My brother told me to use a dab of toothpaste to fix a scratched DVD and I thought he was nuts

I had a copy of a movie that kept freezing, and he said to rub a tiny bit of white toothpaste on the data side in straight lines, then rinse it off. I was sure it would ruin the disc, but I tried it on a junk disc first. After cleaning it, the movie played without a single skip! He explained the paste acts as a very mild abrasive to polish out light scratches. That was two months ago, and the fix is still holding up. Has anyone else tried this weird trick, or do you have a better method for scratched discs?

2 comments

2 Comments

abby_palmer11d ago

Yeah, that trick actually works for light surface scratches. I've used it on old game discs before. The key is using plain white paste, not the gel kind. For deeper scratches, I've had better luck with those professional disc resurfacing machines, but they're expensive. Toothpaste is a solid free fix to try first.

patel.daniel11d ago

Honestly, that part about using plain white paste instead of gel is the real key. I messed that up once and just made a cloudy mess on the disc. It's a solid tip that saves a lot of hassle.