CD Repair

Music recording has come a long way since the invention of the record player. Each new device gets more high tech and durable. Yet, even with the increased durability of CD’s, they are still susceptible to normal wear and tear. Yet, performing your own CD repair is not that difficult.

Before performing your own CD repair, it is important to understand how a CD is created. You see, instead of using groves in a tape to mechanically produce sound, a CD uses a laser bounced off a medium to digitally produce a sound. This medium is made of aluminum and coated with a protective barrier.

Now, when a scratch is formed on a CD, as long as the scratch has not damaged the aluminum, than CD repair is still possible. In fact, the protective barrier may make the CD skip by interfering with the laser, but other than that, it has no effect on the actual recording medium. The sound’s information is still there.

Before resorting to drastic measures, you should clean the CD before deciding that it needs CD repair. This should be done by moving a lint free cloth from the middle of the CD outwards. It is not advisable to wipe in the circle motion that you might be inclined to given the disc’s shape.

Try the CD to see if CD repair is still necessary. In fact, you may assume that some visible scratches would have to affect the playback of the CD, but actually many scratches will not necessitate CD repair. Also, if the scratches have damaged the aluminum center, which can be seen by a lack of reflection or double image effect of the scratch, than CD repair is not possible.

Most scratches will be repairable by using an abrasive solution to kind of sand the scratch down. This should be done by using the same motion from the center outward as the solution will leave its own scratches. The solution you use can be a store bought CD repair solution, or many people have found that toothpaste or turtle wax works just as well.