Skipping CD's

Lasers will typically "fall off" in output as they age. As such, their ability to recover data also declines as they age. Whereas some "scuffed" discs may play fine in a new machine with a new, high output laser mechanism, the older laser with lower output is more easily "confused" and can't read the disc quite as well. One might consider this akin to "reduced mental capacity" as one gets way up in the years : )

In many cases, there are adjustments in the player that allows one to "tweak" a laser back into spec. If one has to resort to doing this, you can bet that the laser is getting weak and may need replacement sometime shortly. "Shortly" might be two weeks or it might be two years, depending on how far out of whack it was to begin with and how often you use the player.

If you've got a really old player that you absolutely love, you can have the laser replaced. Depending on the machine and where you have it done at, this should run somewhere around $50 - $125 for the laser. This does not include about 1 - 1.5 hours worth of labor to remove the old one, replace it with the new one & calibrate it for proper operation. As such, you could end up with $125 - $300 invested in reviving your "beloved". Since CD technology ( especially in the DAC section and the filtering being used ) really HAS gotten much better as time progresses, doing such may not be such a good move unless the player really is quite special to you.

The only time that i would recommend replacing the laser with no hesitation would be if one were using a high end transport and the laser failed. Since most of the performance improvements have been in the areas of filtering and DAC's, the transport can still do its' job quite well and you can upgrade the DAC as deemed appropriate. Sean
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Sean,

Thanks-yes, the laser did go really out of sync and had to be reset. Since then, about 10% of my CD collection is not playing. I am trying to get a laser replacement . They also tell me that the Karik transport is very good indeed and with a new gen, DAC, life will be great.
Ajpat

Sean, that hurts: reduced mental capacity as one ages? Well you did say "way up in years" so I will simply consider that I have not yet reached this stage. Aside from that, I will have to chalk up another great answer to your credit. Regards.

Yes, the laser can become out of alignment and not perform as well. In many ways like a poorly aligned turntable cartridge.
It can also go bad, but so does everything else.

In some ways I guess we might be somewhat guilty of having a plug and play mentality with CD's. We spend hours aligning and issolating our vinyl rig to perfection; but then throw a CD player on the rack without a care, and then wonder why it does not perform near as well.