My 3 year old got into my DVD cabinet when I left him with a baby sitter - the CD's are covered with - well - I am not really sure. Sticky fingerprints, jelly, etc. How do I clean DVD's without damaging the content?
I have been using eyeglass cleaner and polishing cloth on my CDs that I get from the library. I get books on CD and they can be quite abused. This usually does the trick. The recommended cure is just plain clear water and soft cloth. NEVER paper towel or other paper product. They tend to scratch eye glasses or CDs.
My kids are always mucking up their DVD's and video game discs with fingerprints, jelly, playdoh, you name it. We use a product called EZ CD Skip Fixer to polish out scratches with good success.
But try this first. Take regular dish soap or liquid hand soap, (without any particles or fancy stuff in it) and drizzle directly on the shiny side. Using the tips of your fingers, lightly rub this all over the face of the DVD. Then wash off in warm water. Pat it dry with something relatively lint free. Most of the time, this will fix it. If there are visible scratches, then you can use the skip fixer I recommended above.
The important thing is to avoid scratching the plastic. The data is embedded between the two plastic sides so can put up with some abuse without being unreadable. A dirty DVD player can be "picky" with scratched DVD's so be sure that you use a cleaner before you give up on the player or the disc.
I work in a video store and we use rubbing alcohol in a small spray bottle to get the ickies off the dvds. You could also rinse them off in lukewarm water if the stuff is really bad. Just make sure when you wipe them dry to use a soft non-scratching cloth and wipe from the center of the cd to the outside. Cd's are very durable. I boiled one for 10 minutes to see if it would become flexible but it didn't.
Login using the form on the top of the page to post feedback (if you are a registered user). If you have not yet registered, click here to do so. It's FREE!.
