What have you done with optical media?

[dodint]

What have you done with your optical media now that (most) everything is available digitally? I have been lugging around about 225 CDs and about 150 DVDs for the last 15 years or so. I haven't touched a CD since I ripped them to MP3 about a decade ago, and it's *very* rare for me to watch a DVD. Other than the holiday cartoon ones we watch every year I never touch them.

I'm at a loss about what to do with the CDs. I think the best course of action would be to re-rip them to a higher bitrate than what was the standard in 2011 when I last ripped them and then get rid of them. But where? Who wants these?

The DVDs I could probably pick the best 20 and then ditch the rest. My Dad has this vision of retirement where he won't have cable TV or anything. He wants to stockpile media and then live off of that the rest of his life. But I bet he's changed his mind now as well now since, again, everything is digitized.

A few years ago I started trimming down my book collection, donating almost all of my paperback fiction to a library in NC. I want to do something similar with the DVDs, I think. My belief is that the CDs have no value at all, monetarily or functionally.

Any ideas?

[columbia]

Tomorrow, I'm go to remove my CDs from their cases. You can recycle those (cases) at Best Buy?

[skullman80]

I still buy lots of physical meda as far as movies go. 4k blurays/blurays I have probably 300+ and I still plan on buying all of those on physical media if I can.

Games I'm all digital now... have a 4TB hdd for my Ps4.. no need to buy physical copies. I've only bought 2cd's in the past 10 years probably, everything else is digital. I don't know why I have to have physical copies of movies but I do.

[dodint]

I think what's holding me back with the DVDs is I don't believe in streaming services as a real solution to a media library. Every time I decide I want to watch a particular movie, it's either not streaming anywhere or I have to buy it from a vendor that may not be around in 20 years for me to rewatch it.

The CD binder would be a good compromise with the CDs, columbia. Hmm.

[eddy]

I still prefer physical media over streaming when it comes to newer movies. Mainly because I have a nice home theater and want to take advantage of the better sound and picture (but streaming is definitely catching up). I have an older Sony 100 CD disc changer that I still use weekly for music, but I mainly use pandora, amazon and sirius. I have a bookshelf with numerous of those leathery disc wallets that hold thousands of movies. If I had the time to put everything older into a digital library, I would.

[columbia]

I think what's holding me back with the DVDs is I don't believe in streaming services as a real solution to a media library. Every time I decide I want to watch a particular movie, it's either not streaming anywhere or I have to buy it from a vendor that may not be around in 20 years for me to rewatch it.

The CD binder would be a good compromise with the CDs, columbia. Hmm.

I'll just throw the binder in my car. My blu Ray player is on its box and iMac doesn't have an optical drive. I'm just not ever going to listen to them at home (especially with Amazon steaming).

[Viva la Ben]

My physical media is collecting dust in a box somewhere in my garage.

[Morkle]

I think what's holding me back with the DVDs is I don't believe in streaming services as a real solution to a media library. Every time I decide I want to watch a particular movie, it's either not streaming anywhere or I have to buy it from a vendor that may not be around in 20 years for me to rewatch it.

The CD binder would be a good compromise with the CDs, columbia. Hmm.

Torrent and Plex. Any movie you could ever want at your fingertips

I still have a few Blurays around, CDs? long gone.

[NTP66]

All of my DVDs and BRs are boxed up in the basement, and I still have a few hundred software CDs in my desk. As for audio CDs, I do still make MP3 CDs for both my car as well as my wife's car, even though mine has BT streaming via my iPhone. And I think I only do that because I still have about 60,000 blank CD-Rs that I don't want to let go to waste.

[Miami Vice]

Everything is stored in boxes.

I originally did my CDs to 320kbps MP3, and have [mostly] redone them all to FLAC. And WMA Lossles, was screwing around with that for a while too. I have around 400 of them.

My DVD collection was never that large, and except for a few concerts I don't have much evidence of their existence. Originally I ripped them all to XviD AVI files. Most have been replaced by bluray and hd-dvd.

Of which I have about 200. All remuxed to MKV without converting either the video or audio.

Music and video are all housed on an Unraid machine that runs my Plex Media Server software.

[AuthorTony]

I probably have 1800 of so DVDs/Blu Rays. Maybe more, I don't count. I can't imagine getting rid of them and I keep buying more.

[shmenguin]

they're in a box in my basement. lots of blurays. some HD DVD's...i wish i could burn them. not in a computer. in a fireplace.

[columbia]

This thread was a great inspiration and I just de-cased all of my CDs. Everything fits in a shoebox.

[iamjs]

http://www.instructables.com/id/Re-purp ... Ds-into-c/

For those of you that have burned your music/movies to DVD-RW, you may want to take a look at your stash. I ran across quite a few discs in my collection that got hit with disc rot, where the disc becomes unreadable due to deterioration. I thought I read that it's usually starts hitting discs that have been around for a decade, but this article gives a few different ranges, saying anywhere from ten years for low quality discs to a standard of 20 years.

A report by Tedium (republished by Motherboard) demonstrates one of the most alarming failures. Some media, evidently using faulty dyes, can fail in under ten years, via something unpleasantly dubbed “disc rot.”

That just deals with a particular early failure, however. In general, CD formats start to fail in significant numbers inside 20 years – on average, not just including these rot-prone flawed media.

Time's a-tickin', folks.

[tifosi77]

I've jumped into this thread a couple times to comment, but I just realized I don't actually know where any of my CDs are now. I don't know if they're in the garage, or in the storage shed, or what. I'm not even sure if they made the trip from Encino.

[iamjs]

My DVDs are in a box in my office. They probably still have the same dust layer on them from when i packed them up in 2011.
Music CDs are in my game room. Half of them have seen better days due to scratches and stuff. The same layer of dust mentioned above is probably also on these cases.
Burned MP3s are in a 100 CD sleeve. It's sitting on my desk since I was looking for different stuff to load onto my phone before I left for Utah. I might do some surveying tonight of what is left of those CDs and DVDs. I have a feeling I might not like the results since I was known to cheap out on CD-Rs while I was still in school and have already discovered some that are unreadable. That $15 spool of CD-R's probably wasn't such a bargain.

[skullman80]

I remember going to the computer show at the expo mart in Monreville and being amazed at CD Burners and DVD burners etc(as well as the one random booth of porno movies they had every time). Stuff was all the rage back then. Optical drives were the thing. Now...not so much.

[meow]

“Optical media” is a made up term, right?

[NTP66]

“Optical media” is a made up term, right?

If by “made up term” you mean “accurate description”, then yes.

[mikey]

I never really invested much in CDs, for some reason, even as a youth, I didn't think that technology made any sense...mostly, for the simple reason, that I could locate individual song files on the CDs and copy them to my computer, so I figured that would just take over...I didn't give the same thought to DVDs because file sharing was already all the rage at that point in my mind...so I don't believe I own many/any CD/DVDs...

[meow]

“Optical media” is a made up term, right?

If by “made up term” you mean “accurate description”, then yes.

Damn kids

[NTP66]

“Optical media” is a made up term, right?

If by “made up term” you mean “accurate description”, then yes.

Damn kids

You’re more of a 5.25” floppy (haaaa) guy, eh?

[shafnutz05]

Related question: Are Blu-rays a worthwhile long-term investment? I enjoy watching them, and the quality is noticeably greater than DVD, but I'm just afraid the next big thing is going to be coming down the pike. Then again, I also thought that humans can't really detect better quality than 4k, so who knows.

[skullman80]

Related question: Are Blu-rays a worthwhile long-term investment? I enjoy watching them, and the quality is noticeably greater than DVD, but I'm just afraid the next big thing is going to be coming down the pike.

4k is already here. It's the next step up from Blu-ray. Blu-ray stayed a niche for the most part... they never replaced DVD's but the videophiles(like me) will always want the newest and best in video. So I guess it depends if you have already invested in a new 4k display, and 4k bluray player etc and really want the latest and greatest etc.

[dodint]

Investment? The ROI will be dreadful, I reckon.