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What's up with Car CD players?

PostPosted: Thu Apr 01, 2004 11:10 pm
by SkaarjMaster
I just rented this 2003 Pontiac Grand Prix and usually on the last few songs of a burned CD I get static that sounds like a record skipping (pht...pht...pht....pht...). It's a little different sometimes but tends to get louder with the music. This CD plays fine on all other players I have (computer, boom box, stereo, other car stereo, etc.). What's the deal?

PostPosted: Fri Apr 02, 2004 5:28 am
by hoxlund
don't know but im extremely happy with my Kenwood Excelon kdc-979 deck

http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio ... ctID=13652

PostPosted: Fri Apr 02, 2004 8:55 pm
by TheWizard
With any standalone CD player, it's pretty much hit or miss. Some players can play pretty much any type of media, while others can't. Since this was just a rental car, I wouldn't worry about it too much. But if you run into this problem with a CD player that you own, try other types of media and see if there is any improvement. Usually, 74-minute discs have a higher compatibility ratio even with older CD players and players with weaker lasers tend to read cyanine (blue) dye discs a little better.

PostPosted: Sat Apr 03, 2004 12:41 pm
by SkaarjMaster
Well, I kinda look at a burned CD playing in the car as a bonus anyway. I know that all my CDs play in everything we have in the house, so that's fine. I remember when I first heard about car CD players.......I laughed that there was no way they would play right with all the bumps and sudden turns. It's amazing that they even play anyway, hehe. 8)

PostPosted: Sat Apr 03, 2004 1:42 pm
by cfitz
SkaarjMaster wrote:I remember when I first heard about car CD players.......I laughed that there was no way they would play right with all the bumps and sudden turns. It's amazing that they even play anyway, hehe. 8)

They actually once sold phonographs (the old vinyl record players) for cars:

http://ookworld.com/hiwayhifi.html

:D

cfitz

PostPosted: Mon Jul 19, 2004 2:55 pm
by digitaldoc
They'll probably laugh at our cd players in cars the same way in 50 years from now. Only 1 cd at a time to be loaded!

PostPosted: Fri Sep 17, 2004 10:39 am
by JamieW
Laugh? I'd love to have the ability to play vinyl in my car. Mediocre vinyl beats the crap out of the best digital sound any day of the week.

PostPosted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 9:13 am
by SkaarjMaster
OK, huge bump (the thread that is). This has been and still is with a CD player I own now in my car (Pioneer DEH-P6500).

Today I was listening to a burned CD-R and it was fine until near the end (maybe this has something to do with it heating up). It didn't really skip it made loud static kinda like whirrawhirrawhirra and got louder when the music got louder. This is what is normally happening now on my Pioneer car stereo these days. I've been playing burned ones all this time. I'm trying a store-bought one tomorrow and I'll see what happens. I think there is something to this heat thing. Maybe I could get and fan and hook it behind the unit and blow air over it while it is operating? It would have to operate out of the car lighter plug though I think. Anyone else having these problems? Is it only burned CD-Rs? My burners are both Lite-On and using Nero to burn. Most have been burnt at 16X or 24X. Maybe I'll try a new one at 8X and see what happens. Also, it seems to happen to the CD-Rs that have a lot of music on them as well more often.

.......I was wondering though, would this static (whirring thing in the background) be more the quality of the CD-R or the quality of the original MP3 file? I know the original MP3s play fine on the computers and all the CD-Rs that give me problems in the car stereo play fine on the home stereo and both computers. I might try ordering some Taiyo Yuden CD-Rs and burn the same thing and see what happens.

....today again with a burned CD-R (80-min one; I believe the other one was 74 min.), around the 8th song the staticy whiring started on my way home from work. It usually happens on the way home from work because I listen to the first few songs on the way to work. I'm just wondering if it's more the CD-R quality, more the MP3 quality or more the car stereo heating up. By the way, my car stereo can't play MP3s, so they are all converted before burning. :(

PostPosted: Sun May 01, 2005 1:01 am
by SkaarjMaster
OK, I just burned the same thing on the same CD-R and it's actually the 7th song that starts giving the static whirrs to the music and louder when the music gets louder. Anyway, I burned it at 8X this time (possibly anywhere from 16X to 40X the first time I burned it) and I'm try again on Monday (to work and back from work) and report back.

If this doesn't work, I'll order Taiyo Yuden CD-Rs and try those at 16X and 8X and see how it plays in my car stereo. Whatever works I'll go to another CD-R and burn at 8X, etc. until all my CD-Rs that play like crap on my car stereo are replaced with ones that do. How does that plan sound?

........hehe, of course, if nothing plays right for the first two or three CD-Rs, then it looks like I'll be asking for a new car stereo for my birthday. 8)

PostPosted: Sun May 01, 2005 5:39 am
by RJW
IF you can and if your drives support it right (NO LITE ON's) then it might be even more succefull to use Verbatim old Metal Azo dye. It seems to be working a lot better then average on problematic car players. But offcourse getting TY is much easier these days and will do in most cases.
Hmm also the old 550 mb cd-r's will have a better succes rate.

PostPosted: Sun May 01, 2005 5:52 am
by RJW
SkaarjMaster wrote:....today again with a burned CD-R (80-min one; I believe the other one was 74 min.), around the 8th song the staticy whiring started on my way home from work. It usually happens on the way home from work because I listen to the first few songs on the way to work. I'm just wondering if it's more the CD-R quality, more the MP3 quality or more the car stereo heating up. By the way, my car stereo can't play MP3s, so they are all converted before burning. :(


Most likely cd-r quality. MP3 codeing hmm I don't see a reason if it plays fine on the pc (knoweing that most PC's have much worse sound ) while it shouldn't play on a good car player.
Keep in mind car players are sensitive pikcy players.
What your are probally experiencing is to high jitter. Car players are known to react much more problematic on slightly to high jitter which is no problem on the average player.

To solve this I would suggest use better cd-r's. Record at lower speed and if that won't work get a YAMAHA F1 if you can and burn with audiomaster on. (lowering jitter)
If that fails then you really got some problematic car player.

PostPosted: Sun May 01, 2005 6:56 pm
by SkaarjMaster

PostPosted: Mon May 02, 2005 10:39 pm
by SkaarjMaster
Looks like it's the quality of the CD-R and the burn speed. I just burned the same thing of the last CD-R that screwed up on me at 8X last night and played it in my car stereo today and everything sounds great! I'll just have to record all music at 8X from now on. In fact, I may reburn some that I know I will listen to in the car stereo. I'm still ordering some Taiyo Yuden though.

So which one of the above eight do you recommend?

.....OK, I'm guessing 1169 - Silver Thermal Lacquer (Hub Printable) is the one that I want.

PostPosted: Tue May 03, 2005 4:40 pm
by RJW
Tricky question.
On one hand carplayers do not like to thick discs's so number 1 would be nice.

On the other hand the others do come with a label which is more protective for scratches. Still in that cases the cheapest printables would do so aren't that 2 and 3.

So it ain't easy to answer for me specially because most TY media I use is branded. (Verbatim pastel/ Plextor )
So anyone who knows if the printables disc's are quite thick ?
Which I normally like but in this case not !

PostPosted: Tue May 03, 2005 11:16 pm
by SkaarjMaster
I won't be using any printable discs, because I'll be printing the labels separately and punching them on using the Memorex old CD labeling system. That's why I'm leaning toward the silver ones. The disc won't be exposed on the labeling side for very long.

Right now I'm leaning towards #8 (1169), #7 (1166) or #1 (1160). But I'm not sure about #3 (1162) and #5 (1167), because they're silver but also printable.

I wonder if the printable discs are thicker than the non-printable after I put my own label on the non-printable?

PostPosted: Thu May 05, 2005 11:16 pm
by SkaarjMaster
Just listen to 2-3 CD-Rs over the past couple days and all of them are fine in the car stereo. I hope this trend continues and there won't be many to reburn. Of course, I have almost 100 CD-Rs to listen to, so this could take a while.;)

So, should I just order the Taiyo Yuden Silver Thermal Lacquer ones (#1169) and just be done with it?

PostPosted: Fri May 06, 2005 1:22 pm
by RJW
Waite you just posted something really significant.
You said you labbelled the disc.
Seeing that you experience problems after some play time it could be that labelling screws up rotation. (Even with labelling tools this happens. !)
Printables do not have these problems.

The silver TY's (1) sould do but I wouldn't label them personally.

PostPosted: Mon May 09, 2005 4:17 pm
by SkaarjMaster
So, what would be the advantage of getting the Silver Thermal Lacquer version (#8 - 1169) over the one you suggest (#1 - 1160)? Besides hub printable that is.

As far as the labelling, if I can find the cover they will be labelled (that is if I saved the old files). If you're talking about the bubbles that sometimes form between the disc and label, then that's no problem. I use matte labels not the glossy. I've had problems in the past with glossy and bubbles and only used them for about 6-8 discs and that's all. If it's music, they will probably be labelled but not for data.

PostPosted: Mon May 09, 2005 5:03 pm
by dodecahedron
using labels is always a bad idea.
they sometimes come off.
they mess up with the balancing of the disc, causing it to vibrate more and interfere with reading the data back (esp. at high speeds). and the unbalance/vibration also creates more noise.
not a good idea all-around.

PostPosted: Mon May 09, 2005 5:09 pm
by dodecahedron
if you're not going to print on them with some sort of printer, i don't see any advantage of hub-printable ones over regular printables.

it seems you like the silver better than the white (personally i would prefer white).

i've no idea what is the difference between Inkjet-Printable, Everest-Printable and Silver Thermal. can you find out what the differences are ?

i would choose just regular printables for the reasons RJW gave - a better protective layer.

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2005 11:50 am
by SkaarjMaster
I know nothing about printing on white CD-Rs with printer. Are there kits to buy at the store or what? How is it actually done? Maybe the CD-Rs that aren't playing correctly actually have a mis-centered label or something. I haven't seen any of my labels start to peel off at all. So far a few more CD-Rs sound fine in the car stereo and don't need re-burning. I'll check on the Silver Thermal Lacquer thing.

I guess the only advantage of the hub-printable is to actually print on the hub. Does this mess with the CD-R when it is playing at all?

If I decide to go printable, then I'll probably order the white regular ones as suggested and figure out how to print them with my Canon i455 photo printer. If I decide to go silver and worry about maybe labeling later, then I need to decide between regular silver and silver thermal lacquer. That's what it has come down to at this point. I appreciate the help so far.

By the way, this thread should have been moved to the CD-R section a long time ago. I really don't know why I started it in the CD-ROM section.

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2005 5:14 pm
by dodecahedron
SkaarjMaster wrote:By the way, this thread should have been moved to the CD-R section a long time ago. I really don't know why I started it in the CD-ROM section.

your wish is my command! :)

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2005 10:03 pm
by SkaarjMaster
Well, the decision was kinda made for me. #8 (1169) Silver Thermal Lacquer ones aren't listed anymore at Rima.com

I ordered the #1 (1160). 8)

EDIT: ....just tried a burned CD-R today and it didn't even play at all in the car stereo. I got Error-30 after waiting about 30-40 seconds. For the Pioneer DEH-P6500 this means either dirty disc, scratched disc or electrical/mechanical. Well, I switched to a different source and back and also turned the ignition off and on and I still get the error. Another CD-R I just burned plays fine also, so forget the last one. As far as dirty disc or scratched disc, I can't see either on it so it just might not like my almost black label or it was a bad CD-R to begin with. This played fine a couple years ago. One other thing, I tried it in my home stereo CD player and it played but with a lot of static when the music depending on the music volume (more with more volume). This is something similar to what my car stereo was doing with other CD-Rs. So, looks like this CD-R is extremely f-ed up and definitely needs to be burned again (on Taiyo Yuden this time). :o

Interesting, on that same page in the manual it says:
"Do not attach labels, write on or apply chemicals to the surface of the discs."
So, how are we supposed to tell one disc from the other if they are not labeled in any way, shape or form?

Can the lens of a CD car stereo be cleaned the same way that we clean the computer CD burner lens or home CD player lens?

PostPosted: Sun May 15, 2005 1:26 pm
by RJW
Printable cd-r/dvd-/+r's require a cd/dvd printer or a printer which supports printing these my canon I865 can and so do some epson models. However it's just a future that slightly is comming in at least with epson and canon models.
I think the I865 was one of the first canon models that could do it but I could be wrong.

About marking media. Right marker will allways work. In europe we have the edding special cd-r markers which would allow you to mark it decent.
And I think you should be able to find a non solvent based marker.
This should work for the normal media.

About labels. bad centrating can cause weird behaviour. Really labelling disc's with labels is quite problematic. If you can read german I could scan you some nice article on it. It should proof that in most cases for cd-r's it's not so good idea and for DVD recordables it's even worse.

Car players can be cleaned with the standard cleaning disc's.

PostPosted: Sun May 15, 2005 4:12 pm
by SkaarjMaster
Thanks for all the info! I really do appreciate it. I'm guessing my printer doesn't have that capability. I won't be getting one of those printers for a while, so the printing directly onto the CD-R or DVD-R will have to wait a while.

I will label them one more time and as they screw up (if they do), I'll burn them again and no label at that point. I do have a lot of CD-Rs that have labels that still play fine though in the computer, home CD player and car stereo. I will definitely look for a non-solvent based marker for my data CD-Rs/DVD-Rs though. That's a good idea. Any links to them?

I do notice that sometimes the labels are just off of center a bit, but sometimes it looks almost directly on-center. My guess is printing in the printer my be a little more accurate. Once I finish going through all my burned CD-Rs in a few months, I might post a final count on how many would play in the car stereo and how many needed reburning. See Ya! 8)