Damn it. Was just refilling my car's CD magazine for my trip when I noticed the disc I wanted to put in was going goldeny-browny at the very edge, and inside by the spindle hole. Also- I could simply lift the shiny layer and peel a bit of it back. I really wonder how much of a problem this will become over the years. I'd hate to go to my CD and games collection one day and find them like this. I think I'd be devastated actually. When iPods are spacious enough I'll rerip into lossless.. but my games, just gotta keep my fingers crossed I guess! Anyone else had a run in with this sneaky foe?
It's happened to me a few times actually, nothing massively serious but it was a pain in the ass when it happened to Sonic Jam and Street fighter alpha 3 on dreamcast
I'm in the US and some of my disc-based games have issues as well. It seems to happen fairly often with Saturn and Dreamcast games, I've got a few Saturn games where you can see tiny pinpricks through the data layer when you hold them up to a light. Not the same issue that the OP has, but it's still considered disc rot.
That kind of thing could be due to heat or exposure to sunlight. Either of those sound like a likely culprit if you left it in your car. Personally, I've never seen a disc like that.
The last time I used it in a car was in my first car 4 years ago- and it wasn't in there than longer for a week, inside either a case in the glove box or the player. During the winter. Lol! That said- I got the album from eBay and the album was released in 1993..
There's actually a famous issue with some UK-pressed discs. I believe one of the major pressing plants had major issues in the late 80s and early 90s with discs going brown over time due to an unexpected reaction with the paper the liner notes were made from (I can't remember whether it was PDO or SonoPress) (EDIT: Checked, it's PDO). Initially, I thought that these nicely coloured discs I kept finding were actually designed that way, but sadly it was deterioration. EDIT: Ah, here it is. 'Compact Disc Bronzing': http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_Disc_bronzing
I took out my Project Justice disc (nearest DC disc at the time) and while there is no damage I DID see that the disc did seem to be haphazardly put together and it wouldn't take much to pull it apart.
None of my CD games are suffering from this problem (not even the early PC-Engine stuff). I've also never come across an old (80's) CD that wouldn't work due to disc rot. I have only basic knowledge about this, but isn't it mostly dependent of the quality of the CD? Commercial CD's, except for cheap pressings from underground labels maybe, are unlikely to rot, whereas selfmade stuff is generally of very low quality (except you spent a lot of money on discs).
The pin prick holes in Saturn games is common and, if there was data in that area, it's unlikely the game will work properly. Proper storage is certainly recommended for disc longevity.
Maybe common for Euro Saturn games but not in Japan. As you know I own a shit load of original Saturn games, over 150 Japanese discs and not one single disc has any rot on it. As long as you store your discs well, free of moisture and heat they will last for a very long time. Yakumo
