But the favorite? Imagine the Oak Ridge Boys doing a cover of “Carry On Wayward Son” by Kansas. Yes, it’s on there.

Records.

As in vinyl.

I really enjoy music, and one of my favorite genres is southern rock from the likes of Molly Hatchet, Outlaws, and .38 Special. I thought I had collected just about everything that .38 Special had put out on compact disc and then I checked their wiki page. It turns out that their first two albums were not in my collection, either as compact disc or vinyl. So I fixed that last week by purchasing both albums from a seller on eBay.

Tonight I’m ripping them to my computer, using a collection of cables and software packages that ultimately will end up with .wav files on my hard drive. From there I will create my own compact discs, and ultimately load the songs into iTunes as mp3 files.

Oh, and for those of you reading this that are too young to remember? Here’s what an “iTune” used to look like…

My first observation is that I’m probably not using the proper amount of polishing fluid. The first time around the white buffing compound got used up faster than the blue. After my refill purchase I think I have them running down at about the same rate by reducing the amount of white and increasing the amount of blue that I use for each session. I don’t know if they’re supposed to run out at about the same time, but I would think so.

My second observation is that if I polish a number of discs at the same time (which I usually do, since it doesn’t make sense to get the pads wet just for one or two discs) then the machine heats up. As it gets hotter, it seems to “fuse” the blue polishing compound to the pad. That means that when I try to put additional fluid on it is fluid on top of gelled fluid instead of the buffing pad. Periodically I take a pocket knife and scrape the congealed blue fluid off of the buffing bad and that seems to help. I decided to start doing this when the first blue pad eventually wore out, and I saw how much better a new pad worked. By cleaning off the blue build-up the blue pad does a better job of polishing. The white pad does not seem to suffer from this same issue.

As expected, I use about two white pads for every blue pad. The white compound is a buffing compound, meaning it’s responsible for removing material from the disc to get scratches out. The blue compound is a polishing compound which means it uses less friction, and therefore does not wear out as fast. Instead of ordering new pads (and fluid) from the manufacturer or Amazon I found a vendor on eBay that sells the materials much cheaper. I bought pads in bulk (10 pads at a time) last time to get a better “per pad” price. If you have a lot of discs, I suggest you consider doing the same.

I now have close to 3,000 discs in my collection, and I’m pleased to say that the average purchase price has gone down since I know I can pick up a scratched or scuffed disc from the bargain bins and come home and clean it up so that it plays just like new.

There have been a few exceptions. For example, one copy of a Led Zeppelin disc I brought home would not rip no matter how clean the surface looked. Ultimately I found out the problem by holding the disc up to the light. I noticed the light shining through the disc in a couple of places, meaning the data was completely gone in those areas. It affected two of the songs, unfortunately, so that disc had to go away. Now I check my used discs for this sort of defect before I buy them. No amount of buffing or polishing will restore a defective disc.

I also purchased a J Geils Band Greatest Hits disc that was deeply scratched – enough so that I used sand paper on the disc as the initial treatment. I was able to get most of the scratches out on the bottom, but then I noticed that the top was equally scratched. Of course I can’t polish the upper surface of the disc. I’ll probably keep my eyes out for another copy of this disc that is in better shape and pass my current one on to the library.

Needless to say, there are still appeals. The recording industry probably wanted to make a big splash with this case, and the initial verdict certainly did that. The final result will likely not have the same impact, in fact; the woman may even get out of paying anything altogether.

Thanks for taking up court time and valuable public resources on a useless trial, RIAA.

Before

Here is a picture of the before image of the compact disc I decided to use for this blog post.

The disc was nearly opaque in spots, and there were a number of scuff marks and scratches. Some of the scratches went fairly deep so I decided that this disc would require the use of the full four-cycle system provided by the JFJ Easy Pro Plus. I did not take pictures of the disc at each stage but I will show the final results in a few paragraphs.

Heavy Sandpaper

For deep scratches I have the option of using a heavy grit sandpaper disc. The word “heavy” here is relative. I have some really heavy grit sandpaper sheets that I use in my wood working shop; the heavy grit for this device is nowhere near that coarse. The heavy sandpaper is called for if I can push my fingernail across the surface of the disc and feel it catch in the grooves. I could on this disc, so I ran for about twenty seconds on the heavy grit sandpaper.

Light Sandpaper

On a disc that does not have heavy scratches but still has scuffs that are too numerous for the abrasive fluid I can use the light sand paper. It is required to use the light sandpaper after the heavy sandpaper in order to smooth out any abrasion marks left by the first (coarse) treatment. The light sandpaper leaves a fine, smooth haze over the entire surface of the disc. At this point I should not be able to see any remnants of the deeper scratches (if I have used the heavy sandpaper).

Abrasive Liquid

Next up is the white abrasive that goes on a foam pad. The pad should be damp but not wet. If the pad is throwing off too much excess fluid then it is too wet. With most of the discs that I purchase that are scratched or scuffed this is the first step that I try, and for the most part it’s enough. It took a disc that was unplayable and made it playable after just two minutes of this treatment.

Final Polish

The final step of the four-step process is a wax or finishing polish. It removes most (but sometimes not all) of the swirl marks left from the previous steps and helps put a final treatment on the surface of the disc. The device comes with some special pads and anti-static spray that I can use to clean off the polish residue at this point, but I have been just using a drop of Dawn dish-washing liquid and regular water to clean things up. I dry off with a lint-free drying cloth and the discs come out looking like this:

I took a disc belonging to a friend (not pictured) that was totaled and recovered the entire disc. It took about fifteen minutes of various treatments (all the way from the heavy sandpaper to the final polish) but ultimately the disc played perfectly. Now when I find some of those potentially valuable surprises in my discount shopping I can restore them to a near-new finish in just a few minutes.

I have had very good results with my JFJ Easy Pro, and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a disc cleaning device. I opted to go for this one over some of the manual crank options since – even though it was more expensive – it seemed that the consistency of a motorized device would provide much better results in the longer term. The device itself is available on amazon.com for a discount price. Like many devices like this (ink jet printers come to mind) the initial purchase is quite cheap because the company will then be able to sell me supplies for the life of the unit. True, that. But I have discovered that eBay has a host of merchants selling both types of cleaning fluid (stage 1 and 2) as well as replacement pads for prices that are much cheaper than the source company. I’m about to order some new pads since the initial two that came with the unit are showing signs of wear, but in the mean time I have cleaned close to 100 discs from my collection or for my friends.

I also found out that you can order the same disc direct from the artist, for much less than $48.99.

I encountered the same situation about a year ago (right down to the local artist) when I found a used disc from Maylee Thomas. Amazon had her discs listed for exorbitant prices, and you can buy them direct from the artist on her own web site for much cheaper. Or even better, go see her live, she’s fantastic.

• Jordan Critz
• Maylee Thomas Band

For each year they put something on the cover that indicates or at least is associated with that year. For 1963 they had first (of course) “1963″, then followed by “1963: Still Rockin’” as the next choice. Look what is on the cover of the second 1963 disc.

I bought it for $3.

Later I looked out on Amazon to get the cover art because iTunes did not find it. There were no new discs available (not surprising, really). There were three used, “… starting at $99.99″ from various sellers. Wait. $99.99? Yes it was true. There were three used discs available, starting at just under $100 and going up to $250. Hm, I said to myself. Just because they’re asking that much doesn’t mean they’re getting it, right?

So the next step was to go out to eBay and search completed auctions. Believe it or not, there are two completed auctions in the last 90 days, both for over $100.

It seems that this disc was self-financed by Miranda and her family before she went on Nashville Star and ultimately became a hit recording artist. There was a very limited production, and most likely a limited distribution. Miranda grew up in Lindale, Texas, which is not far from the D/FW area. I’m guessing that’s why this one showed up here.

You never know what you might find.

Chickenfoot – Soap On A Rope

Earlier this year they brought the 160gb model back in the “iPod Classic” line. As I was trying to decide whether to upgrade or not, I went to bestbuy.com to see what the prices were. On the bottom of the page was a link offering a “trade-in” on my old iPod. After going through the process, it seems that they were willing to give me almost $100 for my used iPod.

Since electronics – especially gadgets – don’t usually hold their value very well, I was a bit surprised. I went out on eBay and discovered that used 80gb iPods were in fact going for around $125-ish.

So the question becomes: would you sell your used iPod on eBay? take advantage of the trade-in value, even if it’s a bit less? Keep the old iPod to give to a friend or family member?