How did you optimize, or get rid of the "smudges" on your disk?
With a cloth, I assume? But I think that's a red herring. There's people always trying to optimistically come up with solutions for Fallout New Vegas's Freezing, like there was with Fallout 3. The fact its, Fallout New Vegas is a buggy crashy mess. I have no doubts that gamesas knew this and released it anyway. In fact, they've made no mention of fixing the freezes and patch 1.02 doesn't fix it either.
No other game I've played on PS3 has ever crashed. EVER. So it's nothing to do with the hardware, or the disc - it's a faulty game.