CD's damaged from bulldust

Submitted: Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 00:30
ThreadID: 19347 Views:3077 Replies:11 FollowUps:15
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Been meaning to post this for awhile as a warning to others and hoping that someone might know how to fix the CD's in question...

Back in June we headed up the Murchison/Gascoyne and copped a lot of bulldust. Because we pressurize the GU interior (thanks to this forum for that tip some time ago) we don't suffer from bulldust coming in through vents or door seals etc. BUT, after a couple of weeks the floor mats were putting up little puffs of bulldust that we had tracked in with our shoes. Never thought much of it because it was only at floor level and wasn't affecting our comfort at all. However, when we were back on the bitumen one day we tried to play some CD's and couldn't. It wasn't that the CD player had dust in it but rather that the CD's which had been carelessly stored out of covers in the front door pocket at about foot level had become covered in dust, rubbed together as we travelled the corregated roads and basically caused a mosaic of minute scratches which have taken the shine off the surface of the CD's. Now I don't know if they can be restored but if so I would like to hear how. About 10 CD's were damaged and of course, they are our favourites.

The moral of this story is store you CD's carefully. There are also implications for other items that may be stored under seats etc (eg. inverters, camera's).

:o) Melissa
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Reply By: sensei - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 00:53

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 00:53
Melissa,
I have had a lot of success removing scratches from Cd's using a mild car polish, I found this out as I have teenager kids (boys) and thery are very rough on CD's for the computer and often complain the games will not load only to find that there are some very bad scratches in them. There are CD restoring kits out there as I'm looking at them right now, havent choosen one yet but am still looking.

Hope its helps.

AnswerID: 92915

Follow Up By: Member - Melissa - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 01:24

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 01:24
Thanks for the tip. I'll give the car polish a try tomorrow - nothing to lose since the CD's are no good as they are. Failing that I'll try a restoration kit. Where can you buy them?

:o) Melissa
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Reply By: Willem - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 00:55

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 00:55
Thanks Melissa. I do store my CDs back in their folders and away in the glove box. Yes dust is a menace to a lot of equipment.

Good to see you posting again
AnswerID: 92916

Follow Up By: Member - Melissa - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 01:21

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 01:21
Hi Willem,

Never seem to have much time to post these days but when I have time to spare...Like you, I'm usually careful with our CD's but Shelby was only 3.5 months old on that trip and a handful so my careful ways slipped a bit. Happy to say that we just got back Sunday from a lovely two weeks away and both kids travelled extremely well. Start 'em young and reap the rewards :-).

:o) Melissa
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FollowupID: 351880

Reply By: lazylcd - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 01:25

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 01:25
cd burners are wonder things and cheap too, back up ur favourites and keep the originals safely at home

Lazy
AnswerID: 92922

Follow Up By: howie - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 02:23

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 02:23
i agree, copy the original, store it somewhere safe and just use the copies.
thats all good,but please tell me how you copy the "jet' album which has defied copy attempts. is there some software that can be used?
the jet cd does not register at all.
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Follow Up By: theshadows - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:39

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:39
2 ways of doining it. the long way is to read te infomation as a mp3 and save th mp3 to your hard disk. then useing a good burning program convert the mp3 back as wave files onto your cd.

the other way is useing the latest NERO buring program diskcopy as a ".iso" file th burn the ".iso" file back to your new back up cd.

doing a ".iso" file burn copies the protection and the whole disk image.
shadow
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Follow Up By: SteveW - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 22:34

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 22:34
howie, some of the new cd's with their fancy protection don't read in your cd drive in your computer, When i first encountered this I thought i was buggered and that was the end of my cd copying days BUT i soon found out (to my delight) that they play in a computer dvd drive and all u gotta do is use your buring program and press that good ol' copy button :)
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Reply By: Lucky Vic - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:13

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:13
Go here

http://www.slsknet.org/

Download the little program / run it and then search for all of that music /download it and burn it ..

BEAUTIFUL !!!!!

Soulseek is the best p2p out there if you are after mp3 only.

have fun
AnswerID: 92930

Reply By: Member - Mozza (NSW) - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:26

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:26
weirdly enough... toothpaste also works i've been told!?
AnswerID: 92932

Follow Up By: Member - Chrispy (NSW) - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:37

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 07:37
Toothpaste is what I always use to polish plastic - including polycarbonate which is what CD's are made of. Use it sparingly, and polish NOT in a circular motion around the CD, but from centre to outer in short strokes.

Be VERY careful not to scratch the TOP surface (i.e. the label side) as, believe it or not, the CD may not work afterwards.
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Follow Up By: Member - JohnR (Vic) - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 08:00

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 08:00
Hello Melissa, nice to see you post again and after more tripping too. We hope all the family are well.

I would prefer to use toothpaste too and in the way that Chrispy describes from the inner to outer radius. Toothpaste is finer than car polish. No flavours preferred and I am not sure that brand is the most important, but some abrasive quality is - that is a fine abrasive.

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FollowupID: 351898

Follow Up By: Squizzy - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 11:02

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 11:02
To get the best results from toothpaste, make a fine slurry with some water before applying it.
It too can be abrasive if not thinned out a little.

Geoff.
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Follow Up By: Member - Melissa - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 11:09

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 11:09
Thanks guys, all good information. Will give it a try and report back.

JohnR, nice to hear from you. Yes been a bit quiet with the posting lately. Don't seem to be enough hours in the day although I do occasionally find the time to drop in a read a few posts so even though it may seem like I'm not around, I'm watching ;-). Family are all well. Regards to Heather.

:o) Melissa
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Reply By: Member - Sand Man (SA) - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 08:46

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 08:46
Melissa,

I have noticed that our local DVD-Video store has a machine for polishing DVD's hired out and returned "abused".

Perhaps you could check out your nearest one. Should work on music CD's as well.

Bill


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AnswerID: 92944

Reply By: MrBitchi - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 08:51

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 08:51
Jaycar have this cleaner......

CD Cleaner

Cheers, John.
AnswerID: 92946

Reply By: Melly - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 10:47

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 10:47
We are about to take off on an around Oz adventure for about a year and started burning CD's so that we didnt have to take originals. After copying about 40 cd's and seeing that our CD case was nearly full and we hadn't even got half way through, I began questioning this method also. ENTER ---> 40 GB IPOD

We are now in the process of loading all 300 - 400 odd CD's on to the iPod. The great thing about this is that it is great space saver and it gives you instant access to your CD's, I have purchased an iTrip FM Transmitter that sit's neatly on top and we are able to play all our CD's through the car FM radio. There are plenty of tough cases available to protect the sexy beast too.
AnswerID: 92990

Follow Up By: Austravel - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 12:37

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 12:37
Hi Melly, can you tell me some more about the FM transmitter?? How does it work, price, were to buy etc. Thanks
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Follow Up By: Melly - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 13:12

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 13:12
Hi Austravel

There are a few different brands around but from my research i found that the the Griffin iTrip was the best value and also arguably has the best reception. However, the iTrip is only compatible with the iPod, where as say the Belkin FM Transmitter can work with other players such as the Creative etc..

You will pay around the $59 - $79 for the iTrip...i got mine for $59 but that was a bargain. You can get these pretty much anywhere iPods are sold, Apple Centres, Mac Stores, Myer, Harvey Norman, Domayne etc.

The iTrip plugs directly into the ipod and you tune in the station on your FM Radio (home, car, boat) to the frequency you choose on the iPod. The iTrip comes with a CD with frequencies which are loaded into the iPod via iTunes. Once you have selected the frequency which works best for you it will remember this and each time you plug in your iTrip and tune in your radio you will hear sweeeeet music.

The quality of sound is diminished slightly, depending on the area you are in. I live in Sydney where there are many radio stations to interfere with reception but have found no real problems with getting a clear reception. It is not really much different to listening to any other FM station.

Hope the info helps :)
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Follow Up By: Austravel - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 15:21

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 15:21
Thanks Melly, will have to check out these gadgets.
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Follow Up By: Bonz (Vic) - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 21:07

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 21:07
Aus, Jaycar have them for $34.95, take a look here. My daughter has one attached to her CD player as "Vinnie" doesnt have a CDplayer, runs great thru the radio
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FollowupID: 352119

Follow Up By: Member - Brian (WA) - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 22:32

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 22:32
hi . get a ipod no more carrying cd,s no more jumping. store thousands
of songs on it. just get the itrip so you can tune your car radio to a
fm station and away you go.best thing since sliced bread
cheers brian
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FollowupID: 352132

Follow Up By: Austravel - Monday, Jan 17, 2005 at 09:55

Monday, Jan 17, 2005 at 09:55
Thanks all.
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FollowupID: 352522

Reply By: Member - Karl - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 13:08

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 13:08
Melissa,

You can buy a CD cleaning kit from Big W, Kmart etc. Basically you open it up, place the CD coverside down, spray on some of the supplied cleaner, close the lid and turn the handle a number of times. I use mine all the time as I have some wonderfull kids who love to look after their CDs, PS2 games, DVDs etc. From memory cost about $15. Or you could try warm water with a bit or washing detergent and a very soft cloth and wash from the inside to exterior.

For the CDs in my car they are burnt copies of the originals, so I can throw them away if they get damaged and it isn't that great of a concern if some freak tries to steal them (they would proberly get returned due to my taste in music). A good CD Burner is super cheap these days (and DVD Burners are getting cheaper) and it's fun creating your own compliations.
AnswerID: 93025

Reply By: cwebb - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 15:34

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 15:34
Melissa
Just to add to the plethora of advice...
Good old Silvo metal polish. Cleans out scratches of non-playing CD's quite well. As per other advice, never polish in circular strokes, always from edge to centre. I tried toothpaste once and absolutely killed a CD, must have been an abrasive brand!
AnswerID: 93067

Reply By: Member - Errol (York WA) - Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 22:23

Friday, Jan 14, 2005 at 22:23
G,day Melissa . How,s that little billy lid doing , i bet she,s a bit bigger now . As for cd,s , don,t take them . Get you self an Apple IPod , and take that insted . Iv,e got nearly 6000 songs on mine now , so we never lack for something different to listen to . Dosn,t get get scrached and is never out of range . As for your Jets album , bring it to me . I have 3 different programs i use , and one of them always seems to work . Cheers Errol
AnswerID: 93145

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