Which CD side to touch the plastic sleeve?


I have a number of CD holders where one can carry a large number of CD's each in their own plastic sleeve, with a soft cottony insert material to press against one side of the CD, and soft vinyl plastic to press against the other side of the CD.
My question is whether the softer cottony material side is intended to press against the playing side of the CD?
The product illustration shows the playing side pressing against the soft vinyl plastic side of the sleeve, which seems wrong to me.
If I can learn how to use these holders then I can shed a lot of weight when traveling to audition components (without giving up rich desserts), by replacing my old portable transporter boxes which simply carry the complete CD jewel cases, just as they stack side by side on a bookshelf.
I realize what a high tech question this appears to be, but inquirying minds need to know.
listener57

Showing 1 response by mwilson

Ketchup - the bit about not picturing the faces of the CDs (with bandames, label imprints etc) could have something to do with royalties and trademarks or somesuch.

As for your comments, Clbeans - you've learned the hard way like so many of us have, and you speak the truth. My falling out with "the car" came with cassettes - nothing sacred ever went in the car after a couple precious ones went south. With CDs, it can happen even faster.

My rule is: nothing at all goes into the car unless it's a CDR dupe of something safely in my original collection, or unless I truly KNOW I don't care, and am really, really sure of that.

As for the "label side" - a CD in some cases can sustain far far more damage to the underside (data side) and still play than it can to the "label side" - which is a reflective layer that if it peels up, the underside could be pristine, but if enough damage is done to the top, the disc is done for - the laser won't track without that reflective layer 100% intact.

With a manufactured disc (like a CD you buy at the store), the label side is much better protected - perhaps by some sort of coating, but that isn't enough in the heat of a car from preventing these plastic sleeves from gluing themselves to the top layer of the CD and causing damage when pried apart, as mentioned in the thread.

With a CDR, the protection of the label side varies from none at all (like a blank, bulk-quality CDR with no top label - these peel like crazy - at least put a CDR label sticker over the entire label side face, or forget about reliability - even for the week!) to good (a CDR with a full "marker-ready" painted/labeled/coated label face).

If I were you, I'd only take CDRs into the car that are CDRs with a "finished" label face that's printed and marker-ready, and entirely avoid any envelope/cd booklet that employs a clear-plastic face on ANY surface that touched the discs. You can get fiber-enveloped booklets with partial cutaways in the sleeves that show enough of the disc for you to identify them, even if the fiber sleeve is opaque. If you make CDR's, you just write the disc title up top, and put them in showing the name, as best as possible.