I'm in the process of ripping about 1100 cd's to an external storage (QNAP) using a Unitiserve for rip and replay. My cd collection was stored on a fairly large shelf. I organized discs by genre occasionally but more likely, chaos prevails. When inspired to look for an artist or a particular disc, frustration would lead to picking something else, readily in my hand. (I would make a poor librarian.)
Now, well into the ripping chores, my cd collection has come back to life. Every artist, song and album is sorted for me and available by touching an ipad. My cd collection is now competing quite favourably with Tidal for play-time.
Long forgotten discs are rediscovered as I handle them in the ripping process. The SQ is brilliant. The large shelf is freed up to be re-purposed. Space in the living room (lounge to some) is freed up. This is an unexpected benefit of the ripping chores.
If not in a hurry to get them all ripped, it can be done while passing by your ripper, and without the dedication of much time. I was not fast in deciding to get a UServe to take this on, never being sure if it's really worth the effort or if the quality of a ripped cd would equal reference level cd replay.
I'm sure now!
Posted on: 19 October 2017 by Nick Lees
I did about 6.5k CDs and despite the tedium it was, as you say, a voyage of discovery - from old favourites, through “forgotten about this, it’s great”, to “where did this come from, and what was I thinking of?”.
And having done that and having put a fair deal of thought (and admittedly re-thought) into metadata, access through the Naim app means I keep accessing stuff that I’d rarely do if it were hostage to being stuck on a shelf and me having to get up from the settee... 
Posted on: 19 October 2017 by Adam Zielinski
I don't own a CD player anymore - all CDs are ripped. But the rate at which I buy and consume music has gone up.
As [@mention:1566878604008210] wrote - CDs is just a convenient means of storing digital files. Or I should write - was a convenient way. Streaming is even more convenient - gone is the physical constraint of being able to store 700MB on a disc.
So it's vinyl (listening to one now) and local streaming for me now.
Posted on: 19 October 2017 by Gazza
Since I bought my Core, I have purchased more music in years, mainly from music magpie or amazon. When I think back to cd heyday they were charging £15,I was earning a pittance by comparison to today? Times change.
Posted on: 19 October 2017 by AndyP19
Asset tells me I have 13,040 albums (146,508 tracks) on my NAS, given that there are probably around 250 downloads in my collection means I've ripped around 12,750 albums. Took me two years - loved every minute of it, although I'm still correcting artwork and the odd track. Plus I recall the hidden bonus tracks with about 20 minutes of silence then the music appears - those had to be imported into Audacity and edited.
Rediscovered some great albums on the way and still remember where I bought most of them, a few CDs that were going bronze (saved just in time) and the amazement at the odd duplication. Although it is sad that given my collection there are some albums that I will never listen to again in my lifetime, which is a sobering thought.
Posted on: 20 October 2017 by David Hendon
I have a smaller number of albums - about 500 ripped and another 200 that I haven't bothered to rip. It was interesting as others have said, but what surprised me was how many albums I had that were still sealed. And the several where I had two copies. In one case three copies, all still sealed.
Also the several where there was no CD in the case, and sometimes no CD or sleeve notes. These were all things my now-grown-up kids liked, needless to say! Buying replacements of those I really wanted didn't cost much. Anyway all in all it was a pleasurable experience.
best
David
Posted on: 20 October 2017 by Innocent Bystander
Unlike CDs, ripping LPs was a great exercise in listening to them all, because they had to be in real time unlike the quick ripping of CDs - and I agree with others that it was an interesting exercise, playing records I had not listened to for years. I weeded out some that I didn't understand why I had bought - but only a handful out of 400+, others reminding me that I had overlooked the enjoyment they gave me.
However, I don't recognise the original CD storage issue, and never understood some friends - often with smaller collections than mine - who seemed to suffer similarly: Ever since I had amassed more than about a dozen or so albums I kept them in order with a simple filing system, duplicated with CDs: I split by classical and non-classical, then filed alphabetically by composer for classical, and playing artist for others (solo artists surname first). I didn't worry too much about the final order of albums in those 'slots' as they were easy to find/browsw, though where there were a lot of albums I grouped classical by types of work and non-classical by release order. And that I duplicate in my 'electronic' storage system today. Children weren't ever allowed to play LPs themselves, and CDs only once they were old enough to do things correctly (other than a few they were given as their own to play on a separate CD player).
Posted on: 20 October 2017 by AndyP19
In terms of finding CDs (before I had them all to hand on my NAS and Naim app I used and still use, as back-up, 'Music Collector' software this is a library package with a barcode zapper where I simply zap the barcode of the CD connect it via USB to computer and the software goes away and finds the album with cover art, plus it allocates the album a number.
I wrote a simply spreadsheet macro which allows me to input the album number reference and it tells me where the CD is located. Sadly, too many are "Box # - in the loft". But handy if I have to track down a CD to re-rip.
