Disc problems with TV shows on DVD sets using Scanavo cases (1 Viewer)

[BobSchneider]

Hmmmm ok have you tried cleaning the disks with 100% alcohol? Ive saved a few clouded disks with that. But I think is a combination of factors, cheap low rent easily damage dvd blanks and poor packaging that excellerates the (lack of a better term) bio degration of the dvd disks that renders them unwatchable more rappidly than expected. BTW on cnet about a couple a months ago there was a artical about cdrom rot and the early year lies about cds lasting hundreds of years was BS and the average life of music cd in testing varied from 6 year for low grade comerical cd (which most of the record companies were and still are using) to the high quality ones maybe 10 years but the average was 8 years? So is going to be worse with dvds? I hope not but it does not look promising.

 

[Gary OS]

What the heck?!!! I've never heard of anything this bad. Compact discs going bad after 6 years? I don't believe it. No way. There might be some very obscure examples of that, but no way is that the average. And I don't believe DVDs will go bad that quick either - this Scanavo fiasco not withstanding.

Gary "neither DVDs nor CDs may last 100 years, but no way do I believe they are going to crap out after only 6 to 8 years" O.

 

[Jonathan Peterson]

Yes, I have many CD's that hit the 20 year anniversary this year. They still look and play perfectly. I think as long as you store them correctly and do not use them as frisbees, they will last a long time.

 

[DanMel]

Or don't store them in Scanavo cases...

 

[Scott Kriefall]

The Firefly and In Living Color: S1 sets also use Scanavo cases. Single-disc variety, with no disc problems noted. Also the Mel Brooks movie box set...

 

[RickER]

You were talking about CD-rom discs. Right? I can belive they dont last long. But CDs...i know they last 20 years, i have a few that old! I also have a few DVDs from 1997, thats the year i bought them, and they play.

 

[Jeff Willis]

I was a huge CD collector during the 80's and some of the 90's. I have about 450 CD's in the collection, most of which are in the 20-yr age range. The ones that I've checked recently all play ok.

The DVD history's not near as documented but I remember the cases of "LD Rot" with some of the early-mfg'd Lasr Discs. I had a couple of those rot in my collection as well. I don't remember what the visual indications were at the time, just that they wouldn't play after a 1-2 yr storage time. And that was when they were stored as suggested, vertical, friendly temp envorinment, etc.

I haven't yet come across a case of DVD Rot where a disc isn't playable but I've seen the "cloudy" visible issue present on a recently-checked set, Hogan's Heroes S2. I think I posted this earler, but the worst visible disc in the set is disc 5 stored in the single case where I don't see the "Scanvano" label inside the case. The disc played without problems recently after ~2 yrs on the shelf.

 

[John H Ross]

I just saw that Boston Legal seasons 1 and 2 (Region 1) are in thin 2-disc Scanavo cases. ARGH. I'm gonna get some replacement cases just in case...

 

[Kevin L McCorry]

So far, I've had two DVDs rot on me. Vertigo and Looney Tunes Volume 2 Disc 3. The Brady Bunch discs are borderline right now.

OTOH, among the oldest discs I have, Alien, Alien 3, Avengers sets, and Nicholas and Alexandra still play.

 

[Firebee]

``Nicholas and Alexandra'' Great movie!

 

[RickER]

The old Vertigo (orange artwork) is a known problem. It was poorly manufactured.

 

[BobSchneider]

Yes the guy in the cnet artical also had cd's that were 20+ years old but also has some cds as old as 6 or 7 years that were stone dead. His theroy was ethier poor cd manfactor or the inks used for the screen prints on the cd's was rotting out some cd's faster than others? Honestly I didnt believe at first but now were talking dvd rot maybe his story wasnt so off after all? :frowning:

 

[Doug^Ch]

The news that DVDs and CDs may have a very limited lifespan really makes me angry. Besides far better picture quality, one of the major benefits that were touted of digital medium like DVDs and CDs were their longevity. There was nothing touching them like the video heads of tape machines like VHS and Beta. I believe the number thrown around at the time was something like a life span of at least 100 to 300 years; now this idea seems like a load of crap. As someone who has invested $20,000 -$25,000 in CDs and DVDs, I find this news kind of distressing. I bought all of these with the thought that they would last me the rest of my life to watch whenever and however I wanted to. Now it seems like that is a pipe dream. I work in a library where we loan out lots of movies, and we are finding that the VHS tapes were a far better medium for longevity than the DVD. At least with the tapes, people couldn't get their grubby little hands on the medium.

 

[Joe Karlosi]

I don't even know what we're talking about here, and I'm afraid to know! I have Paramount shows -- all the I Love Lucy seasons, for instance... so what's the lowdown on this? Are we talking about strictly ONLY dual slimcases which have two discs inside when you open them? How do I know which are the "Scanavo" cases??

 

[TravisR]

Unfortunately, there's a massive amount of "THE SKY IS FALLING!!!!!" panic going on in this thread and it's completely clouded things.

SOME Scanavo cases used in Have Gun Will Travel, The Brady Bunch and Hogan's Heroes have an oily film that MAY be causing DVD rot.

You can tell if it's a Scanavo case because it says 'Scanavo' inside it near the bottom (I Love Lucy uses them but there's NO reports of problems with those sets). A sensible solution seems to be to look at any of your sets that use Scanavo cases and feel if there's an 'oily film' and if there is, transfer the discs to a binder or a replacement case. If there is no 'oily film', it seems extremely premature to panic and act like the case is going to destroy the disc.

 

[BrianP]

After reading this thread I checked my Andy Griffith Show Season 4 and 5 sets to see if it was effecting the discs. It appeared all but one disc in season 4 was starting to get the cloudy coating and one disc in season 5. I have a lot of the other series mentioned but haven't had the chance to check them yet. However when I compared the cases to other ones they didn't seem to feel different or oily like some have mentioned. Really depressing to hear my DVDs might be silently going bad.

 

[Dave Jessup]

Have just gone through the "likely" discs in my collection, and TCF's "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea" (season 1 part 1) seemed the only likely suspect. Oily film on the inside of the cases, and some smudges on one side of one of the double-sided discs (t'ank yew so much, DVD-18). 91% alcohol Q-tipped on carefully and sparingly, mopped off immediately seemed to remove the smudges without ill effect.

Thanks to all above for the alerts to the possibility of damage. Having worked with various media in archival situations for nearly 30 years (film and recordings), I know how fragile these things can be, no matter the claims of durability early on. My personal position for my collection is - don't panic, but do take sensible precautions when something is noticed.

 

[RoyM]

My take on the longevity issue is that even under circumstances where any medium is engineered to last virtually forever, there are going to be instances where due to manufacturing or materials issues, or other unforeseen phenomena, a certain percentage of that medium is going to fail or disintegrate in some fashion during its projected "lifetime' in one way or another.

My own personal DVD collection is about 2800 individual disks at the moment, and I would say I have had some kind of problem, whether transient or serious enough to warrant replacement, with 100 or more disks. And that's just the ones I've gotten around to actually watching all the way through (about 45 % or so of my collection at the moment). And almost all of those disks were problematic right out of the package brand new, which means they came off the production line with some kind of issue.

So the point I'm trying to make is that a certain amount of error or failure is probably reasonable to expect over the lifetime of these disks, and would not necessarily indicate wholesale failure of the medium itself. It may be that over time, we collectors will discover individual cases where a particular manufacturer had a flaw in their materials that lead to degradation of certain specific product, as may be the case here. But likewise that may be reasonable to expect on a large scale, and no reason to panic in general about your collection.

I think the major flaw with the case of DVD is that it is a very finicky medium, with so much data crammed onto such a fragile element, and the data needing to be converted fairly flawlessly in order to work correctly. CD's have the benefit of a much lower data density and conversion rate to perform successfully, which explains the far fewer cases of problems for CD consumers over the twenty-some years that medium has been around, as opposed to the many more problems for DVD in its ten years of existence.

 

[Doug^Ch]

RoyM,

I think your take is the most reasonable on this entire DVD degradation issue. I thank you for it, and I have a similar number of DVDs, but with probably only around 30% viewed. I am going to try to keep what you said about DVDs not failing as a medium in its entirety, only as a certain percentage in mind. It will let me rest easier at night.

 

[David Owens]

Add The Honeymooners (Classic 39) and Vol. 1 of the Beavis & Butt-head Mike Judge Collection to the list of cloudy discs.

I stumbled across this thread today and am glad I did. First noticed the problem with Honeymooners about 3 months back, but didn't notice any playback issues, so it slipped my mind. After reading these postings, I decided to check my other "slimpak" sets, and sure enough 2 out of the 3 discs in Beavis Vol 1. were beginning to cloud. They're now in hard jewel cases for the time being, along with Honeymooners.

I do have 4 of the X-Files slim sets in Scanavo cases, but so far no issues. Will likely transfer them to jewel cases temporary until I can order some "reputable" slimline replacements.

I've found a "consumer" phone number for Paramount Home Entertainment, so I'll post if I get any sort of answer.