CD Storage Advice? 144
An anonymous reader asks: "I'm up to my ears in CDs! Driver discs, games, software, music, data backups, you name it. Right now they're all stashed in various jewel cases and sleeves, and dumped into boxes in my closet. What's the best way to sort and store them? I bought a 128-disc storage binder, but once it filled, it tore apart from the weight. Any ideas? Does anyone make large-capacity binders that are sturdier than the average stuff you'd find at a Best Buy? What do you use?"
My solution (Score:5, Insightful)
I use those 100 CDR stack spindles that media come in. People at the office never re-use them, so I just grab'em, take'em home, and stack my media on them. Makes in a little of a pain to find stuff, but I use little bits of sticky notes to index major sections (OSs, Windows drivers, games, etc).
It's not ideal, but it works better than anything else I've found to date.
Re:My solution (Score:3, Insightful)
A warning to everyone: don't apply a sticky note to a CD-R, because the glue will peal off the data layer, especially on cheaper CD-Rs.
Re:Images + DVD+/-R (Score:3, Insightful)
Several years ago when only CD's were affordable, I had way too many CDs. Now I just take several CD's (and get rid of older programs in the process) and put as much of them on DVD.
Everything I install on my system (Windows, Office, etc) is all on one DVD. Much easier to store and recover data.
For important stuff (e.g. documents), I use WinRAR and add a recovery record and I use PAR to make an additional recovery record. Perhaps overkill, but I've found the smallest scratch can kill a CD or DVD.
The problem is "denser" media - movies, TV Shows, where one DVD won't foot the bill. I'd like to see Blue-Ray come out.
Use copies, only have a few nearby (Score:3, Insightful)
I make copies of all my CDs, and leave the originals in the jewel case at home on a bookshelf. I don't bother to index them because I rarely look for one in that mess.
I keep the copies in small binders (I like the 72 disk ones, which work for me) in the car. I keep an assortment in each, and just take one binder at a time. It might not always have the exact disk I'm looking for when I want a particular one, but normally I just want music so it doesn't matter so long as there is a variety.
I have a 60 disk changer for my music in the living room. Not enough, but still useful, I just stock it with my long term favorites and live with the selection. (I don't use that stereo much so it isn't too big a deal)
I'm considering ripping everything to a server, and sharing things, but so far I haven't bothered. Still I dream of a nice box on my stereo that will play any of my music. (I even bought one once, but I returned it after I read the software license agreement)
I run only FreeBSD so all my software comes from ports. If I loose it I just download a new copy from the net. Someplace I have a few OS/2 programs on a shelf somewhere, though I'd be surprised if they were still readable.
I don't own a TV, I recommend you throw yours away too. If you are not willing for that (which is nearly everyone) I can't help you, though some of the above ideas might apply somehow.
Re:My solution (Score:1, Insightful)
It might peel it off, but there's it's not a sure thing. Still, I'd always stick them to the read side just to be safe. It's almost impossible to damage the read side in a way that can't be fixed. It drives me nuts when people put CDs upside -down. They have now idea which side a scratch will cause the most damage.
Simple solution... (Score:4, Insightful)
Stay away from Best Buy. Most of their accessories are pure crap.
But since you bought it from Best Buy, did you buy the $39.99 annual replacement policy?
Simplify, simplify, simplify (Score:5, Insightful)
But I'd suggest step one is to simplify your life; if you're at all like me, you don't need all those CDs. I don't even mean in the "if you're not careful, your possessions possess you" sense (although if you want to go that route, that can help too), I mean in the "drivers for the motherboard two motherboards ago that went up in smoke" or "drivers for my nVidia Riva 128 that even if I installed in a system again I'd just download" or "free trial version crap included in a box of Cheerios".
I was beginning to have this problem too, but lo, I cleaned out my CDs, wasn't even too aggressive about it, and lo, well over half of the CD-ROMs were garbage and suddenly I didn't have a problem anymore.
Obviously, this doesn't apply to music CDs, but this can help with the CD-ROM problem.
(If you've already done this, then consider this advice for others.)
Throw most of them out (Score:3, Insightful)
What do I use? A trashcan. (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, unless you're starting some kind of kitchy museum, you really don't need to keep all of that stuff.
Drivers? Get on the web, download the latest versions of everything, put them all on one CD. I guarantee that there is nothing else on those driver disks that's worth keeping.
Games/Movies? Trust me, you do not need too keep every single one you ever purchased. I know it's tempting to keep them "just in case", but that case will never come. Sell them used or give them away. If it's in your closet now it can't be that worth keeping.
Backups? Who are you kidding? I can't think of many scenarios where an individuals vital data would take up more than a handful of CDs or one DVD. There is some stuff that just isn't worth the hassle of backing up like that. If you've got a bunch of ripped music or something just mirror it onto an external hard disk.
I say this as a reformed packrat.
Here's what i've taken to doing... (Score:2, Insightful)
If you look in the rubbermaid tote section of walmart they have some fliptop boxes that are made for jewel cases and others that are made for DVDs. I have one cd box i use for my game cases (the games are in a binder somewhere around here...) and several DVD boxes i use to keep all my DVDs contained (but i always end up with a large stack on my desk...).
Anyway, there is no RIGHT way to do this, i've found. It either works for you, or it doesn't, end of story. PLay around til you come up with a system that works for ya, and go from there.
Re:What do I use? A trashcan. (Score:3, Insightful)
Great, unless you can't find it on the web when you need it. Or you need a newer version since you upgraded some software, or you need an older version than the one you did burn, or you can't install just the driver without having the super-duper-install-drivers and-tons-of-crap-you-don't-need CD.
You are totally missing the point. The parent said to get all the latest versions of the drivers off the web and burn them to one CD. There is no need to keep 15 CDs around for 15 piceces of hardware when the drivers only take 20MB or less on each CD.
I can back up everything important on one CD. It's much easier to do a full backup once a week than to do an incremental backup since I don't have any backup software to figure out which of the 8,000 files changed. Some of us work from home and might just need to grab some file from a month ago.
So you can back up everything on one CD - fantastic! So, why do you ever need more than 2 backup CDRWs then? One for current backup, one for the last one. If everything you need to back up fit son one CD, you don't need to keep a stockpile of old backups around.
What? And jettison my 400 SVCD collection of my former VHS collection of crappy sci-fi movies?!? Why, just yesterday I watched episode 3 of Space:1999 ("Black Sun"), and I liked it!
You need to look at this logically. Assuming you are an averagely busy person who has time to watch 2-3 movies a week, if you have a 400 SVCD collection of movies, even assuming that you watched only those movies for an entire year, the odds of you watching any given one of those movies is less than 0.5%. Assuming you do other things than watch crappy old movies (like watch crappy new ones), your eyes will probbaly never even look at 75% of that colleciton for your whole life.
Go through them, pick out your true favorites, toss the rest. You will thank yourself later when your GF stops calling your place a hellhole and starts spending time there.