Quote Originally Posted by jb143 View Post
With discs, as Natty Bumppo was alluding to, cheaply manufactured discs mean greater likelyhood of premature failure. Quality made discs mean they should last much much longer.
The problem is, with video games, you really have no idea where they are coming from as Sony and the other companies all have a bunch of facilities which are approved and other than general quality control at release, there is no requirement that the discs be tested for likely future degradation. There was a great segment on Modern Marvels a few months back that showed the Smithsonian or the Library of Congress, I can't recall which and all the testing they are doing of digital formats. The chief digital archivist made it clear that they really have no idea which discs are more or less likely to degrade as even within a single batch by the same manufacturer, you can have failures.