Glass CD

[GTMan]

According to the article below. Someone has created a glass CD that is less prone to damage and has a longer lifespan.

This could be a good idea but it brings up a pet peeve of mine which is the claim that the glass CD will have better sound, quote: "like listening to a live performance".

Reminds me of salesmen who think they can sell an expensive gold plated printer cable by claiming it can deliver superior quality ink jet prints. Or those $5000 Denon CD players with their special vibration dampening super deluxe shock absorbtion system (I'm getting sarcastic here).

In my opinion digital data coming off a CD (or printer port) should be 100% accurate. Otherwise all the software we install every day off CDs would be full of fatal errors. A program installed off a CD must be 100% accurate or it will most likely crash at some point.

In terms of paying $5000 for one of those Denon CD players I think the claims of more accurate sound are worthless from the data input side. Where the difference lies is hopefully in the quality of the output, the D/A conversion, signal to noise ratio on the analog outputs, etc.

That is why I don't really understand the "error rate" data that is usually part of a CD/DVD burner review. I've always assumed that those errors are fixed by the reader's error correction and that the point being made is that higher quality output is preferred, not that we are constantly getting faulty data from lower end devices.

But maybe I am missing something here with regards to errors on CD media???

I recently heard there is a new type of speaker cable made of silver that costs around $50/ft and is directional (sounds better if the correct end is plugged into the speaker) and makes Billy Bob Thorton sound like Elvis.

Greg

http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/national/news/20061021p2a00m0et027000c.html

[[buck]]

All that stuff about glass being a "great receptor of sound" and "existing plastic CDs are not completely transparent, information on them cannot be read perfectly" is total marketing hype, since we're talking about a digital format. If in CD is in spec, virtually ever player should be able to play the disc perfectly.

The claim that they "are not affected by heat or humidity and remain in perfect condition forever" also sounds like BS to me. They could be more resistant to warping to normal CDs, but I wouldn't say warping is a huge issue for properly stored CDs.

To sum everything up, a plastic CD should sound the same as a glass CD, unless the source is different.

That is why I don't really understand the "error rate" data that is usually part of a CD/DVD burner review. I've always assumed that those errors are fixed by the reader's error correction and that the point being made is that higher quality output is preferred, not that we are constantly getting faulty data from lower end devices.

Great question. The errors measured in the reviews you read are correctable errors, and as such should not affect playback as long as they do not exceed certain limits.

[dolphinius_rex]

Great question. The errors measured in the reviews you read are correctable errors, and as such should not affect playback as long as they do not exceed certain limits.

Not that most reviews are done with equipment that can actually MEASURE media to those standards or anything though...