Rain-X as CD Enhancement Treatment

Shadorne, There is nothing wrong with his transport. From my experience treatment of discs works on ALL cdp's. I have confirmed it on these players:
Ah! Njoe Tjoeb
NAD
Rega
Marantz
Ayon
Cambridge Audio
Parasound

Not one of these players had an issue. It's the MEDIA which improves, making the players more efficient.

You can say, "A Bit is a bit, is a bit...." Until the end of the world, but this is WAY too easily heard an improvement (treatment, not necessarily Rain-X) to experience to be held up by objections. Anyone can do this and find out for themselves. I would suggest that anyone who cannot hear the improvement has either profound hearing issues or really, really crappy equipment (or both). This is NOT a comment directed at you, Shadorne! It's an arugment in general. :)

When a fuel additive is put in the gasoline of a car's tank and the performance improves slightly, one does not say, "There was a problem with the engine". Similarly, treatment of the disc resulting in improvement of sound is NOT a sign of a "problem" with the transport/cdp.

Excellent point, Elizabeth! An already "slippery" disc will seem like a "failure" when treated.

Read my comments on the Jena Labs Disc treatment goop:

http://www.dagogo.com/JenaEsoteric3DX.html

Note that I was treating discs on my own long before reviewing this disc treatment system.

Shadorne, There is nothing wrong with his transport. From my experience treatment of discs works on ALL cdp's.

Then I'd suggest PC audio + external DAC or CDP player + external DAC (re-clocking DAC preferably) => this way you completely separate the transport laser "smoothness" issues from the D to A conversion. Just common sense really - rather than treat every disc which seems impractical. (how do you even know when enough treatment has been made?)

Actually Rain-X was developed for use on jet windshields which are not glass but a thick plastic right?

ET

Shadorne, Consider changing the entire set up because a low budget treatment improves sound? Sheesh. You should be an audio salesman. ;)

It works the same with transports using external DACS. I have tested it as well with Benchmark DAC1 and Monarchy M-24 pre/DAC. You're still looking for a problem where there isn't one. I haven't tried it with PC's transports, but I wouldn't be surprised if it improved them audibly as well.

Enough treatment has been made when the disc is shiny. You know, sort of how you can tell when enough car wax has been applied to get a car shiny.

I tested whether re-treatment after a year or two was effective. It was not. The effect was permanent improvement from one treatment.

Man, just DO the test; just get some goop and use it! Don't tell me you won't spend five bucks to find out for yourself? I think you would be VERY surprised at the result. I, for one, would rather spend five bucks and a few hours of my time rather than sell off and purchase a new source. :)

Shadorne, Consider changing the entire set up because a low budget treatment improves sound?

Absolutely! I find it totally unacceptable that digital equipment should perform so badly. Analog has major problems in this area (must be clean and even then you get surface noise) but digital should not be a problem. This is shoddy design - something awful is going on if you get such an improvement.

It works the same with transports using external DACS. I have tested it as well with Benchmark DAC1 and Monarchy M-24 pre/DAC.

Are you saying that a proper re-clocking DAC like the DAC1 can tell if a bit was read by the laser from a treated disc or an ordinary disc? I find this beyond credibility - not unless the disc was damaged or really dirty and some interpolation* was going on in order to generate the bit stream by "guessing". If the CD is in good condition but a CDP is making extensive interpolation (without help from a special green marker CD treatment) then it is a fault of the equipment, IMHO.

I, for one, would rather spend five bucks and a few hours of my time rather than sell off and purchase a new source.

This may be acceptable for you - but if the sound changes audibly with special treatment (other than simply a clean unscratched disc) then basically it proves the equipment is faulty or at the very least sub-par. No audiophile should accept that, IMHO. Say a CD improves 10% after treatment - how in the world do you know that the poor performance of the transport/laser is not still affecting the sound quality by a further 10%? I would not be satisifed with this situation and I would want to get to the bottom of it.

*interpolation - this is very bad as this means missing bits that cannot be reconstructed without a "guess" (these occur about 1 uncorrectable bit in 1,000,000,000 under normal conditions) If you ever heard a CD with "CD Rot" then this is an example of massive interpolation going on - so much data is bad that you are hearing interpolation or "guessing" nearly all the time.

I guess it boils down to philosopy or expectation of what digital equipment should be capable of - to me digital should be a lot more robust than you seem willing to accept.