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Price
v Quality - Is 'cheap' good?
"I can get it cheaper elsewhere - after
all, one CD is the same as another...",
is something we hear from time to time. OK, let
me ask you this question - would you rather have
a 42inch widescreen TV from a known and respected
brand or a company you've never heard of? Like most
things, it comes down to price or quality, even
for CDs!
When we talk of quality with CDs and DVDs there
are two issues - does it look good,
and does it work? Firstly let's
address the question of 'does it work?'.
Manufacturers are always looking at ways of cutting
costs and CDs/DVDs are no exception - both pressed
and recordables. We purchase our discs from Taiyo
Yuden and Sony, two companies who helped pioneer
CD and DVD technology and the original manufacturing
standards.
So how do other disc manufacturers cut
costs?
Disc thickness
By using less polycarbonate material for
each disc, manufacturers are able to increase their
volumes and reduce their costs, but at the expense
of disc rigidity and stability. Problems can occur
with thinner discs when used in high speed drives
as they can wobble and flex, causing misreads. Thinner
discs are more prone to damage and cracking, particularly
the inner ring when clipping them in and out of
laptop drives. In very extreme circumstances, cracked
discs have been known to explode in high speed drives.
Just Google
"Exploding CD" to see what I mean!
Thin reflective layer
During manufacture, aluminium is "sputtered"
onto the disc surface creating a reflective layer
for the laser during read operations. If this layer
is too thin, its reflectivity will be too low and
the laser light will pass directly through the disc
causing it to be unreadable. With some discs you
can see straight through them!
Now, assuming the disc works, does it look good?
After all, it's carrying your brand and marketing
messages and it's the first thing your user will
see before getting to the content. Most of our duplication
work is inkjet
printed, as it will be for the majority of our
competitors, so we'll address a couple of inkjet
related quality issues and things to look out for.
Performance and consistency of the inkjet
surface
There is a huge array of inkjet surfaces available,
some better than others. Colours on a bad surface
will bleed (blue/yellow is a particular problem),
and if the surface is uneven there may be white
'pin-pricks' and colour inconsistency. Some surfaces
don't absorb the ink, causing your CD face to remain
'wet'.
Compatible or original inks
Original inks, such as those from HP or Epson, give
vibrant colours, whereas compatible inks are often
dull by comparison. Achieving colour consistency
between compatible cartridges can be a problem,
especially as there is no guarantee where the ink
has come from - so the job you had done 6 months
ago may be a completely different shade of red the
next time around!
Lacquered discs
It is important that the printed surface is coated
with a lacquer. As the ink is water based, if unprotected,
the image can run if splashed with liquid, or smudge
with the movement of a damp finger! In a bid to
keep costs low, some duplication companies do not
lacquer their inkjet printed CDs.
So, whilst most cheap discs will work OK, their
tolerances are so low that certain CD/DVD drives
will have problems reading them. Also you may find
that after a couple of weeks the colours of your
beautiful logo have bled so that even your name
is unreadable. So although it may seem like a good
idea to save a few pence with a cheaper supplier,
think about who your customer will blame when the
disc doesn't work, or criticise when the print is
poor - it won't be the transparent duplicator, it
will be whose ever name and brand is printed on
the disc surface (if they can read it)!
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