Re: Definition: "Gold CD"
On Fri, Jun 26, 1998 at 12:57:19PM +0200, Florian Hinzmann wrote:
> What does "Gold CD" mean?
> It isn't the color of the CD I think .. ;)
It's in fact the color... no kidding!
Have you seen the media used by CD writers? It's gold. Well, not really
gold, but a compound. In fact, right now, I'm holding one of the few truly
gold CD's I've seen in a long time. Now they are made of something else
(funny names like "cyannide<sp> something", "something I can't event
pronounce", and "something else that starts with an 'f'" ;-). The cover
surface is still gold in color... btw, if somebody hands you a "blue" cd --
really blue, not greenish -- start screaming and run like if hell has just
been set loose... those are made of some organic compound which degrades
greatly over time, specially if exposed to direct sun light (e.g., when you
leave the cd on the desk by the window during summer). At least, that's my
experience. There are some gold-green, green-blue, dark-shiny-green, ...
The other option is "platinum"/"silver" CD's. Those are the kind that are
used for mass production, but the material is not "soft" enough to be burned
using a cd writer.
Why do ppl emphasize the cd's are gold? Because that means they are not
mass-produced, so they are more expensive than silver cd's. Dwarf used to
sell Debian Gold CD's for about $30, if I recall correctly. That's a fair
price taking into account: a) the media costs less than $3 by the hunderds
(somebody on #debian said he got blank cd's for 50 cents, I want to know
where and how) b) it takes time to prepare the cd c) it takes time to burn
the cd d) one can't burn more than a few per hour e) the burner doesn't come
for free with the computer ;-) ... Don't you love free market economy?
In Hamburg there are some quite excellent material science physicists, whom
I'm sure will be delighted to answer these kind of questions in detail...
(material science people tend to be chatty, I-don't-know-why...)
Marcelo
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