Weird DVD problem, any clues?

So, I've always had a problem with my Terminator Special Edition DVD, its always been a bit flakey ever since I bought it, some DVD players didn't like the disc, others were fine.

Anyway, its been a few years since I've seen it, and so I popped it in for the first time on my current player, and it wouldn't read the disc at all.

The player itself is a little flakey right now, but I checked the disc anyway, and there was a layer of scum, (for lack of a better word) covering the data side, almost grippy in nature. There was also a very fine layer of gold dust on this substance. Anyway, it makes the DVD opaque, and thus unreadable.

I took the disc, washed it off with warm soap water, dried it and cleaned with a lens cloth, and it the disc works better than it ever did...

Which is my question, what the hell is this coating? Its actually present on the bonus disc of the Terminator boxset, and I've cleaned off half the scum, so you can see what its doing. The right half the disc is now all reflective, and the left side is murky.



If you need any better pictures to see whats going on let me know.

Anyhoo, what is it? Whats going on? Oddly, it seems only to have affected these two discs, nothing else as far as I know.

If I was going to hazard a guess I'd say that's evaporated fat and grease from cooking... It normally leaves a thin gold/yellow film on shiny surfaces that's tacky to the touch.

How the hell it got onto a disc though, I'm stumped.

DVD player spooge?

No, the discs have been sitting in their cases for a few years now. And Skor, thats actually a pretty accurate description.

All I can think of is maybe its a left over chemical remnant from the production factory, but I'd like some sort of clarification on my assumption.

Hmm.

I'd say there's been some problem with the box, either because of the product itself, perhaps a defect in manfacturing the plastic of the case, or because of something in the environment interacting with it.

I just checked my copy and it's the same, which sucks.

I went to watch it a while back and my DVD player couldn't read it, and just thought it was the player.

I'll need to try cleaning tomorrow.

Chaos was the law of nature; order was the dream of man. Henry Brooks Adams, American Historian (1838 - 1918)

Ah, so shitty made DVDs it is then.


The surface probably reacted with the air to create a DVD super serum, that when ingested, gives you DVD-like super powers.

Soon you'll be laying around, getting eaily scratched, looking fairly shiny and having people load you into machines.

Have you tried putting it in without Boba Fett standing on it?

OMG. That must be it! That damn Fett, always trying to ruin my fun! And its not even a proper Fett, just some parallel dimension guy.

I don't have that Terminator disc, but I think my brother does. I'll have to check with him to see if his disc is in the same poor shape.

I have only ever once come across a DVD disc that was unplayable, it was a UK version of 'Donnie Darko' that Draven gave me. When you looked at the playable side in reflective light, you could see all sorts of weird shapes and waves in the disc. I'm guessing poor DVD pressing.

Eleanor says: Jack, this is Bimma, blonde and social butterflyist Icelandic who buys duty free menthol vodka, likes Chris Lowe and Transformers and right now a celebrity has buggered of with her bedding.