CD other tweaks


Over the week-end, I had the chance to try an audio tweak.. sanding the outside rim of a CD, the impact was great. I have tried the paint route and had some success..but I had heard about using very fine grit sandpaper on the outside rim of a CD. I tried it and it was up there with major component changes. The most hear-able differences were: a more quiet or "blacker" silence between notes..and a sense or more detail..but more ease at the same time. Has anyone else tried this?
whatjd
You must have been speaking with Rick Schultz of Electronic Visionary Systems. If you haven't check out his website: tweakaudio.com - he is truly the king of tweaks. Great guy and really know his shit cold.
There have been numerous threads here about CD tweaks/treatments like Auric Illuminator and Optrix. I use the Illuminator and really like it; am not familiar with optrix but know that there are many out there who are very positive on it. Here's a cheap total system tweak I read about on Audio Asylum a couple of weeks ago. Go to an auto parts store and buy some dielectric tune up grease (from $3 to $15) and apply a fine film of it on all power connections (DO NOT apply to signal connections such as spades, bananas or interconnect RCA's!) such as prongs on male ends of power cords and female iec's (just use a q-tip or toothpick to put a little of the grease into the openings and connect up!). This supposedly helps to maximize electrical contact and prevents arcing etc. I thought the result was pretty good in terms of quieter background, smoother delivery of the music etc. In my opinion, much better than XLO's TPC which Jonathan Scull raved about in Stereophile a few years ago. A nice cheap tweak!
I have tried this it helps.I found the Auric Illuminator to be more effective.
Sanding or smoothing the edges can only achieve so much. I too was skeptical of all of this stuff ( I do NOT believe in "green marker mumbo jumbo") until i tried the Audio Desk Systeme. You know, the "CD circumsizer". It's a motorized platter with a variable speed control ( up to 9000 rpm's ) and an arm equipped with a tapered blade on it. You clamp the CD in place TIGHTLY and proceed to motor the disc up to speed while applying light pressure with the cutting arm. This does several things to the CD. First of all, it actually trues the disc. You would not believe how much "wobble" some of these discs have from the manufacturer. It also removes any burrs or rough edges. It also adds a downard taper to the edge of the disc. All of this adds up to a disc that is better balanced, has less diffraction / reflection problems while offering quicker data retrieval / read times. The results were a great improvement in terms of detail and resolution with a decrease in upper midrange / lower treble glare. Bass was also cleaner and especially improved on "muddy" or "murky" recordings. Pace actually seemed to pick up after cutting these discs especially, probably due to the bass not dragging any more. We tried this using several duplicate discs within the same system and came up with pretty consistent results. My girlfriend, who thinks all of this stuff is "goofy", noticed the difference right away. She told me that i better NEVER cut any of her discs before we did a few comparisons. After we did the first few comparisons using duplicate discs that i had and she heard the difference, she asked me to cut one of hers that she listened to all the time. She is no longer afraid to cut her discs and now thinks differently of SOME of my tweaks. Sean >
Sean, Cable Co has been trying to convince me to get the Audio Desk CD lathe but it is a very expensive tweak and obviously irreversable if you change your mind. Sanding the edges of CD is similar to blackening edges, trying to minimize light scatter. I am very positve about Auric Illuminator after testing several similar products using duplicate CDs. I also like to demagnitize using Bedini II. The ultimate tweaked CD according to Cable Co is Audio Desk Lathe/Furutech RD-1 (demag)/Auric Illuminator triple treatment.......BTW if you get duplicate CDs you can send one to Cable Co and they will but it on A.D. lathe and return it to you, Sam