Blu-ray movie collection... help

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Blu-ray movie collection... help

(20 posts) (15 voices)

Started 1 year ago by ntsing
Latest reply from jsights
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ntsing
Member

So for the last few months I've gotten addicted to the whole "uncluttering" thing, I've sold/donated/tossed a good 90% of my possessions! It's great! One roadblock I've come into though is how to handle my Blu-ray collection. I have probably 150 Blu's currently, all in their original cases. Now with my CDs and DVDs I just made digital one-to-one copies onto my computer, then sold/donated the physical discs. Seems like a good solution, uses no space, easy to organize and very accessible. Now I would do this with my Blu's except they have much higher space demands. My CDs took about 60GB, and DVDs about 1.9TB. I estimate my Blu's would use a good 8-9TB! There's no reason I couldn't go and buy a 10TB Drobo hard drive but I figure it would set me back at least $1400 which seems pretty steep to me. I could toss the cases and put all the discs in a binder but they would lose a considerable resale value without cases...

So any other unclutterers come up with a workable solution?

Posted 1 year ago #
bandicoot
Member

if it was me....and i wanted to see the movies again....i'd just keep the originals as they are.
and if i was more interested in selling them...then i'd sell them.
but you can't keep them AND sell them!

Posted 1 year ago #
whyawhelk
Member

Be aware that legally you can't actually keep them AND sell or donate them at all. Once you get rid of the physical disks, you have no ownership of the data on those disks, and no way of proving that you once legally purchased the film that you now only have a digital copy of (same goes for cds and dvds, obviously). Just a thought to bear in mind before you chuck those (I'm presuming reasonably recent) Blu-rays.

Posted 1 year ago #
hlg
Member

Blu-ray movies will not have a resale value, just like CDs and DVDs do not. They're all mass produced. Me, I would put 'em in a binder and toss the cases. Takes up less space and it's easier to deal with.

Posted 1 year ago #
lmcinnis
Member

Do you have any off-site backup for the data? I copied all of my CDs to my computer/external drive, but I kept the discs (in binders) in case the data gets corrupted, plus I have an online backup service. If I lose all of my music in a hard drive failure, I can easily recover it.

Posted 1 year ago #
Rosa
Member

Are you really going to watch 150 movies again?

To me that's the real question. We have about...I don't know, a drawer full, maybe 30 DVDs and vcr tapes, including home movies from when we were kids. Even of those there are 2 or 3 unwatched discs, because of time constraints (and 2 brand new unopened because between when we made our christmas lists and when Christmas came, my son lost interest in a show.)

Every day you're holding on to them, they're losing value - at this point you can't even give away VCR tapes. So if you want to reclaim that space, I'd just weed them out and take the ones you won't watch again to a resale shop or pawnshop.

Posted 1 year ago #
Claycat
Member

Thank God for Netflix! :)

Posted 1 year ago #
habithacker
Member

I'm with Rosa on this one. I don't understand why you would want to keep movies you've already watched when great new films come out every day. Switch to Netflix, like Claycat, and sell the DVDs.

Posted 1 year ago #
lucy1965
Member

I, like Claycat, adore Netflix and have been able to thin out a lot of my DVD collection because of it -- but there are some things, like the UK edition of the complete "Nigella Bites" series or the copy of "My Neighbor Totoro" that my BIL in Japan sent for DS, that can't be easily replaced.

However, that doesn't seem to be ntsing's issue, so I'll join Rosa in asking: "How likely is it that you're really going to watch all of those movies again, and can you spare the space?"

Posted 1 year ago #
Rosa
Member

Heh, Lucy, one of our VCR tapes is a badly-dubbed copy of Totoro a friend copied for me back in...1992? We don't own the DVD, we get it from the library, but I haven't discarded that useless old tape.

Posted 1 year ago #
Kamakazi
Member

As a person with a Blu-Ray collection much larger than 150. What I do is, like hlg said, I have the big 4 per page binders that I put them in then toss the cases. This reduces the space that they take up by a lot.

I personally consider watching films one of my two big hobbies and probably watch 20+ movies a week. About half of them are rewatches (the rest netflix or new discs). I can say that I get just as much enjoyment out of watching a good movie again as I do watching a good movie the first time.

Posted 1 year ago #
chacha1
Member

I used to have my music CDs in binders but found it really difficult to keep organized as things were added/subtracted. I am switching to shelf-sized boxes with just the disc & liner notes. Very easy to reshuffle. Will be going that way with DVDs too, for those that exceed the storage in my movie jukebox. (Ahem. Rosa, I have probably 500 movies! It's nuts! LOL)

+1 to legally, you have to keep the source disc if you are keeping the content. No one enforces this, but that's what the law says. Basically a gross analogy to selling off the discs but keeping a copy is, you sell your car but still keep it in your driveway for your personal use.

Sounds as though ntsing has made a lot of space in the home and is kind of on a roll. :-) As noted elsewhere, uncluttering can be addictive! However, 150 isn't really that many. I'd advise taking a step back and just enjoying what you've accomplished for a while. The answer on the Blu-Rays will come to you in its own time.

Posted 1 year ago #
ntsing
Member

Thanks for your replies everyone, this is very helpful.

The legality of tossing physical media but keeping digital copies is a good point, I wish I had considered that before getting rid of my CDs and DVDs! So I suppose only having digital Blu-ray copies is out.

The binder idea is definitely one I am seriously considering for the moment, the real question is how to handle the cases. Someone mentioned that Blu's wouldn't have enough resale value to worry with tossing the cases, and while I imagine this will be true in five years time, casually perusing the value of my collection on eBay looks like I could procure a respectable 50%-60% of the original 'new' value back ($10-$15 back per movie). So if I sold them all we could get a good $1500 back, not counting the more valuable box sets. Really seems like a bit to much to just throw away to me. I could use the binders and keep the empty cases in storage but this somehow doesn't seem like a great solution either.

Some of you mentioned Netflix Instant which is a great suggestion. We actually tried it a couple months back but it seems like the selection was extremely limited in terms of the movies available. The lack of HD content is also a real bummer.

Another option I have looked at is buying movies on iTunes HD, anybody do this? It's digital only and would use no physical space, but seems to have some downsides. One is that they only offer 720p, and there are no special features or subtitles but it costs the same as a real Blu-ray. Plus of course you couldn't resell it.

Posted 1 year ago #
Kamakazi
Member

ntsing: I guess I should say that I haven't thrown away ALL my cases, just the ones for movies I know there is no chance I will ever resell. The cases I have are in a big rubbermaid container in the closet. It does take up space, but just in a closet and I am okay with that because that closet is mostly empty thanks to getting rid of stuff.

Netflix Instant is good for older movies, and their HD selection is getting better, but still much to be desired in terms of new movies, and I doubt that will change anytime soon. If you value video/audio quality it can also be very annoying when the service is being slow and giving you crappy quality video because the connection isn't getting a good enough speed.

When you mention iTunes I also considered that route awhile ago and I decided not to because of the 720 and the lack of subtitles (this also really bothers me with Instant Watch). I don't care too much about the special features as I realized some years ago that for the majority (90% of movies) I don't really care to watch the special features anyway.

I should say I don't take uncluttering nearly as far as most people on this forum, and if I have room for all my stuff I am just fine with it, as long as there is a closet for it it can stay basically.

Posted 1 year ago #
lucy1965
Member

@Rosa Hee! When DS first started learning Japanese, BIL would bring him a ton of anime (hooray for multi-region DVD players!) and let him work through them once with the English subtitles switched on. He's released most of them into the wild now, but that one was the first and he does still watch it when he thinks no one's looking.

As a rule, I'm happy to let Netflix look after my DVD collection for me: there aren't a lot of things I have to have NOW NOW NOW (those that I do, I have hard copies of), and I generally have to wait until the weekend to block out enough time to watch something. But everyone's mileage varies.

Posted 1 year ago #
Periwinkle
Member

About keeping the physical copies...yeah, technically it's illegal to get rid of them if you copied it. In the US, at least - here in the UK it's actually illegal to copy it even if you still own the disk! But I wouldn't worry too much if I were you - ripping DVDs/CDs is a commonplace thing to do and it's not as if anyone's going to check.

The price of blu-rays is going to drop as they become more common, so if you can, you're probably best off selling as many as you can now to recoup your investment (obviously retaining those you'll watch many times) - if you want them back, you'll probably be able to get them cheaper in the future.

Posted 1 year ago #
bandicoot
Member

just a note on multi-region dvd players:
if you don't feel like paying big bucks to get one of these, or you are considering buying a second dvd player set to a different region, then try hacking your dvd player first.
i've done this twice and i am a long way from what one would call technically-minded.
i simply googled my dvd player's model number and make, along with dvd region hack.
or you can search a site like this: http://www.videohelp.com/dvdhacks
both of my hacked dvd players were very cheap models and it seems that these often do better with the hack.

Posted 1 year ago #
nws2002
Member

<<here in the UK it's actually illegal to copy it even if you still own the disk!>>

It's actually illegal to copy DVDs here in the US as well, sort of. It's actually illegal to circumvent the copy protection that commercial DVDs use. It's a stupid law and I don't follow it myself, I see no reason to purchase another copy of a movie I already own just to watch it on my laptop or iPod.

FWIW, I have way more movies than I ever need, and I also have a Netflix subscription. I keep my DVDs and BluRays in these with just paper sleeves.
http://www.amazon.com/Snap-N-Store-SNS01617-Storage-Pack-Black/dp/B00063E2FU/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1295145455&sr=8-2
One box holds over 100 in the paper sleeves and is easy to flip through without being stuffed full.

Posted 1 year ago #
Nithy
Member

I have most of my DVDs in a few multi-disc binders and the cases are all in a box in the closet while I decide whether I like storing them this way or not. If I do, I'll probably weed through my collection to see if I want to sell any, and then get rid of the cases.

The DVDs I've kept in their original cases are the TV show sets. My friends and family and I loan each other DVDs, and it's easier to keep track of a whole season of TV when it's in the original case.

I get a lot of movies from the library (for free!) so I buy the ones that I want to watch over and over again (which I do, because I have a lot of spare time).

I don't know if/when I will ever make the switch to Blu-ray.

Posted 1 year ago #
jsights
Member

DVDs is one thing I can't get away from. It's my fiance's one clutter vice. He didn't bring much when he moved in, but he watches a LOT of movies. We have several hundred (I haven't counted in a while), and most of them, he watches several times. We do have Netflix, but I agree with the complaint about the limitation of movies available on demand.

Currently our DVDs are still in boxes while we wait to buy a new shelf for them all. I think when we unpack them I'll ask him firmly to consider which ones he really doesn't need anymore so we can get rid of at least a few. Is it available on Netflix On Demand? Get rid of it. (I went through a similar process with my books last year - is it available on the Kindle? If so, get rid of it. That way IF I ever want to read it again, I can get the digital copy. Sure, it will cost a few more dollars to rebuy it, but so far, I haven't wanted to read any of the ones I got rid of.)

Posted 1 year ago #

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