When I first heard about the Wipe Out! CD Repair Kit, I was a little skeptical. But a pile of "not quite ready to throw out" music and computer CDs next to my desk made me decide to give it a whirl. I called Marc Guest at Esprit who explained to me: "When a Compact Disc gets scratched, most people think it is ruined forever. Nothing could be further from the truth. A scratch on the surface of the C.D. simply confuses the laser, and causes skipping, or the inability of the player to load the C.D. It does not damage the digital information stored below the surface of the plastic." This sounded good to me, and as they were willing to donate a kit for us to test, the only one taking a risk, I figured, was them.

My first patient was a Jerry Garcia music CD. Let's just say I'm listening to it now as I write this article, and it sounds "good as new." The spots that used to skip and/or jump on me no longer exist, and I'm thrilled at the reclaimed perfection of the sound. Esprit's Wipe Out! Disk Repair System is a polishing compound designed specifically for the C.D. plastic, which effectively interacts with the polymer, and allows you to polish the scratch out of your disc.

Now I take pretty good care of my CD's so I needed a real mess to fully test out this product. For my next patient, I searched in the top drawer where my daughter tends to throw unprotected discs and CD-ROM games. Ahh, there it was, the Scupper the Sailor Dog CD-ROM Game. I know for a fact this game has been useless for quite a while. I cleaned off what looked like jelly from the badly scratched up data side of this CD-ROM, and followed the "easy to follow instructions" included with the kit. Each Kit includes an instruction sheet, a polishing cloth, and has enough Repair Compound to fix between 60 and 80 CD's, CD-ROM's, or DVD's. Immediately, I could notice the difference in the look of the disc, but the real test was in trying to install the program from the newly repaired disc. I'm happy to say that this went flawlessly, and the product and my reclaimed CD game work like champs!

If you own a business, or work in the corporate world, you know that many high-end programs can run hundreds, even thousands of dollars. Here is a product that can really save you a lot of headaches. For the price, less than fifty cents per repair, this is a product no computer user should be without. Now, if they would just make a CD glue for all the scratched ones I flung against the wall...

Terry Penn Editor, New Jersey Web Guide Magazine

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