Counterfeit Taiyo Yudens?

[Paul Stamler]

Hi folks:

I've read rumors of counterfit Taiyo Yuden CD-R blanks in the last few
months. If I have a stack of blanks, how can I tell the real from the phony?
I ask because I've been getting some odd results lately: CD-Rs made from
alleged Taiyo Yudens (ordered from www.rima.com) won't fit into certain
Tascam slot-loading CD players, or get stuck in the player if you do get
them in. Sony blanks from Walgreen's work fine in the same players.

Anyhow, any info on the counterfeits? Oh, I'm using the silver-lacquer
discs, not the white-inkjet-printable.

Peace,
Paul

[Richard Crowley]

"Paul Stamler" wrote ...
> I've read rumors of counterfit Taiyo Yuden CD-R blanks in the last few
> months. If I have a stack of blanks, how can I tell the real from the
> phony?
> I ask because I've been getting some odd results lately: CD-Rs made from
> alleged Taiyo Yudens (ordered from www.rima.com) won't fit into certain
> Tascam slot-loading CD players, or get stuck in the player if you do get
> them in. Sony blanks from Walgreen's work fine in the same players.
>
> Anyhow, any info on the counterfeits? Oh, I'm using the silver-lacquer
> discs, not the white-inkjet-printable.

http://www.digitalfaq.com/dvdguides/buyerguides/buymedia.htm
According to Digital-FAQ, Rima is the #2 rated vendor in the US and
is said to have "an excellent return policy for defective media".
That website lists the moulded-in ID sequences that are supposed
to identify the actual manufacturer of any disc.

I have no experience with Rima. I buy all my DVDR and CDR media
from their #1 rated vendor: www.supermediastore.com

My vendor (SuperMediaStore) publishes this info/images online...
http://www.supermediastore.com/taiyo-yuden-how-to-tell-fake-or-real.html

But if you don't have the intact packaging...
I use DVDdecrypter to burn all my DVDRs and it reports on-screen the
moulded-in manufacturer's ID sequence. But it has been reported that
some really unscruprulous counterfeiters (from a country I'll bet you can
guess) are even counterfeiting the moulded in ID sequence.

[Geoff]

Paul Stamler wrote:
> Hi folks:
>
> I've read rumors of counterfit Taiyo Yuden CD-R blanks in the last few
> months. If I have a stack of blanks, how can I tell the real from the
> phony? I ask because I've been getting some odd results lately: CD-Rs
> made from alleged Taiyo Yudens (ordered from www.rima.com) won't fit
> into certain Tascam slot-loading CD players, or get stuck in the
> player if you do get them in. Sony blanks from Walgreen's work fine
> in the same players.
>
> Anyhow, any info on the counterfeits? Oh, I'm using the silver-lacquer
> discs, not the white-inkjet-printable.

Plextools will tell you the ATIP info if you have a Plextor, or google
CDR-Indentifier.

geoff

[jwvm]

On Dec 5, 1:36 pm, "Paul Stamler" > wrote:
> Hi folks:
>
> I've read rumors of counterfit Taiyo Yuden CD-R blanks in the last few
> months. If I have a stack of blanks, how can I tell the real from the phony?
> I ask because I've been getting some odd results lately: CD-Rs made from
> alleged Taiyo Yudens (ordered fromwww.rima.com) won't fit into certain
> Tascam slot-loading CD players, or get stuck in the player if you do get
> them in. Sony blanks from Walgreen's work fine in the same players.
>
> Anyhow, any info on the counterfeits? Oh, I'm using the silver-lacquer
> discs, not the white-inkjet-printable.
>
> Peace,
> Paul

I received a batch of Taiyo Yudens that had excessive defects (cdspeed
quality test) and visually had severe discontinuities in the
interference rings. The ATIP as reported by cdspeed did say Taiyo
Yuden and the dye color looked like TYs. I ordered a second batch from
supermedia.com and they certainly were better. I wouldn't be surprised
if TY is shipping some low-quality merchandise.

[Peter A. Stoll[_2_]]

"Paul Stamler" > wrote in
:

> CD-Rs
> made from alleged Taiyo Yudens (ordered from www.rima.com) won't fit
> into certain Tascam slot-loading CD players, or get stuck in the
> player if you do get them in. Sony blanks from Walgreen's work fine in
> the same players.

How about suspecting the other player in this crime? The Tascam slot-
loader may require thinner than spec-limit blanks in order to work right.

I've heard (but not seen hard data) that the CD spec for thickness is
moderately broad, and that most manufacturers for some years have been
manufacturing very near the thin end of the spec to save materials costs.
Mitsui and TY were, I think reputed to aim near the center of the spec, and
thus quite a bit thicker.

I bet if you weighed a stack of ten of the Sony's on a postal scale or such
you'd find them appreciably lighter than the same number of TY.

Anyway, my latest CD blank purchase was hundreds of white inkjet printable
Taiyo Yuden from Rima Industries. I've spot-checked the errors and been
pleased. I did have one clearly defective one a few weeks back, but that
was not subtle (stopped in the burner, was perfect on a read check until
near the outer edge, where it developed hundreds of thousands of errors
before the stop, and visually there was flaw in the dye layer).

If your problem is thickness, and competent counterfeiter would more likely
cheat on the thin side than the thick side. I suppose the other
possibilities are diameter or the hub.

If anyone here is better informed on the thickness issue, I'd appreciate
correction.

For my own part, I'll get out the scale, stack up some blanks, and report
later today.

[Richard Crowley]

"jwvm" wrote ...
> I received a batch of Taiyo Yudens that had excessive defects (cdspeed
> quality test) and visually had severe discontinuities in the
> interference rings. The ATIP as reported by cdspeed did say Taiyo
> Yuden and the dye color looked like TYs. I ordered a second batch from
> supermedia.com and they certainly were better. I wouldn't be surprised
> if TY is shipping some low-quality merchandise.

It seems more likely to me that somebody is counterfeiting
T-Y discs including the ATIP. What did SuperMediaStore
say about it?

[Paul Stamler]

"Peter A. Stoll" > wrote in message
. 97.131...
> "Paul Stamler" > wrote in
> :
>
> > CD-Rs
> > made from alleged Taiyo Yudens (ordered from www.rima.com) won't fit
> > into certain Tascam slot-loading CD players, or get stuck in the
> > player if you do get them in. Sony blanks from Walgreen's work fine in
> > the same players.
>
> How about suspecting the other player in this crime? The Tascam slot-
> loader may require thinner than spec-limit blanks in order to work right.

It may. Or I may have gotten some slightly warped blanks. (These Tascam
players, by the way, are VERY persnickety about what fits into the slots. Do
I wish the station hadn't bought six of them? Yes.)

> If anyone here is better informed on the thickness issue, I'd appreciate
> correction.
>
> For my own part, I'll get out the scale, stack up some blanks, and report
> later today.

Thanks -- I'll see what I can do. Let's see, my gram scale from the sixties
is...where did I leave that?

Peace,
Paul

[David Morgan \(MAMS\)]

"Richard Crowley" > wrote in message ...
> "jwvm" wrote ...
> > I received a batch of Taiyo Yudens that had excessive defects (cdspeed
> > quality test) and visually had severe discontinuities in the
> > interference rings. The ATIP as reported by cdspeed did say Taiyo
> > Yuden and the dye color looked like TYs. I ordered a second batch from
> > supermedia.com and they certainly were better. I wouldn't be surprised
> > if TY is shipping some low-quality merchandise.

> It seems more likely to me that somebody is counterfeiting
> T-Y discs including the ATIP. What did SuperMediaStore
> say about it?


My recording supplies retailer is carrying *two* TY products.... the
standard, which sells for .24 cents each; and a 'budget' which sells
for .17 cents each.

[jwvm]

On Dec 6, 11:40 am, "Richard Crowley" > wrote:

<snip>

> It seems more likely to me that somebody is counterfeiting
> T-Y discs including the ATIP. What did SuperMediaStore
> say about it?

I bought the first batch from a different vendor who insists that they
really were TY's. They play well in most players as expected and, as
noted before, the dye color was correct. The SuperMediaStore TYs were
aluminized right up to the hole which is different from previous
shipments I have received so maybe that is how they mark their better
products now.

[Peter A. Stoll[_2_]]

"Paul Stamler" > wrote in
:

> "Peter A. Stoll" > wrote in message
> . 97.131...
>> If anyone here is better informed on the thickness issue, I'd
>> appreciate correction.
>>
>> For my own part, I'll get out the scale, stack up some blanks, and
>> report later today.
>
> Thanks -- I'll see what I can do. Let's see, my gram scale from the
> sixties is...where did I leave that?
>
> Peace,
> Paul

I had handy in stock five sorts of blank CD-Rs, three of which I think of
as economy, but possibly not bargain-basement.

I attempted weighing a stack of ten, and attempted thickness measurement
using a cheap "digital caliper". My raw observations were:

Brand oz. Thickness (mm)
Taiyo Y 5.6 1.26
MAM-A 5.5 1.19
Prodisc 5.3 1.15
SKC 5.3 1.16
Plasmon 5.1 1.14

I had considerable repeatability trouble with the calipers, and don't
trust my result much farther than saying that I am almost sure the TY and
MAM-A were thicker about half an inch in from the outer edge than the
other three by "a little", and possibly my TY sample was thicker than the
MAM-A.

The weights were more repeatable but lack resolution. But I am almost
certain the TY and MAM-A blanks weighed more than any of the other three,
which makes it nearly as sure that they are a little thicker over some
appreciable fraction of their circumference.

Eyeballing the hub ridge makes me think the shape of that ridge on my
MAM-A has more abrupt rise and fall than the others.

Anyway, since lots of audio folks used to believe in Mitsui, you might be
able to test my guess if you have some old Mitsui around you can afford
to put at risk. My guess is that your Tascam slot-loader won't like that
either.

By the way, while I was doing this I decided to redo the error rate trial
which brought me to TY, but this time using the actual burner in my new
Primera BravoSE publisher.

All went moderately well until I tried using the Pioneer drive in the
Primera as the checking drive in CDSpeed after I'd gotten decent results
using the Lite-On drive in my PC for the checking. To my horror, the
Pioneer reports trouble reading the disks it burned and for which my
Lite-On drive reports pretty low error rates (zero LITE-On reported C2
errors on each of the five brand samples, not-zero for the Pioneer
reading on TY, and worse on MAM-A and ProDisc. C1 errors were just
continuous, suggesting marginality, not local defects).

This seems potentionally serious, as my current publishing method has me
burning one disk in the Pioneer using CD Architect as the controlling
application, then using the copy mode of Primera's PTPublisher
application for up to twenty more. If it can't read its own burns
reliably, then I'm replicating its misreads (or at least the ameliorating
interpolations). Or maybe it means my copy of CDSpeed has trouble
controlling a USB burner.

So while I'm grateful this discussion prodded me to this discovery, I
don't like my options. I'll first try doing the master burn in each of
my other two drives, and see if CDSpeed thinks the Pioneer reads those
any better.

Or maybe I should do EAC rips and bit-level compare to see whether I'm
actually failing to make identical copies.

[Richard Crowley]

"jwvm" wrote ...
> "Richard Crowley" wrote:
>> It seems more likely to me that somebody is counterfeiting
>> T-Y discs including the ATIP. What did SuperMediaStore
>> say about it?
>
> I bought the first batch from a different vendor who insists that they
> really were TY's.

That doesn't seem terribly surprising. Do they have a good
reputation for not selling counterfeits?

> They play well in most players as expected and, as
> noted before, the dye color was correct. The SuperMediaStore TYs were
> aluminized right up to the hole which is different from previous
> shipments I have received

Or perhaps you (and your first vendor) are in denial about
your counterfeit T-Y discs.

> so maybe that is how they mark their better
> products now.

Seems unlikely that T-Y makes two different classes of products.

[David Morgan \(MAMS\)]

"Richard Crowley" > wrote in message...

> Seems unlikely that T-Y makes two different classes of products.


My recording supplies retailer is carrying *two* TY products.... the
standard, which sells for .24 cents each; and a 'budget' which sells
for .17 cents each.

[Paul Stamler]

"Peter A. Stoll" > wrote in message
. 97.131...

> I had handy in stock five sorts of blank CD-Rs, three of which I think of
> as economy, but possibly not bargain-basement.
>
> I attempted weighing a stack of ten, and attempted thickness measurement
> using a cheap "digital caliper". My raw observations were:
>
> Brand oz. Thickness (mm)
> Taiyo Y 5.6 1.26
> MAM-A 5.5 1.19
> Prodisc 5.3 1.15
> SKC 5.3 1.16
> Plasmon 5.1 1.14
>
> I had considerable repeatability trouble with the calipers, and don't
> trust my result much farther than saying that I am almost sure the TY and
> MAM-A were thicker about half an inch in from the outer edge than the
> other three by "a little", and possibly my TY sample was thicker than the
> MAM-A.
>
> The weights were more repeatable but lack resolution. But I am almost
> certain the TY and MAM-A blanks weighed more than any of the other three,
> which makes it nearly as sure that they are a little thicker over some
> appreciable fraction of their circumference.
>
> Eyeballing the hub ridge makes me think the shape of that ridge on my
> MAM-A has more abrupt rise and fall than the others.
>
> Anyway, since lots of audio folks used to believe in Mitsui, you might be
> able to test my guess if you have some old Mitsui around you can afford
> to put at risk. My guess is that your Tascam slot-loader won't like that
> either.

VERY interesting! Do you happen to have some recent Sony discs around, the
kind they sell at Walgreen's? Those have worked flawlessly in the Tascams.

Peace,
Paul

[Peter A. Stoll[_2_]]

"Paul Stamler" > wrote in
:

>
> VERY interesting! Do you happen to have some recent Sony discs around,
> the kind they sell at Walgreen's? Those have worked flawlessly in the
> Tascams.
>
> Peace,
> Paul
>
>

Sorry, My only Sonys are about ten years old--they have probably changed
source manufacturer half a dozen times or more since then.

This web page:

http://www.chipchapin.com/CDMedia/cdda1.php3

asserts that the spec allows total thickness anywhere from 1.1 to 1.5 mm.
Even allowing for the fact that my cheapo digital calipers in my hands are
not giving very good measurement, that hints that the thickest allowable CD
is a whole bunch thicker than anything you have probably seen lately,
unless possibly you have seen one bearing a rather thick stick-on label.

Specifications are a fine thing--but rather more helpful if people at least
try to follow them.

[Paul Stamler]

"Peter A. Stoll" > wrote in message
. 97.131...

> > VERY interesting! Do you happen to have some recent Sony discs around,
> > the kind they sell at Walgreen's? Those have worked flawlessly in the
> > Tascams.
>
> Sorry, My only Sonys are about ten years old--they have probably changed
> source manufacturer half a dozen times or more since then.

Yep -- and the ones that are ten years old are almost certainly Taiyo Yuden.

Peace,
Paul

[Peter A. Stoll[_2_]]

"Peter A. Stoll" > wrote in
. 97.131:

> By the way, while I was doing this I decided to redo the error rate
> trial which brought me to TY, but this time using the actual burner in
> my new Primera BravoSE publisher.
>
> All went moderately well until I tried using the Pioneer drive in the
> Primera as the checking drive in CDSpeed after I'd gotten decent
> results using the Lite-On drive in my PC for the checking. To my
> horror, the Pioneer reports trouble reading the disks it burned and
> for which my Lite-On drive reports pretty low error rates (zero
> LITE-On reported C2 errors on each of the five brand samples, not-zero
> for the Pioneer reading on TY, and worse on MAM-A and ProDisc. C1
> errors were just continuous, suggesting marginality, not local
> defects).

While I fear I may be committing an etiquette transgression for responding
to my own post, I should not leave this accusation against the Primera
Bravo SE standing.

Having spent most of my day on this problem, I've concluded that CDSpeed
4.7.0.0 cannot do proper disc quality measurement using the Pioneer drive
in my Primera Bravo SE. The drive itself appears to work fine both at
reading a disc as the master for a burn run, and at burning.

The final step in persuading me of this description was a perfect bit-level
comparison of tracks ripped from copies made in the Primera using as copy
masters CDs for which CDSpeed showed reproducible very substantial
clustered C2 errors.

The beyond final step was that I installed CDSpeed 4.7.7.5, which promptly
refused even to try to do a disc quality test using that drive, stating the
drive did not support that function! It still likes my Lite-On just fine.

Along the way to this conclusion, I've seen the Pioneer Drive in the
Primera burning Taiyo Yuden silver inkjet printable stock give me the
highest-quality burns I've had, as measured by CDSpeed on my Lite-On drive.
An 80-minute burn at 10x speed drive by CD Architect, gave 14 C1 errors
and, of course, zero C2 errors. A reread of the same disc gave 9 C1
errors!

To end this with a nod to the counterfeit topic I've drifted from, the TY
discs in this exercise were shipped by Rima.com as their product number
1162.