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Rain-X as CD Enhancement Treatment

I have used the Auric Illuminator treatment on my CD collection for several years now. I am a believer in the AI, and repeated A/B tests of identical treated/untreated CDs bore out significant improvements after treatment with AI.

I ran out of the fluid and my marker dried out, so I was searching for mew treatments on the market before buying another AI kit or choosing something new. That's when I ran across this article by Greg Weaver at Soundstage, where he talks about having used Rain-X and a green marker(Staedtler Lumocolor 357, price about $3.00) as a treatment on his CDs to great effect.

http://www.soundstage.com/synergize/synergize200005.htm

Being the complete geek that I am, I had to try it for my self. I found the marker at Office Depot, and picked up a little bottle of Rain-X for $2.99. I treated a couple of CDs that I have ended up with duplicate copies of (Grant Green's Green Street, Frank Sinatra Sextet Live In Paris)and tested the Rain-X/marker treated vs. untreated disks.

Well, low and behold, the treated disks sounded notably improved; the music was clearer and louder, especially the midrange, the soundstage was larger with better definition and separation of instruments and the bass was tighter and deeper.

I can't say that the Rain-X treatment was or was not better sounding than the AI, but at the least very it is close, for a fraction of the price.

Has anyone else ever tried the Rain-X treatment?
craig_hoch
douglas_schroeder
3,281 posts
 
Eldartford, Yes, I did see your comment on the test being difficult and subjective; I agree in essence. I was not attacking you in my last post, merely stating real possibilities when people conduct these tests. There will be some with hearing issues, some with room issues, some who try cleaners versus polish, etc. These all influence the outcome.

Nasaman, frankly, this has been quite the civil conversation once we got past the initial jousting. :) So far, Eldartford is the only skeptic to actually conduct a test, and I respect his efforts to look into it.

There really should be no need to listen to the track over and over. Find music you like and know well; then select the track or two you want to work with. Polish the disc. Then re-listen. The difference should be so obvious that previous listening saturation should not be needed.

I found an old bottle of Rain-X in my garage! Ha! Now I can find a disc or two and see how efficacious the Rain-x treatment is. It would not surprise me if it comes nowhere near to the improvement of using a polish. It will be interesting to check that.
douglas_schroeder
3,281 posts
 
I will likely use Rain-X first on discs and compare to the untreated disc. Then, I will polish the disc and see if there is further improvement. I found that any type of cleaner had much less effect on the sound post-treatment than polish. Even cleaned CDs made a remarkable improvement after being polished. That's why I ultimiately skipped cleaning and went straight to polishing.

If a Rain-X treated disc still shows large improvement after polishing, then I will skip use of Rain-X, as it would only be comparable to cleaning.

I may run down to the used CD place today, find some new music and have a stack of discs to work with. You know, in the name of science, discovery and all that stuff! ;) Also a convenient excuse to get new music!
tbg
5,263 posts
 
Nasaman, as Douglas says, in my opinion this has been most civilized as compared to what appears on Prop Head on AudioAsylum. I am a social scientists and find it quite curious that many who profess to value science, refuse to listen, Eldartford obviously excluded, and that many who listen are dismissive of worrying about explaining what they hear.

Douglas introduces another concern, namely hearing loss, but I think also that people listen for different things. One of these is to enjoy the musical reproduction that they have without the quest for greater realism. My wife characterizes my listening room as a laboratory. I cannot really disagree. I have achieved greater realism with all of my tweaking with my system, such as isolating all cables from the floor with a single ceramic isolator, but this has meant many false steps and has taken time from listening to music. But when I do listen, I enjoy the thrill of more realism. What accounts for individual differences in this regard?

Finally, why do some bother posting here and elsewhere? It is quite difficult to characterize in words what we hear. Why not just enjoy and tell no one? Is it ego?
eldartford
4,262 posts
 
Agreed this is a very civil discussion.

By the way, my idea for a bit-by-bit comparison of digital files was not to suggest that such a test would have anything to do with sonic quality, which is a subjective thing. I look on such a test as a pre-requisite for there being a sonic improvement. I say, if the bits are identical, so is the sound. If they are different, then we go listen some more.
tbg
5,263 posts
 
Eldartford, if you copy two differently treated discs to a hard drive using WAV and both copies show no errors and the same level of confidence from the WAV database, are the copies bit for bit accurate?
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