Shaped Compact Disc

A Shape- CD (also Shape Disc, ShapeCD or professionally die cut CD) is a CD that vary the contours of the usual circular shape. This special form of CD was developed in the early 1990s by the Berlin music producer Mario Koss.

A shape like a normal CD disc can contain audio, video or other files, but the amount of data is usually very limited, since a large part of the writable surface of the CD is cut out.

Shape- CD is a protected name for the shape discs professionally known as die cut CDs. The Shape CD will be produced and sold by the same company in Germany. The die cut CD is or was also under different names from other manufacturers, in particular CD pressing plants, produced and sold, such as fun CD, Cool disc and more.

Technology

Shaping a Shape-CD/DVD should preferably be balanced, symmetrical construction and the centroid in the middle. This imbalance is avoided when running. Each Shape-CD/DVD needs a contour master, indicating which contour the design must have in order to be able to run in the most popular CD / DVD players. The special shape of the CD / DVD the shape CDs are not usable in all drives. The main reason for this are the imbalance caused by the non-circular shape asymmetrical shape CDs. You can at higher speeds mean that the drive is damaged. This damage can be prevented by an adapter, which is necessary, for example, in slot-in drive. For this reason, most shape discs carry a label that warns to use the disk to the car radio or CD changers.

Manifestations

The so-called business card CDs win despite all these disadvantages in those years is becoming increasingly important, not least because they have no imbalance as other shape discs. This particular type of advertising is used primarily by companies in the computer and IT industry used to, but mostly to make a special product attention to the company. These CDs contain, for example, songs, presentations, advertising texts or films address data or images.

Also available are

  • Normal music CDs with a few titles, for example, by Shania Twain, Jon Bon Jovi, Die Toten Hosen, the Sugababes and the Backstreet Boys.
  • Shape DVDs that such shape CDs work, but can hold a larger amount of data
  • Are ticket - CDs that can be valid as a ticket sold, for example, for music concerts and a title of the artist included (this was, among other things at a concert by DJ BoBo applied, but this CD contains no music, but a voice message by DJ BoBo ),
  • Shape- CDs, which are combined with a magnetic strip, a bar code or a smart card
  • And writable transparent or scented shape discs (so-called flavor - CDs).

All of these manifestations tend to have a symmetrical shape. The popular until around 1998 asymmetric shape CDs are now regularly no longer available new, as the imbalance is too strong especially here.

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