I was told at the weekend that CDs (and I suppose DVDs as well) have a limited lifespan and that after X time they become useless or something. This referred to original CDs, not CD-R.
Is there any truth in this? I fucking hope not...

Death Is Certain (Life Is Not)= also applies to cds...sorry, listening to darkness descends right now...

Ok, soooo...

CDs can last for a life time if you handle them with proper care, these are some basics for you:

Eventually the constituent elements of the universe itself will decay into unusable forms of energy...

Anyway, just follow the basic guidelines outlined above. Don't leave the shiny side in direct sunlight/light/heat lamp, etc. Don't leave cds you care about in a cd folders, etc. Don't use them for frizbees or coasters, etc.

Cheers, but last night I looked at a couple of discs I've had for about 13 years and it looks like they've become sort of cloudy, ie the reflective surface is not shiny and clear but 'murky'. I always put them straight back in the case and handle them with care. Is this possible?

All very applicable but can't see it making any difference to the CDs if you stack them in the cases upright or flat. At the end of the day the case is protecting the disk so really makes no difference.

Average every day CDs have a limited lifespan, yes. Oxidation of the material that the data is printed on is inevitable, but can be delayed by storing the discs properly and in a fairly climate controlled enviroment (IE not humid). This is one of the reasons that CDs utilizing a gold plated surface for recording have had spurts of popularity. Gold is resistant to oxidation, and is therefore theoretically capable of much longer lifespans.

No. Stacking them flat makes them warp over time. (Sorry if that sounds Star Trek-ish)

Sources? Come on LPs yeah but now you are spreading rumors about CDs first I've heard of it. Even a lot of CD stands or shelving make you stack them flat. And where is all these so called warped CDs I've never seen one google does not seem to have much to say about this rumor as well. Within cases I can see they are safe but without maybe just stacking disk on disk. But even if you had them upright the weight of each case laying or pressing near might warp....

I'd explain it to you, but...


That doesn't make me want to bother.

It's pure rubbish that's why!

If you take reasonably good care of your discs, they should long outlive you. I wouldn't be worried.

Interesting read - http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t ... -dvds.html

Environmental factors like exposure to heat and temperature change over a long time will probably wear them out eventually, but they don't have a short shelf life.

I have a copy of Death's "Scream Bloody Gore" that's 25 years old this year (older than me!) and there are no problems with it. In Flames' "The Jester Race" has been in my CD player for nearly a decade and it's been through at least 1000 plays and it still plays flawlessly. I also have a lot of computer software CDs that are almost 20 years old and haven't been taken care of by any means, and I haven't had a problem with any of them when I dug them out of my basement.

Don't count on them expiring soon.

But do you believe in this store them upright, not flat rumor? Because I also have had some disks from over 25 years ago still all playing fine and nothing wrong with them. Even have them stacked in over 120 CDs stack on top of each other and they have been like this for around 10 years with not a single one warped or bent out of shape.

I think it's hard to tell what the lifespan is, considering that we haven't had CDs long enough. But I think as long as people take care of them, there shouldn't be any problems. I have a fair bit of older CDs, 80s pressings, that work just fine.

I would recommend not using CD wallets to store CDs though; those things are terrible for them.

Do you smoke? I've bought cds from smokers before and they sometimes look yellowed from smoke on the bottom, but it eventually comes off by putting some rubbing alcohol on the disc bottom and wiping it off.

I have them stored both ways, I don't think it matters.

Guess it depends on quality of the manufacturer - I have cds from 1993 that sounds just as good as they did when I bought them, and I have some cds from 2 years ago that have degraded quite a bit without any obvious signs of trauma. I book all of mine for storage:

Nice

Thanks, that was from a few years ago. Today, I have over a thousand albums, spanning everywhere from grunge and Tori Amos/R..e.m./U2/etc to all the usual black metal/death metal suspects and older punk, grind, etc. I've seen a lot of collections on here that put mine to shame, though.

Well yeah but I doubt it's from that. It's not yellow, just... not as clear as newer CDs. I was thinking that maybe they are made slightly differently and maybe have always been like that but I just hadn't noticed or something...

+1

And about the stacking thing, how come they sell CD racks that store them horizontally? And surely as long as the discs are not touching each other and supporting weight it should be ok...

I'm sure it's fine. This is the first time I've heard of the stacking thing. maybe if all the cds were outside of their jewels and stacked on top of each other... in the sun... I can see that happening. But do you know how much time/pressure needs to take place for a cd to warp or bend? And this is after the jewel case itself has warped and bent to allow this to happen.

You would probably be dead long before it ever occurs.

Necrophagist, Nickelback, Nile

Yea that's a very sad site. there is no reason anyone should listen to that band.

I know some people burn their cds right after they purchase it, and then store the original in a safe place. They just listen to the burned version, and one day if anything happens, he can burn the original again.
It's pretty intelligent but I don't have the time or the courage to do this. I have too many cds to start doing this now...

Hey, that's a first press Nickelback CD SHUTUPANDPIE has.

i seriously doubt rack manufactures care about taking the best care of cds. they are selling an item to make a profit, not to care for your collection.

gravity is an enemy when storing cds flat. eventually, gravity can peel the layers that make up a cd apart. that said, it is not a problem that rears its ugly head often. libraries, archives and government agencies store information on optical media in an upright position. there is a reason for it. but hell, they are your discs, so store them however you like. myself, i store them like a book, in cd cases in a controlled environment.


cd rot is an urban legend. 99% will not rot. period. the exception is:

"All but one rumor have proved groundless; any problems that have occurred have been traced to specific, improperly manufactured batches or releases where a manifest breach of quality control occurred."
http://www.classical.net/music/guide/so ... cerpt3.php
other articles of interest:
http://www.itl.nist.gov/iad/894.05/docs/disccare.html

http://www.itl.nist.gov/iad/894.05/docs ... gGuide.pdf

bad manufacturing lots can happen, but only in rare circumstances. it is something 99% of us should not worry about. handled and stored properly, they will (quite likely) last a lifetime. i have several cds that are over 30 yrs old and they look and play fine.

EDIT:
someone will likely call out my gravity idea, so hopefully this will clear things up. it all has to do with mass - a disc is more affected by gravity when flat since more of its mass is exposed to it.

"Here on earth, gravity pulls stuff down. In fact, that's what we mean by "down" -- it's the direction in which stuff falls when you drop it. The ordinary ("Newtonian") view of gravity is that it is a force which attracts objects to each other. Forces can bend objects. If you hold a long, bendable object on one end, gravity pulls down on the whole thing, and the object will bend downwards. A diving board will bend under its own weight. Gelatin dessert bends under its weight. People who design buildings and bridges and such stuff have to worry about the weight of all the material pushing down on supports, bending things. I once heard on the radio show "Car Talk" that even the hoods of some cars can sag downwards if they are not properly braced. Wires between telephone poles and electricity distribution towers sag under their own weight.

Gravity bends the paths that objects take when they move. A baseball, if thrown in space far away from earth's (and the sun's and the galaxy's and...) gravitational field, will travel in a straight line at a constant speed. Throw it on the earth, and this straight line gets bent so that the ball falls down after going up. The actual path is a parabola (air resistance changes that a bit, but that's the idea). A parabola is a bent straight path.

Einstein predicted that gravity bends the paths of light rays too, and this effect was observed shortly after its prediction. Since then it has been verified lots of times. Search our site for the words "gravitational lensing" and you will find more about this.

Stuff gets weirder still. Einstein effectively said that the paths light takes are "straight", and it's really space and time that are "bent". There are lots of consequences of this idea, such as the prediction of black holes, gravitational radiation, and a change in the frequency of light as it goes into or out of a gravitational field. All of these ideas have strong experimental support. "

Nickelback is not the worst band in the world. I play them around hard rockers and some adults, and I can honestly put up with it.

It could have been Lady Gaga, or worse-- Brokencyde!

All the metal in there to earn me super kvlt troo metuhlz status, and it NEVER fails when I post that pic that some doofus comments about my ONE Nickelback cd.

I like it for a rock record. *shrug*

That would be a very sad "sight," (not to mention it's kinda sad that people care about shit like that...good thing I didn't show my REM or U2 discs...) and I dig your sig btw. Very true!

Come to think of it, I'm actually a little disappointed no one griped about my Ill Nino cd in there...

Honestly, as long as it's not pop or R&B, I'm down with whatever you have.

P.S. Double post.

I would rather listen to Nickelback than any Burzum record.

LOL. Well, go ahead!

Back to the real topic.... Personally, If you have like.. 6 CDs stacked on top of each other... it would take the same amount of space to turn them the other way so although I doubt that gravity would warp them in any real matter of time, if you really care about them, turn them vertical. I try and store all my discs that way.

Good links there Di3Pain or whatever your stupid name is.

You like nickelback.....fag! I'm joking of course. It's okay man I like country! think of all the shit I get haha