Sorry for another topic regarding CD-R lifespan and write quality... but the more I read, the more I get confused and the more I feel that nobody really knows much about this... (I mean facts)
I spend a really long time (and patience) burning CD's, I invest a lot of time and money to try to make sure it will not be a waste of time and that all this effort is not "erased" in a few years time.
I have a good burner (Plexwriter Premium 1 - Now I've bought a new Premium 2), I store my CD's in individual rigid cases, in usually dark environment... and I try to choose the best media that is available to me.
Choosing the right media... that's the main problem. Because nobody seems to be quite sure about this.
Gold, silver, Cyanine, Azo, black CD's... you name it!
I was told that TY is a safe bet. But then TY CD's are Cyanine Dye, which should be the worst type, technically, at least when longevity is a priority.
How long should a TY CD last? 5 years? 10, 20 years?
Should I really spend the extra money (and time to find them) to get Phthalocyanine Dye CD's, like HHB CDR74 Gold:
http://www.hhb.co.uk/hhb/int/hhbproducts/media/detail.asp?ID=1464
Is AZO from Verbatim a superior Dye type, is it better than TY Cyanine CD's?
Is TY Cyanine types, for some reason, much better than other Cyanine CD's, and will they last a long time?
What are the manufacturer claims regarding life span? Is it just me, or for the most part of brands and medias, they just don't claim anything?
How come, in 20 years history of the CD-R, there is still so much doubts and uncertainty about this?
Wikipedia info:
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Cyanine dye CD-Rs were the earliest ones developed, and their formulation is patented by Taiyo Yuden. CD-Rs based on this dye are mostly green in color. The earlier models were very chemically unstable and this made cyanine based discs unsuitable for archival use; they could fade and become unreadable in a few years. Many manufacturers like Taiyo Yuden use proprietary chemical additives to make more stable cyanine discs ("metal stabilized Cyanine", "Super Cyanine"). Older cyanine dye based CD-Rs, as well as all the hybrid dyes based on cyanine, were very sensitive to UV-rays and could have became unreadable after only a few days if they were exposed to direct sunlight. Although the additives used have made cyanine more stable, it is still the most sensitive of the dyes in UV rays (showing signs of degradation within a week of direct sunlight exposure). A common mistake users make is to leave the CD-Rs with the "clear" (recording) surface upwards, in order to protect it from scratches, as this lets the sun hit on the recording surface directly.
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Phthalocyanine dye CD-Rs are usually silver, gold or light green. The patents on phthalocyanine CD-Rs are held by Mitsui and Ciba Specialty Chemicals. Phthalocyanine is a natively stable dye (has no need for stabilizers) and CD-Rs based on this are often given a rated lifetime of hundreds of years. Unlike cyanine, phthalocyanine is more resistant to UV rays and CD-Rs based on this dye show signs of degradation only after two weeks of direct sunlight exposure.
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Azo dye CD-Rs are dark blue in color, and their formulation is patented by Mitsubishi Chemicals. Azo dye is also chemically stable, and Azo CD-Rs are typically rated with a lifetime of decades. Azo is the most resistant dye against UV rays and begins to degrade only after the third or fourth week of direct sunlight exposure. More modern implementations of this kind of dye include Super Azo which is not as deep blue as the earlier Metal Azo. This change of composition was necessary in order to achieve faster writing speeds.
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