, but Buddha makes up crap like this.

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For kicks, I took the top off my disc player and it still let me play discs.

It has a switch that turns off the lights for the display, and there was no visible light scatter from the laser assembly.

Don't tell Geoff.

It brings up an interesting point.

I can see 780 nanometer wavelength, the length of the CD laser light.

(Lapedes, Daniel. Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms: Second Edition. New York: McGraw Hill, 1978: 954. "visible radiation(Phys.)

Electromagnetic radiation which falls within the wavelength range of 780 to 380 nm, over which the normal eye is sensitive." ...380

"I can see 780 nanometer wavelength, the length of the CD laser light."

Please make up your mind. You already confessed you couldn't. Better yet, let's ask Frank, he's an engineer.

Humans are very insensitive to red, especially infrared light; snakes on the other hand are quite sensitive to red light. We might be onto something here...

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"I can see 780 nanometer wavelength, the length of the CD laser light."

Please make up your mind. You already confessed you couldn't. Better yet, let's ask Frank, he's an engineer.

The visible light range is roughly given as 400 to 700 nanometers (nm) wavelength. Wikipedia gives it as 380 to 750 nm. Hyperphysics website lists as 400 to 750 nm.

Warren J. Smith (Modern Optical Engineering, 2nd ed.), puts it at 400-760 nm. According to Smith (p.128), the human eye is most sensitive around 555 nm (yellow-green) for daytime (photopic) vision. At night (scotopic), it is around 510 nm. Relative to this maximum sensitivity, the level at 780 nm is 4-5 orders or magnitude less, which is essentially zero (photopic). Scotopic reaches this level not as far into the red, at 690 nm. It would be a rare person, if any, who can see 780 nm light.

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Of course I wasn't referring to players with buffers, you big duffus, I was referring to home audio players (that aren't immune to problems associated with non-level transport or vibration). Anyone who believes vibration isolation is not critical for the home CD Player is way out in left field.

I would guess that car CD players are built with some vibration isolation for that purpose, whereas the home CD players are supposed to be put on a shelf and left there unmoved while in use. It's possible that the isolation applied to a home unit improves the 'sound' for this reason.

I know that Ethan wrote about the bits coming off the disk being unchanged, so that there should not be a difference in sound. If the sonic difference is large enough, then you're done. If it's subtle, then we open up the DBT question again.

I personally don't know which, as I have not tried these tweaks. But, I have an audiophile friend who swears by vibration isolation and dampening the CD transport internal mechanisms to improve the sound.

Guys, it's visible.

You can see it!

Hell, I think your TV covers that wavelength, too!

You guys are shitting me, right?

But you already told us you couldn't see it. It was right there in front of your nose, you must be slipping.

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But you already told us you couldn't see it. It was right there in front of your nose, you must be slipping.

Yeah, I can see sunlight, too, but not when it isn't there!

Try taking a gander inside your player and see what you can see, or is that too 'objective?' Let's just pronounce this a problem with invisible light, and then the cure can't be argued about!

Come on, ya gotta be curious enough to look.

Afraid you'll need some infrared goggles to see the infrared light. That's what infrared goggles are for. And a very dark room.

Maybe y'all could point an old fashion IR remote control at your head and notice whether you can see the light comin' at ya.

On the other hand I think a few of you have probably tried this little "dodge the funky channel 11 red light" trick a few too many times already.

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For kicks, I took the top off my disc player and it still let me play discs.

Excellent! Now prop up one side so the whole player is at a 5 degree angle or whatever. Discs still play fine? I knew they would!

I bought my wife a new PC for Xmas in December, and the DVD player is sideways. I also have an external Phillips DVD burner on the laptop in my living room. Yep, both have the CDs/DVDs vertical. And you know what? They burn and play just fine. Then again, I'm sure Geoff and Jan and KBK know much more than the idiot engineers at Phillips and Dell.

Morons.

--Ethan

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Then again, I'm sure Geoff and Jan and KBK know much more than the idiot engineers at Phillips and Dell.

Morons.

Yeah, they may be morons, but they are the best Phillips and Dell can do.

Geoff and KBK are just trying to help minimize the damage.

for Kait...What the hell does being a veteran have to do with anything?
as a recently ETSd veteran with multiple Iraq tours, id like to know what you were implying.

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Alas, I try not to too severe with folks 'cause you just can't tell who out there's on their meds, who's off their meds, who's a veteran, who recently had a brain aneurysm and so forth.

Another classless post, well done!

NCdrawl, Would you mind editing your last post to properly identify the offensive poster, G.K?. Thank you in advance.

Aw, come on Frank, take a bullet for the big guy. I'd take one for you.

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Aw, come on Frank, take a bullet for the big guy. I'd take one for you.

I'm honoured though somewhat bewildered by your generous offer.

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Excellent! Now prop up one side so the whole player is at a 5 degree angle or whatever. Discs still play fine? I knew they would!

I bought my wife a new PC for Xmas in December, and the DVD player is sideways. I also have an external Phillips DVD burner on the laptop in my living room. Yep, both have the CDs/DVDs vertical. And you know what? They burn and play just fine. Then again, I'm sure Geoff and Jan and KBK know much more than the idiot engineers at Phillips and Dell.

Or maybe you are just the dip you come off as. Leveling a CD player - oooooohhhhhhh, just too damn tweaky for Winer!

Or maybe you just aren't as critical as some listeners. Wow, I bet no one ever accused Winer of that before!

I have a Discman type portable that plays at all sorts of angles too. I don't think it sounds as good as my Rega by any stretch of the imagination, shutting down of critical faculties or just convincing myself it plays is good enough. For most people who enjoy listening to music the simple idea "it plays" is a long way from the pleasure of "it plays as well as it can". But you've made your life and your equally deaf engineer friends around not noticing these things, so well isolated CD players and class A amps have nothing to offer you.

ROTFL!!!

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Aw, come on Frank, take a bullet for the big guy. I'd take one for you.

why dont you answer the damn question? what did you mean, referring to "veterans" in the same breath as "aneurysm patients" /??

What about cleaning SACD's? Several have come with warnings that they shouldn't be cleaned. So what if you get a used one that's covered with fingerprints?

News!! Photo of Codename Turquoise in presence of infrared light.

See photo on Codename Turquoise web page at:

www.machinadynamica.com/machina34.htm

Use a microfibre cloth to wipe off the finger marks. Don't use any abrasive cleaning fluids, if you have any stubbon marks, use an optical lense cleaning fluid.

Both microfibre cloth and lense cleaning fluid can be picked up under $15 for both from any Optical Store.

If you wear spectacles , reading or otherwise, then you may already have a supply.