Cd storage

Unless you are lucky enough to live in a very large place, sooner or later you are going to have to look at alternatives to standard shelving even if you do find that CD spines make an attractive alternative to wall paper.  I reached this point a few years ago and have switched to cabinets.  I'm in Canada and managed to find a local product which works very well for me.  Here is the link to give you an idea:

http://www.can-am.ca/CD-cabinet-DVD-cabinet.htm

I'm sure there must be manufacturers/dealers in Europe and elsewhere offering something similar.  I have 2 three-drawer units stacked which stand less than 5 feet high and are about 4 feet wide.  This six drawer piece accomodates well over 2000 CDs, keeps the dust off them and can be locked up when I'm away.

When I rippied my collection this past year I found that those that had been stored for any length of time in sleeves were marked up a bit and had a much higher error rate than those that had always been kept in their jewel cases, so I don't use those anymore.

Interesting.

What types of sleeves, if I may ask?

I also have all my CDs on Ikea Billy Bookshelves (maxed out with extra shelves), however now that everything is ripped onto my UnitiServe with Synology NAS, I'm intending to get me some "Really Useful 18 Litre CD and Multimedia Storage Boxes" from Staples.  At about £10 each, and holding 93 CDs per box, it's an effective way of storing them in the loft, whilst still protecting them from dust and dirt.

I've been using caselogic cases as my main CD storage for several years now.  Jewel cases in the loft in those plastic crates.

They save a lot of space and don't look too bad - but you'd hardly call them elegant and they do have their limitations.

Where possible I store the booklet in the sleeve opposite the CD with the case open and for 80% of my CD's this is fine.  I've never tried storing rear covers as I don't think this would be very practical (cos of the spines), but for some CD's this means I have no track listing. Also for CD's supplied in card packages rather than a jewel case + booklet I tend to end up just storing the CD itself.

Thick booklets can present problems - Opera librettos are a complete no no for sure - and the corners of the booklets do tend to get a bit dog-eared after lots of handling. 

So not a perfect solution, but they're only £18 a throw for the large cases and I'm still buying more of them.  As I move over to streaming the downsides matter less and less and they still provide a convenient way to keep my CD's accessible for the occasional run out in the CDP.

Olly

Can't remember the manufacturer of the sleeve cases I used (tossed them) but most likely they were Caselogic.  IME the difficulty with sleeves is that the playing face of the disc sits right against the sleeve and if any dust/grit etc gets in there, there is the potential for it to be rubbed against the playing surface as the case is moved around, pages turned,CDs inserted and removed etc.  One advantage of jewel cases is that, though bulky, they do keep the playing surface away from any contact with the surface of the case itself.

The CDs that were damaged in this way would, in most cases, still play - but I could not get bit-perfect rips from them.  I suppose that might mean that playback quality might have been degraded somewhat.

I bought one of these - holds around 1,200 CDs.  So far it has been great.

Of course, check back with me after I move to see how it fares in that instance...you know what they say; 3 moves = 1 house fire.

Wrap it with a roll or two of Saran wrap and I'd bet you can move it with the CDs in place .

Given I don't really expect to want or need to access the CD's much again other than to lend to people this is my order of preference:

1) Staples "Really Useful 18 Litre CD and Multimedia Storage Boxes" - thanks George, these could be the winner. No faffing around and realistically I am not going to be browsing the CD's much in the future so design no issue. Minimal effort to file away - just chuck 'em in the box. Only downside is they still consume a bit of space.

2) Fleecepack - this is interesting. I see the Covers 33 shop sells them. Saves the greatest space but how visible / accessible are your CD's if need be? Won't deal with all case types and booklet sizes. Looks like an unindexed pile of plastic to deal with afterwards.

3) Jazzloft sleeves - spines are invisible and they look a bit messy but good space-saving as above.

4) Caselogic - bought a sample of Caselogic but don't like it that much and agree with the limitations outlined by Olly. I am not sure the browsing of these is worth the pain.

Finally, the other option is still to chuck the lot out.

Re the fleecepack covers, please can Chris, EJS or someone comment on my questions:

1) How accessible are they? Assume spine invisible and you can't see the front cover either when they are stored.
2) Do booklets / front covers of various thicknesses realistically fit in or is it just the 2-page style that can be accommodated?
3) How to store once in fleecepack? Easy way to index or just chuck in a box.
4) Anyone else had problems with them leaving residue on CD's as per EJS post below?

Thanks in advance!!

They work well for thin bookets, thick bookets do fit but make the CD sit really snug. The 'fleece' is actually of the non-woven type: poly or nylon fibres glued together. Over time, there is a danger some of the fibres get stuck to the CDs, which happened with mine. On a couple of CDs, the fleecepack also removed the ink from the front of the CDs. I had a brief e-mail exchange with the supplier, it ended nowhere but after that a warning appeared with the product description at the website (in Dutch; "label side can get stuck to the fleece"). Quite shocking really - if you care about your CDs I recommend leaving them in their original cases, or jacket them in jazzloft sleeves. These sleeves cost next to nothing, accommodate just about anything short of opera bookets, and also allow the CDs to be in individual envelopes. 

Cheers,

EJ

Thanks EJS. Doesn't make the fleecepacks sound very appealing particularly as the CD's would be left in there for a very long time and probably in a storage space subject to temperature extremes such as a loft. I suppose there may be an issue with the solvent holding the fibres together.

Whilst I greatly admired the results of your fastidious efforts as described above, I would never get round to doing it all. Can I just check, why are you scanning the original covers, booklets etc, printing inserts at jazzloft size and then storing originals separately? If for collector reasons then you have my full respect but I personally would just want to put the original booklet + rear cover etc in the sleeve.

Thereafter, how do you index and access the JL sleeves...surely just an indecipherable huge pile of thin soft plastic wallets remains?

It started as an experiment and sort of grew out of hand... I'm happy I did it but given the effort involved I would never start over again. I'm not yet done, still about 100 CDs to go, but there's light at the end of the tunnel, and my workflow ensures no more than a few minutes work for a new cover. I don't know why I don't get rid of the original covers, probably just in case I ever end up with a mansion with more shelf space.

As far as indexing goes, no issues as the spines remain readable. 300 sleeves fit onto a single billy shelf... my whole collection fits into a single book case.

EJ

Hello DrMark

I really like that storage unit a lot. Could youy please tell me where you got it. I live in the Netherlands, and it would be nice to find them here. Maybe the manufacturers name would help.

Thanks a lot

urs

In case any one cares, in the end I made the effort to trial the Caselogic that was in my cupboard and was very happy with the pilot. So much so that I have now ordered more.

Olly's review is good and my first impression was wrong really. They make for good browsing yet are very compact. For me the best compromise of the various compromises available. If I was going to just chuck them in a plastic box then I may as well throw them out. The browsing will more be for the benefit of others but a nice nostalgia fest from time-to-time that cannot be recreated on a streamer / computer.

As Olly said, 'as I move over to streaming the downsides matter less and less.'