longetivity of dvd's and cd's

memory

memory

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How long should a music cd last? I have several albums I bought in stores years ago. Well I never listen to them anymore so I was going to sell them. The problem is I was checking all of them to make sure they work and out of 12 cd's, only 1 of them works. They have hardly been used and not to many scratches on them. Did they do that because they set for so long? Is there anything I can do to make them work again or are they garbage?

Now for the DVD question, if I transfer a VHS movie to a DVD, how long will that DVD last? What will last longer VHS or DVD? What about a store bought DVD movie, how long will it last?
 
Have you tried a different CD player, or cleaned the discs?

DVDs last much longer than VHS tapes do.
 
i meant writeable media

pressed discs last as long as you keep good care of them, but the writeable material in blank media disintegrates in ~10 years
 
ya, wikipedia says they should TECHNICALLY be able to last a long time, but there's too many variables that can speed aging, especially writing on the disc with markers, which can reduce life to just a year or two

last i heard the common 'estimate' for cd-r/dvd-r lifespan was ~10 years, more if you don't write on it, and keep it indoors, in cool temperatures, and of course less if you don't take care of it, and let it get too hot/wet/etc.

the ink oxydizes, and disintegrates is why they become unreadable

store-bought discs are actually pressed pieces of metal inside, which wont break down over time (although early discs, including laserdiscs suffered from something called laser rot, which was basically oxidation on the pressed data layer)
 
I read somewhere that actually using the media every few years (versus storage) will increase the life of the recording. Too technical for me to understand why.
 
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