Do laser burns reduce value?

[Oniudra]

I was just wondering on some systems that have a problem with laser burning on the games. Do the ring swirls reduce the value of games or is it a usual happening depending on what dye the disk was made with.

And why do certain systems do laser burns, I have a friend who’s Xbox puts laser burns on every one of his disc, while mine never does. And does it also affect future game play of the disc depending on the burn?

Is it mostly overheating or just a bad laser?

[ProgrammingAce]

Here's what i've had to say on the subject before:


As for a burn mark, it's impossible to do on a stamped disc. IMPOSSIBLE. Even if you mysteriously had a laser that was strong enough (impossible for a cd reading laser) the foil that makes up the game would disipate the heat long before it left a mark. I see tens of millions of discs a year, and not one has ever been returned because of a "burn mark". If somehow there was a spike in the voltage in your playstation, the reflection of the beam would blow out your laser before it could ever leave a mark. The disc would survive with no signs of damage, the playstation would be dead. Besides that, the focus of the reading laser is only about the width of a human hair, if it were to leave a mark, your eyes could never see it.

Just to reiterate my point, there is no possible way on the face of the earth for there to be a burn mark on those discs

If you have marks on your disc, it isn't from the laser.

[Oniudra]

Then how does that discoloration get on the disc's?

[ProgrammingAce]

I'm not sure the discoloration you're talking about, but there are always tiny stress fractures in any stamped CD/DVD. It's a byproduct of the manufacturing process. The only way to leave a mark on the inside of a disc is to pop it in a microwave.

[rbudrick]

Whoa...this is a new subject to me. I've never heard of such a thing. I doubt snopes.com has anything on this, but it belongs there, imo.

-Rob

[s1lence]

I dunno, I personally saw a burn mark on a dvd nav system in a Audi A8 last saturday. I didn't think it was possible until then, but then again it is in a moving vehicle so thats probably why it happened. The unit itself didnt work anymore either so I'm 99% sure it was a burn mark.

That being said , I've never seen a true burn mark on a videogame system/cd player disc. Manufactoring flaws yes, but burn marks no.

[Oniudra]

Here I scanned one of my disc to show you guys what I mean. Sometimes its on the outer edge even!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v92/oniudra/cd.jpg (http://photobucket.com)

[njiska]

That's generally a sign that there's a mild seperation between the layers (it's a dual layer DVD). It's not a good thing, but it's just a sign of a poor manufacturing process.

[ProgrammingAce]

Nope, not a burn mark. Just a standard flaw in the manufacturing process. It was there all along, you just may not have noticed.

The thing people don't realize about "burn marks" is that a burn is one of two things, it's either oxidization or soot left from the burning material. Since the metal in a disc is sealed air tight, neither of those is possible.

And as i said above, the focus on a DVD/CD player laser lense is smaller than a human hair, if there was a mark left, it would be too small to see.

[Oniudra]

Good to know. Funny to think some games (even if it is the same exact game) may or may not have this flaw.

Its sad to think so many games have this.

Thanks for the help everyone. Anyone I personally asked said it never was there from the start and it was the cause from the system!

[vahn401]

I know at my best buy, we leave all our game systems running non-stop until the day they die and we swap them out. Well, few months back we got in the Socom demo, so I swapped it in, and noticed that the disc i pulled out of the ps2 had a bunch of marks. I thought it was dust, but it didn't rub off. About a week ago we pulled the socom demo out and it had the same thing. Not sure if these were burns or not, but they were not rubbing off with wipes or the forms of cleaning solution we used.

[njiska]

I know at my best buy, we leave all our game systems running non-stop until the day they die and we swap them out. Well, few months back we got in the Socom demo, so I swapped it in, and noticed that the disc i pulled out of the ps2 had a bunch of marks. I thought it was dust, but it didn't rub off. About a week ago we pulled the socom demo out and it had the same thing. Not sure if these were burns or not, but they were not rubbing off with wipes or the forms of cleaning solution we used.

They can not be burns, the laser simply isn't powerful enough. I'd say it's more likely just scratched from the drive itself.

[Wavelflack]

I am simply astounded that anyone is gullible enough to believe in "laser burns", particularly on stamped media. Aside from the fact that the little semiconductor lasers simply don't have the wattage required to heat anything to a noticeable degree, you might also consider that the surface being "burnt" is --[surprise!]-- reflective!

[Tan]

if i mount a ps2 laser on my watch can i cut through steel? j/k. seriously though alot of people think lasers are deadly, i suppose the whole "laser pointer in the eye danger" fad prob didn't help much, either that or they watch too much sci-fi :P

[googlefest1]

the lasers in those drives are not powerful enough top burn anything. yes they can ruin your vision if you aim the beam at your eye and give enough power to it but they can't burn anything. these lasers would burn out if you tried to give them more than an amp of power.

[c0ldb33r]

A girl I used to know said that one time she accidentally left an audio CD (real, not CD-R) in her PCs cd-rom for 8 hours on pause. Apparently her brother was pissed - it was his CD. She said it burned it. I believed her.

This was a number of years ago, like 10 or more, so it probably wasn't a cd burner.

[googlefest1]

well in that case mabey the disk over heated from bad ventilation ?

i work with laser diodes and the ones i have used could not burn anything even I wanted to. The ones i use are more powerful than the ones used in cd players.

But that is today -- some years ago could be a diferent story.