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Years ago, as I reached 200 CDs in my personal collection, I decided to buy
one of those pretty neat soft suitcases made to store 200 CDs in 8-pocket
sheets bounded as in a book. That was an era when I used to travel a lot,
for medium-large stays at construction sites, and I wanted to take my CD
collection with me. I had acquired an also pretty neat CITIZEN brand CD
player, back in 1991, which is sized like a pile of five CD cases, to give
you an idea. So to move from site to site with the player and the 200-CD
suitcase seemed quite reasonable. The player is quite good; it still is my
home CD player, still in good shape and perfect working order. Back in '91
it costed to me some $400, which by then was a serious expense for me. The
good quality and endurance have largely ustified the expense! During these
years I've had other CD players that regularly have failed in two years!
Anyway, back to the subject... The CD suitcase was useful for three months
or so. Then I noticed that the treat I was giving to the CDs, when
extracting them from the pockets and storing them back, was not good for
preserving them, if only because of the friction of the disc surfaces
against the plastic and the cloth of the pockets. I read somewhere that
this in the end will scratch and ruin the CDs, while the proper storage in
plastic cases avoided any scratching, for the disc is taken from the front,
and the cases hold them only by the center hole. I discarded the suitcase
and put all the discs again in their original cases, forgetting the idea.
Of course, almost all my original CDs, 25 years after, still work fine. One
or two of certain brands have deteriorated until unplayable, but this was a
problem of manufacture, as I read later.
Invariably, a few ones that were copies from the originals, have all
failed.
I've also noticed the sticky ink problem with the toner used in paper
photocopies when stored in PVC bags. These are ruined on a few months!
Inigo Cubillo