"Rotted" LD's

Archived from groups: alt.video.laserdisc (More info?)

I'm sure you can google for this information.

Short Answer: Most of the time you can't tell until you play it. (Well,
you can look for a 'Columbia Tristar' logo on the disc and a 199x (C)
date, which is in many cases, an indicator of rot) Anyway - While
playing, you will see a large quanity of 'white specs' in the picture.
It somewhat looks likes its snowing on the screen. As the 'rot' gets
worse the video signal will lose synch, the audio will drop out and
eventually the disc will be totally unplayable.

Other than the aforementioned Columbia Tristar discs, I'd say i've
noticed around 2% rot in the 1200 or so LDs I currently own.

= numsix
= http://www.villagebbs.com

Archived from groups: alt.video.laserdisc (More info?)

On Tue, 19 Jul 2005 10:36:49 -0700, Ernest Cassirer <erncass@foxinternet.net> wrote:


>What constitutes a "rotted" LD? How would one know if a disc is "rotted"?

Rot is a manufacturing defect. You'll see colored specks, worst at the
beginning or possibly the end of each side.

Archived from groups: alt.video.laserdisc (More info?)

> Rot is usually multi-colored speckles, though obviously if you see a
> large quantity of white specs that could be rot as well. One or two
> random white specks are not necessarily rot. They may be dropouts
> (inclusions under the disc surface that prevent the laser from reading
> through them). Dropouts do not get worse over time, like rot does. White
> specks could also be from defects on the film source used in the video
> transfer, such as an old print with scratches and dirt.

If you see enough white specs to think it's snowing in the picuture -
that's rot not dropout. Dropout does happen, especially on some older
discs but there should be a big difference between the two. Especially
now that all the discs I have that are rotted are -really- rotting
since all discs are at least (generally speaking) 6-7 years old at this
point.

= numsix
= http://www.villagebbs.com