Also, libraries will often take the old cases. They need them as replacements for their rental DVDs that come back in broken cases. Live green!

When I moved this past summer to a new place with limited storage, I did this very thing. It made a world of difference - quick to find and easy to tuck away. I only kept a couple of collector's box sets on a shelf. In total, my collection takes up one square foot now, instead of four shelves on my bookcase. Parting with the cases might feel tough at first, but you really don't miss them once they're gone!

OK, sure, it does need another file of storage but I made the change in my dvd storage suggested here and then put all the cover pictures/wrappers in a clear file in alphabetical order by movie/cd etc. Now I can see the movie blurbs and pictures of my favourite stars and the advertising material for a particular movie or cd etc. whenever I desire.

Anyone know a good place in NYC where one can sell barely used CD collections? I still have a large box of these and no desire to keep them.

All my DVDs are now in those sleek white MUJI CD/DVD holders. If I want to see details about any of them, I just look it up on IMDB.

ProfKD,

You can try Academy Records on 18th between 6th & 5th. However, their stock is mostly classical, musical theatre and jazz.

It's time to move on to digital files, folks.

My movies, like my books, are a point of pride and I have always really hated the idea of stuffing them into some big binder rather than letting them be on display. This is especially true for the boxed sets I own and the Criterion Collections; often, the art is so beautiful on the boxes that it's a total shame to hide it!

It's not that I don't understand the limited space thing (it's a good solution for people with the problem!), I just can't get behind it myself.

I wouldn't recommended using binders to anyone. Over time dust and other junk starts getting stuck in the sleeves and it will scratch up your discs.
And the collector side of me is screaming over people getting rid of all their cases. If you want to do this pack em up in a box and keep them.

I'm totally on board with this, and I'm working toward finding a solution for getting rid of the 1000-plus jewel cases currently in IKEA cabinets in our den.

However, keep in mind that this particular setup makes it much easier to have all of your movies/albums/etc. stolen at once, unless you have a digital backup somewhere secure.

I agree with SBGblogs comment on having the cases and artwork displayed but man am I tired of moving these things! I'd love to stuff them in a case and throw the bulky dvd cases out to save space, but just haven't gotten to that point yet.

Instead, I still pack them all up in boxes, struggle to find enough drawer and shelf space to keep them all....bleh! Maybe this next move I'll do the case thing, maybe!

My husband recently did this for his video game collection and it really did free up a lot of space.

Our own DVD/CD collection is small enough to contain in drawers, though. I'm very visual so I do like seeing the covers.

We have a dresser for a TV stand, so that's where the DVDs are, neatly lined up in a row until we have a nicer entertainment media solution.

I have mine in lovely Muji binders. They are white plastic and can contain up to 80 cd's. I realised most of my cd's were iTunes back-ups so the boxes didn't really matter any more - as little works of art.
And for the ones in boxes? I imported them into iTunes a rediscovered my music library :) While the CDs are stacked away in a cupboard, not collecting dust or being visually disruptive.

@ProfKD - Half Price Books buys media; but, you may not get much for your collections (depends on popularity & how many the store already has). Hopefully, you'll find a local used media store ... perhaps you'll get a better pay-out.

Then there's Netflix

Those media books are terrible for your discs. The process of sliding them in and out of the casing ruins the back of discs beyond repair. Also, if you want to get rid it in the future, I haven't been to any record store that would take any disc without the cover artwork or case.

I did this with all my dvds when I went to college, since there was no way I was lugging 100+ cases halfway across the country and then paying to store them every summer. Now that I live here permanently I’ve been slowly bringing all the cases from my parents house by sticking a few in my suitcase everytime I come back from a visit…I’m about halfway there at this point. I’m having to do the same with all the books I collected in high school as well…

I can relate to most of the comments here. I moved many of my cd's into zippered binders to shelter them from dust. LOVE the extra space that's available! My binders have double sleeves making it easy to store the cover insert with the cd. I prefer my tall, narrow, 2-sleeved binders to 4-sleeve versions because they seem sturdier & more protective of my collections. I kept all my covers: CD collection boxes stored with the binders & regular covers are in a box in my garage. Sighhhhh ... now I need to import my CDs into iTunes.

@Waiting for Gateau ... please share info on the binders you recommend. I'm looking for expandable binders for my DVDs & the versions that I've found online didn't get good customer reviews.

My husband trashed the cases to his bootleg Iraqi dvds when he was deployed, so I bought skinny jewel cases and the CD storage boxes at IKEA to put them all in. Works pretty well, but those jewel cases get expensive when you have to buy 400 of them....

External Hard Drive.
Most dvd players have a usb port.

@atarichamp is right. digital, kids.

no packaging = so green. :)

Can I just say...I hate that dvds come in such bulky and wasteful packaging. Why can't they come packaged like cds? Although, come to think of it, I'm not a huge fan of a lot of cd packaging either. There's got to be a better way.

Thanks for the store tips! I just culled several boxes of books and have been inspired by this post to relinquish most of my remaining CDs and DVDs.

I use media binders for computer software and backups of visual media for my courses. These were from No Boundaries and came in bright neon colors. I bought several from the .99 store and use a color for each category. I wouldn't use them for valuable or resale media, but I'm long past the point where I buy CDs or DVDS

I would love to get rid of the packaging, still would like to keep some movie artwork though. I think I will start looking at possible binders.

Would also love to keep a digital copy of all my movies but how does one go about that? any recommendations?

This would feel to me like pulling the covers off all the books in my library to save shelf space.

We did this three years ago and I'll never go back. We give all our cases to the library and just keep 1 huge cd binder for adult movies, 1 half size one for kids movies, and 1 half size for video games. Totally worth it.

Oh, and I keep all the interesting covers and use them for crafts and gift wrapping because I couldn't bear to part with them without trying to reuse them.

When we redid our living room last fall we did the exact same thing with our CDs and DVDs. DVDs went in sleek clear boxes (Containter Store) and the CDs went in the binders (hubby's choice, I prefer the boxes). We saved all the cases (they're lovingly in our parents basement in bins), because we know when we move to a place with more storage -- and an actual office, we'll be willing to put them back out on shelves.

Best Buy has drop-off kiosks for recycling CDs and CD cases.

Doesn't really help if you've got VHS and video games older than gamecube.

Though we definitely keep a lot of movies on discs and they STILL pile up! Without the cases it's impossible to keep them scratch-free. :(

Hmm... If you really can find a home for your old cases (as in 1st comment above), maybe it's not so bad. But those CD storage books are made of plastic, so you're taking your CD out of its original plastic container and putting them in a new plastic container. Not at all green.

Recycling (rather than re-using) the cases, btw, is probably not at all green because 1) recycling takes energy and 2) apparently some plastic gets "recycled" as fuel, ie it gets burned - think of the toxic fumes and greenhouse gases from that.

I strongly suspect you'll end up with scratched CDs, probably separated from their liners too, if you abandon their cases. Put some simple shelves on the wall and line the up there instead.

CDs/DVDs are neither furniture nor accessories.

The cases from HMV are well designed to include the booklets/covers pls the disc and hold several hundred at a time.

Thankfully, copy DVDs don't come in cases, just small poly bags.

I put my CDs in storage books years ago but I still wanted to look at the covers. I bought a picture frame at a flea market for $4 and a little two sided tape later, I have a collage of my favorite CD covers.

My husband is a movie and video game collecting fiend! Even after purging his collection, we went from two book shelves FULL of cases to four binders that take up about a foot and a half of space on one shelf.

It's WONDERFUL!

We did this when we moved into a much smaller home. It saved SOOO much space. We haven't done it with the Wii games, though, because we like to trade them in when we get tired of them, and the game store wants the original cases.

A year or two ago I transferred all of my CDs with the liner notes to paper sleeves and wrote the artist and album on the envelope. I store them in a long box. They are easy to shuffle through and organize. Plus, if I want to grab a handful for a road trip, they are compact. I did the same with the DVDs. I have been keeping the empty jewel cases and boxes in a closet but they are getting taken to Goodwill when I move.

I recently put all my DVD cases in under the bed boxes and the discs in IKEA binders. It saves so much space on my shelves, but it also keeps me from piling up other random stuff under my bed and then forgetting about it forever. I'm not ready to part with the cases yet, but maybe one day!

Never work for us. My partner upgrades from standard to blu-ray regularly as things come out in new formats, and the old disks are sold or donated, which goes better with the original packaging. Plus we have hundreds of disks to deal with, and we keep them in alphabetical order, so it's constantly in flux as he gets new disks almost every week.

We refer to the information on the liner notes, a lot, too.

Eventually he intends to download all of them to a mega movie server, but that will take special software and many gigs of storage (HD, remember) so it's a future project.

That's terrible for the discs, though...

Mind you, I can't really talk. My entire DVD collection fits in a Kassett box that lives on my Expedit (plus a few of those storage books, but they're only for DVDs that don't HAVE covers - burnt ones and the like). My entire CD collection fits neatly into another.

Some of them have such wonderful art - how can you just throw it out? I'd rather be selective about what I buy than throw out the cases!