Storage Suggestions

[Elwood]

Okay, seeing as there’s a lot of people around here that seem knowledgeable about how to store and display games and such, I figured I’d ask for some help on my situation. You see a few months back I had to throw out my broken down entertainment center, and that has left me with a lot of stuff that needs a place to put it. At the moment I have my TV and DVD player set up on a sturdy bench, and my game systems on the floor near it. I only have one shelving unit available to me, but it only has enough space to hold my CD’s and books, leaving me with little room to put my VHS tapes, DVD’s, and videogames.

I managed to score a large wooden trunk, which stores my DVD’s and videogames pretty well (although there's no real room for the VHS's, their stuffed in a box in the corner of the room), and it’s also serving as a make-shift table, but it gets rather tiresome to move my laptop and anything else off of it to get something from it and put it back. I thought of getting some CD Wallets, putting the disc based games, cd’s and dvd’s in them for easy access and keeping the cases in storage and using the freed up space on my shelf for the cartridge based games. That idea seemed like a good one, however, I’ve heard some nasty stories about micro scratches and what-not with CD Wallets, so now I’m not sure what to do.

The thing of it is, I’m low on cash. I can’t really afford a big entertainment center to store all of this, and most of the shelves I’ve seen elsewhere look like expensive IKEA stuff. Plain and simple, I need some kind of suggestions for what would be the cheapest, most space effective way to store my games and other stuff, while still keeping them safe. I don’t mind anything being out in the open.

To give you an idea of what I’m working with, I roughly have around 220 cds, 32 PS2/PS1 games, 3 Nintendo DS games, a PS2, NES, SNES, 36 DVDs, about 2 dozen VHS tapes, and a few dozen books, plus a small box with some comics. I have one solid shelving unit, but at most it's holding all of my books and cd's. No idea where it came from, got it from my brother. Any help would be appreciated.

[Harvey]

This seems simple, I'm sure you could find some quality, if old, storage units if you looked around at some yard sales near you. I really dig the way those old wooden bookcases look, and sometimes people sell stuff like that for cheap because it is difficult to move. If you have transportation for it, or could borrow transportation, I think it would be worth it to look.

[Navin_Johnson]

Yeah, I would think some sort of bookcase is the best way to go. For used ones, look around yard sales, thrift shops, craigslist, freecycle. In my area the university has a surplus store with great bookcases for not much money. You might even consider cheap (and I mean cheap in cost and cheap in quality) new bookcases at some of the box stores. They're basically wallpapered particle board but games are not heavy so you don't need anything more substantial. I've gotten them on sale before at about $20-$25 for the 5 shelfers.

-Navin

[peace4myheart]

Put them in paper boxes, put my address on each of those box, go to the P.O. and ship them. Problem solved.

[RackGaki]

If craigslist works Somewhere In The Cursed Midwest, I would go with a bookcase or shelf on there. I know that Montana folk have yet to cultivate craigslist enough to make it worthwhile for browsing, while Seattle is bustling. I could find you dozens of 6 foot tall bookcases for under $30.

And CD wallets are murder on your discs, especially if you decide to haul them around in a backpack. Many people scratch the discs on the zipper when they pull them out, too.

I keep Dreamcast homebrew discs in a CD binder, so if I scratch them up too much, I just burn another disc.

[Ziggy]

I was kinda in the same boat as you, I was in desperate need of a media/book shelf but couldn't afford to spend a lot of money on it. I really wish the one I found was still up on eBay, but its not, I just checked. I've searched long and hard, and these shelfs were the best cost to space ratio. It was about $70 or $80, shipped, and it holds a massive amount of stuff. Also, there's three sizes, mine being the middle size.

Any way, I'll keep an eye out. If it pops back up on eBay I'll post the link. Or if I can remember the brand name, maybe you can find one else where.