garylkoh
WBF Technical Expert (Speakers & Audio Equipment)
distilled is just that, water heated to 212 F boiling and the steam is condensated back into water, presumably free of anything but water. Osmosis is simply filtering water.
Sorry, Christian, but reverse osmosis is NOT simple filtering.
Reverse osmosis removes dissolved substances which filtering will not. Filtering is often needed before the reverse osmosis process.
Reverse osmosis uses pressure and a semi-permeable membrane. It can remove even molecules and ions from the water and so can remove salt from sea water. There is quite a range of technology involved, and can result in a range of quality of water. Extremely pure, sometimes, it is called de-ionized water. Early reverse osmosis technology can pass fairly large molecules, so not everything is removed.
Distilled water is the steam condensed from water being heated to boiling point. It's quality is determined by the process (the materials the still is made of) and also whether there is anything dissolved in the water that has a lower boiling point than water that will be condensed with the steam. For example, if you boil bourbon at 212 F and condense the steam, you get essentially vodka.
Reagent water is the purest form of water possible.
I buy distilled water for my Klaudio, but for convenience, I've been using drinking water from my office water cooler which has a 3-stage filter. A particulate filter which removes undissolved substances, and a carbon filter which removes (mostly) organic dissolved substances and chlorine, and a permeable membrane which removes larger molecules (a semi-permeable reverse osmosis membrane removes smaller molecules as well).
I have found NO difference in the records cleaned between distilled water, water cooler water, or tap water.
I'm assuming that the dissolved chlorine in tap water *might* attach the vinyl, so the water cooler water *might* be better (tastes a lot better too!!).