Physical Music Collections

[Matthew Strongin]

Alright you music loving forumites, here's the deal. Over the years I've amassed a decent size music collection. The vast majority of it CDs. In recent years I've started to buy almost everything digitally and what was once a collection I wanted to display proudly on my shelves is now just a bunch of heavy, accumulated stuff filling up all the nooks and crannies of my closets. So here's the question. For anyone who has made the same transition, what did you do with all the CDs/cassettes/etc.? Sell, donate, burn...? And for those of you still proudly displaying your collections, let's see some photos of your walls of music. I could potentially be convinced to break everything out, plug in the old Marantz changer, and relive the late 90s.

(Seriously, though, I could use some tips on unloading this stuff in a reasonable way.)

[cash]

I don't have any suggestions but I'm in the same boat... compounded by the fact I'm in the process of moving. CDs, books, DVDs ... once so crucial but now so millennial.

[davids]

I did this about four years ago. My solution (since I am one of the twenty three people in the US who still buy CDs) was to get a bookcase and stuff it full of these binders.

Attachment 82768

Here's a link to Amazon: Amazon.com: Bellagio-Italia CD/DVD Storage Binders-3 Pack Black: Electronics

I've got many hundreds of CDs and DVDs in these things and, while they're not exactly gorgeous, they are a big improvement over shelf after shelf of CDs.

Combined with custom cabinets, it looks like this now. If only I could do something similar for the vinyl:

[steve garro]

Burn them all to I-pod and box them up, I'll send you my fedex # and send them to me, where I shall keep them forever with my other 3000-something CD's, and when you ruin your I-pod you can come burn tunes at my house.

I'm serious.

I've soaked up a few collections now.

- Garro.

[TMB]

All of the CD's got burned to digital.

I started on the LP's and realized that was a mug's game.

All of the LP's and CD's were taken to the SPCA and donated when they were running a fund raising garage sale.

Amazing how much more room is in the house.

I have the most listened to stuff on my laptop for easy syncing. Deeper dive stuff is on a separate 1.5 TB hard drive (of which there are two copies) and all of the stuff on my laptop is also backed up to external drives (of which there multiple copies).

Even so, hard drives are the size of a deck of cards. The music on them would fill a reasonable sized room. I count that a win.

[davids]

Lossy audio is a tool of the devil.

[Lurpy]

I haven't "listened" to a CD since loading my first iPod however many years ago it was and just transferred all my CD/DVDs to seven of these binders and pitched all the jewel cases following a move. FYI, don't bother buying additional inserts for the binders, loading up the included inserts takes them to full capacity.

[djg21]

Me too. My wife made me get rid of my old stereo system because it was "too big," and she's been pressing me to sell the closet full of CDs I've amassed over time. I already got rid of the Vinyl years ago.

[rec head]

Technically if you get rid of the disc you should delete it off your computer too. Just thought it should be mentioned. You could probably make an argument that you are storing them in Arizona.

I still by CDs and rip them to flac. Then once the pile on the shelf gets big enough they get thrown in a box. Buying the binders would make sense but right now I have the space so I keep everything.

[oopfoo]

Technically if you get rid of the disc you should delete it off your computer too. Just thought it should be mentioned. You could probably make an argument that you are storing them in Arizona.

I still by CDs and rip them to flac. Then once the pile on the shelf gets big enough they get thrown in a box. Buying the binders would make sense but right now I have the space so I keep everything.

+1 for ripping them with FLAC. It's a good codec that doesn't make music sound like a Sirius XM broadcast.

I trashed the cases and store the CDs in paper envelopes in plastic, sealed cases. Did the same for DVDs and Blu-Ray, too. Now VINYL...that's another story. It's all in record-store racks for browsing, though I REALLY need to reorganize my studio to make better use of my space.

[xjoex]

Here is what I did, all my punk and hardcore vinyl I posted on a forum and asked for donations for the whole collection. Whoever pledged the most to a charity got them.

For the CDs, I gave them to a younger punk bike racer who was psyched. Or give them to Garro.

I ripped it all a long time ago and never felt bad about it .

I kept one 7" - Desiderata / Dischord 61.5


-Joe
PS I had a Rio player with 32MB of space. Then I bought the first 5GB iPod the day it came out.

[golivar]

I kept one 7" - Desiderata / Dischord 61.5

Wow, I have this 7". I like it. That's kind of a random/interesting choice to keep. Were you in this band or something? I sort of knew Amanda years ago, when a friend of mine was in a later band with her.

I have several milk crates of punk and HC vinyl. I don't think I want to get rid of it, though. Music was such a huge part of my youth, it would be hard for me to sell or give away those records.

[Matthew Strongin]

I'm definitely leaning towards giving it away as long as it goes to a good home. Maybe I'll break it out by genre so my Klezmer albums can all go to the same place.

[pdmtong]

the time sink is ripping them...my choice is lossless and later if you want to shrink the file size convert the lossless file to something smaller. its not a big deal to go with a small file until you play the file back on a real stereo - not your car, not your headphones, not a boom box. a real stereo. anything less than lossless sounds like garbage.

[rowdyhillrambler]

Alright, what is lossless.?.? I speak no jargon, and am equal to a monkey.

[Kentf14]

Lossless (as I understand it) generates a bit-for-bit copy of your CD. If needed, you could take the compressed digital file and use it to burn a perfect copy of the original CD.
Per the Wikipedia "A lossless compressed format stores data in less space without losing any information. The original, uncompressed data can be recreated from the compressed version."
There are a lot of formats out there, but a lot of people recommend FLAC since it's open source and is unlikely to go away based on some corporate decision (i.e. apple etc).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_file_format

I've recently undertaken the SLOW process of ripping about 1,000 CDs and did a little research before selecting a format. I always swore that I'd never box up my CDs until a decent music server came around that could handle lossless. My wife is pretty happy to get rid of the massive CD storage furniture. The only downside... I've started stocking up on vinyl LPs ;-)

[pdmtong]

the time sink is ripping them...my choice is lossless and later if you want to shrink the file size convert the lossless file to something smaller. its not a big deal to go with a small file until you play the file back on a real stereo - not your car, not your headphones, not a boom box. a real stereo. anything less than lossless sounds like garbage.

Lossless (as I understand it) generates a bit-for-bit copy of your CD. If needed, you could take the compressed digital file and use it to burn a perfect copy of the original CD.
Per the Wikipedia "A lossless compressed format stores data in less space without losing any information. The original, uncompressed data can be recreated from the compressed version."
There are a lot of formats out there, but a lot of people recommend FLAC since it's open source and is unlikely to go away based on some corporate decision (i.e. apple etc).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_file_format

I've recently undertaken the SLOW process of ripping about 1,000 CDs and did a little research before selecting a format. I always swore that I'd never box up my CDs until a decent music server came around that could handle lossless. My wife is pretty happy to get rid of the massive CD storage furniture. The only downside... I've started stocking up on vinyl LPs ;-)

there is no speedy way to burn discs; thats why I wanted to be sure I burned the best copy possible to my hard drive, and then convert them to 320kps for iphone/ipod. yes, that means I have two file sizes for each song.

I added a column in the file descriptor so i could see the bit rates, in order to keep the versions organized.

its a huge PITA but life at 128kps to me sounds like a 1965 GE clock radio set to full volume so its 4" speaker with about a 5k hz range is screaming to be free.

in itunes/preferences/general/import settings select import using apple loss less encoder

[rowdyhillrambler]

well, I stopped reading after, "as I understand it," because I knew I would not understand it. Not joking, if you don't understand, no way I can/will. CD Luddites of the world unite!!!!!!!!!

Lossless (as I understand it) generates a bit-for-bit copy of your CD. If needed, you could take the compressed digital file and use it to burn a perfect copy of the original CD.
Per the Wikipedia "A lossless compressed format stores data in less space without losing any information. The original, uncompressed data can be recreated from the compressed version."
There are a lot of formats out there, but a lot of people recommend FLAC since it's open source and is unlikely to go away based on some corporate decision (i.e. apple etc).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_file_format

I've recently undertaken the SLOW process of ripping about 1,000 CDs and did a little research before selecting a format. I always swore that I'd never box up my CDs until a decent music server came around that could handle lossless. My wife is pretty happy to get rid of the massive CD storage furniture. The only downside... I've started stocking up on vinyl LPs ;-)

[davids]

Alright, what is lossless.?.? I speak no jargon, and am equal to a monkey.

The term is so transparent that, the first time I heard its antonym, I wondered what "lossy" stood for.