Customer Reviews

Maxell CD-340 CD Lens Cleaner

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

My 2002 Pontiac Montana's CD player started acting up a few months ago. Almost every time I put a CD in, the player would spit it back out and the display would say "CHECK CD." After 3 or 4 tries, the player would finally accept the CD. But it sure was frustrating. So I stopped at the dealership and inquired about this problem. The first thing the service advisor suggested was to try a CD lens cleaner. I had never used one of these in my life. And I've had CD players since 1984. But when I went to my brother-in-law's house for Thanksgiving, he had just purchased this same identical CD lens cleaner at the local Meijer store. I asked him if I could try it out in my car's CD player and he gladly obliged. Well, after one cleaning, so far the CD player hasn't rejected any of my CDs. And we drove back home after Thanksgiving...almost 300 miles...and played many CDs. So, for now at least, I'm convinced. I came right home and ordered this Maxell CD lens cleaner for myself. I don't know if I'd feel comfortable enough to try it in my Mac desktop or PowerBook...but I think I'd feel safe using it in my Sony CD player or PlayStation. In fact, the PS2 will be the first device to get cleaned when this arrives. It's been rejecting discs, too. Maybe the lens is just gunked up with dust. Anyways...it fixed my car CD player trouble and saved me a lot of money that the dealership would've charged me to service the darn thing. I'd recommend it highly.

I've used the maxell CD-340 cleaner in my car and home players (two of them -- one a recorder where I've cleaned its mirror too) for 10 years and they've never failed. These things don't do much; you stick it in, listen to some jingoism and a pleasing voice on the first track, then advance to the cleaning track and wait for 20 seconds while a continuous beep ensures you turn the volume way down. Afterward, your lens is clean. That's all there is to it.

Why does the lens have to be cleaned? I can't answer that since I've never seen one. In the cassette era, I bought a clumsy plug-in electrical wand with a metal probe that I had to physically touch to my recording and playback heads (on reel-to-reel players too) to demagnitize them. Apparently all that tape going through left some kind of magnetic charge behind that would foul the signal at some point. It's questionable whether the gadget I owned ever actually worked, unlike this product, which works every time.

There's no such issue with the digital CD lens cleaner. This disk has some encoded voice commands and about a dozen little brushes the protrude about 1/8 of an inch from the surface of the disk. I guess the disk spins and the brushes rub off the bad stuff from the CD lens. If there's another explanation, I'd like to hear it. It works every time.

Unfortunately, the thing this product won't do is eliminate age from cranky car CD players. I've owned a couple GM models where the player had to be replaced and the player in my 2006 Chevy Malibu is becoming increasingly wearisome. It has a habit of failing to play disks that are thicker than the norm. You'd think there would be a standard in the digital industry but there is not. Sometime spinning my maxell CD-340 arrests this behavior but typically it does not. I usually have to burn myself a homemade disk on a maxell CD-R blank disk Maxell 32x CD-R For Music - 30 Spindle to get the recalcitrant player to spin the music.

As for the cleaner, it works in spades every time. Buy with confidence for that purpose.

I was ready to purchase a new CD Player because the one I had wouldn't recognize any CD/DVD's. I read quite a few of

the reviews and based on price and reviews I decided on this one. I installed this cleaner into the player and followed

the instructions and in less than a minute everything was working like new. Great product.

Received the shipment on-time, but the first thing I noticed when opening the box were the words "not for laptop use" written on the package. There was no mention anywhere in the specs or description of this item on the site that said it was only for laptops, so since I only have a laptop, I have now needlessly purchased a product I cannot use.

I was having problems burning DVDs in my Macbook Pro SuperDrive. Bought this and didn't realize it said "not for use in laptops" until after inserting disk and it getting ejected without being recognized by the drive.

BUT...it worked! Tried burning a DVD afterwards and it worked. I guess it spinning in the drive trying to be recognized did the trick.

How 'bout that...

Great item does the job. Easy to use and instructions are easy to follow.

Would recommend to others. Used to clean all my electronics that use CD,s.

I used this product on a Philips DVD Recorder. Horrible Mistake!!! It must have screwed up the lens alignment because all discs that are now inserted into the drive come back with the message "NO DISC" and no playing or recording can be done. It ruined my machine!

This is taking FOREVER. It's been over a week and the damned thing hasn't even SHIPPED yet. PFFT. Order from elsewhere if you want it within a reasonable timeframe.

What a peace of junk. The brushes were all worn after one use. If you can get if for cheap try it, otherwise look elsewhere.

I tried using this product to clean the DVD drive on my Zenith Surround-Sound system, and it wouldn't run at all. It was a complete waste of money.