 303
Sonic Blast CD Cleaner and Restorative
"@#!!*," I bellowed.
My CD of Ellington's The Great Paris Concert had
developed a glitch -- a nasty one. Just as "Kinda Dukish" segued into
"Rockin' in Rhythm," the music halted, stuttered, jumped back 12 bars -- and
repeated that sequence ad infinitum.
Drat!
Worse yet, that particular disc is not currently in print,
so I couldn't replace it.
Double drat!
Then I remembered that I had a tube of goo somewhere around
the house that claimed it "repairs and enhances all CDs and DVDs." A quick and
reckless search through the strata surrounding my desk revealed 303 Sonic Blast -- a tiny
tube containing 4ccs, billed as enough to treat 20 CDs.
I snipped the tube open, spread a small dab on the
Ellington disc with my finger (that's what the instructions advise) and buffed the disc
with a lint-free optical wipe (you could use a tissue, I suppose).
I reinserted the disc in the Musical Fidelity Tri-Vista
SACD player and, sure enough, it played clear through the formerly catastrophic gouge,
proving once again that the universe feels no obligation to perform in what I
consider a logical manner.
I hate when that happens. But I sure am happy I can listen
to my Ellington disc.
It was a miracle of rare device
303 Sonic Blast's website doesn't exactly go into much detail about what the product is.
Actually, it devotes more space to what it isn't: "It is not a polishing compound, or
a coating, or like any other 'CD Repair' product."
The description is maddeningly non-specific: "It is a
specially formulated liquid that leaves behind a micro-layer of product that adheres to
the polycarbonate surface of a disc. This coating not only cleans the CD, but also makes
it highly resistant to dirt, dust, fingerprints, grease, and future scratching. In
addition, it makes the disc virtually static free, but its real purpose lies in its
ability to actually repair scratched or mistracking discs. The coating left on the disc
re-directs the disc reader's laser so minor scratches and scuffs no longer create
mistracking."
Some of these claims are pretty hard to quantify and
others, like being resistant to "future" fingerprints, seem insanely easy to
disprove. (Treated discs seemed to take my fingerprints without any trouble at
all.) However, the fact is, that Ellington disc was unplayable and now I can play it.
That's gotta be worth something.
One more thing -- the website mentions the importance of
keeping the label-side unscathed, and that's a detail most audiophiles overlook.
Some discs don't even have a painted mask over the data substrate, so any scratches on the
label side actually peel off data. Sonic Blast says it protects the label side of a
disc without leaving a residue or coating. I have no proof either way, but it's great that
the company is even alerting people to the issue.
An event which creates faith does not deceive: therefore
it is not a fraud, but a miracle
I tend to ignore stuff like Sonic Blast's claims to improve
the sound of every disc you treat. I reckon it's possible -- I'm sure I could spin
out some remotely plausible theories about the coefficients of reflectivity -- but the
fact is I'm reluctant to clean or spread anything on a perfectly fine compact disc. If you
want to, go ahead and treat your discs. I'd like to keep mine around for as long as
possible, and until you can show me decades of user data, I'll refrain from doing
anything rash to my music collection, thank you very much.
But I can't think of any reason on earth not to treat discs
that no longer provide music -- the worst that will happen is that they'll continue to be
useless --but you just might bring them back to life, as I did with my Great
Paris Concert.
At $6.95 per 4cc tube (or $15.95 for a two-ounce bottle),
303 Sonic Blast pays for itself with the first disc you bring back from the dead -- the
next 19 are gratis. I've now used it on about 12 discs and 11 of them are once
again making music and making me happy. The twelfth was just too far gone -- Sonic Blast
is a doctor, after all, not a miracle worker.
Or maybe not. When I thought my beloved Great Paris
Concert was DOA and impossible to replace, I started praying for a miracle. Finding
Sonic Blast, and then finding that it worked, was close enough for me.
...Wes Phillips
wes@onhifi.com
303 Sonic Blast CD Cleaner
and Restorative
Price: $6.95 USD per 4cc tube; $15.95 for a two-ounce bottle.
Warranty: 30-day money-back guarantee.
303 Products, Inc.
PO Box 966
Palo Cedro, CA 96073
Phone: (530) 549-5617
Fax: (530) 549-5577
E-mail: info@303products.com
Website: www.303sonicblast.com
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