What is This Noise?

I recall encountering this same effect many years ago. It did sound a lot like static. The weird part was that it only seemed to happen on a very few particular spots on an equally few CD's, yet there would always be no visible defect on them whatsoever. What's more is that the noise was entirely repeatable, backing up and replaying the spot invariably gave the same results...and the specific *character* of the sound of the noise would not change one iota when you did replay it - almost like it *was* disc defect - except it wasn't. The disc would look perfectly clean and no amount of wiping them down seemed to change anything. CD pressing defects?? Fast forward a decade or so, after many iterations of system changes (better wiring, some power conditioning, component changes and various tweaks) I one day realized that I was no longer hearing this noise at all, but that it had seemed to fade away by degrees. By that I mean that, at first, the noise just seemed not quite as 'loud' as before, then at some point later in the system evolution it was like some of the affected CD's were no longer exhibiting the problem while others still were. Finally, every problem disc that I had, had eventually been 'freed' from that effect and it has remained so ever since. For the past 7 or 8 years or so, not only has it not recurred, but I would somehow be shocked at this point if it did. The system these days is operating at a high level and all my usual-suspect (soundstaging, dynamics, etc) vagaries have been successfully worked out and, as a byproduct, all things electrical concerning the system seemed a bit more 'stable' (the sound being less affected by things like "popping" when turning on or off a particular light switch, time-of-day voltage sags, etc). Again, no sign of the noise anymore, these days. But, I never did come to any real understanding of what phenomenon might be involved or what might have caused it. My best guess is that it may indeed be related to static charge, but that my 'problem' CD's (which are now for me problem CD's no longer) may have managed to 'trick' or 'induce' the player to audibly stumble in that way - something in the musical signal at some particular spot on the spinning disc may have been enough to trigger interference with some 'borderline' condition existing either in the system as a whole or perhaps the CDP itself...the combination of static and digital "self-noise" anyone?? I don't really know, myself. Have never seen the phenomenon referenced anywhere outside this thread that I recall...

Have you checked the voltage at the wall outlet(s)?

Loved the Soup suggestion. Although static is never good for digital, I suspect the first answer is correct and the laser just needs to be cleaned. Didn't you just have a monster dust storm? Well, it's probably dusty enough there just normally. So try that, else the laser assembly needs to be aligned - more likely if this were an older unit. You didn't drop it did you?

Ivan: I think you've heard what I'm hearing.
It's almost like my system is so resolving now that it is passing artifacts from the equipment used to record the event (microphone head amps with noisy components, etc.).
It's like low-level static riding on the hall ambient noise.
I'm just worried that it may be something in my crossovers.
I'll have to focus and try your "replay" test to see if it can be duplicated on a given musical passage.
It's encouraging to learn that it may go away in time!

Bill: Haven't checked the voltage. Why would this matter?

Truman: It's always dusty in the desert. Also, we just had a "monster" fire on Mt. Charleston that put tons of junk in the air. The Oppo 105 is mere months old but I'll try to find a lens cleaning CD.

BTW, My system is configured in XLR "balanced" mode which should filter out the more typical junk noise.
This wouldn't help if the noise is actually in the source program or coming from my speakers crossovers.

1) yes to humidity..even if its not the cause, you don't want a static charge problem to damage your gear
2) I have heard static pops at higher volume when RCA connection points were not clean, almost like arcing over the contaminants. So cleaning and preserving connection points can help
3) new gear does have a break in period. That "new gear" smell may be your pop's slowly aerosoling away.