Anime Storage


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khael

/人◕ ‿‿ ◕人\ being M
Sempai
My 3rd WD Mybook's filling up. I need to buy a new one.

That said, I was wondering what you guys use to store your animu. I'm not good at canvassing stuff and I mostly get my recommendations from friends and other geeks/people on the internet.

The bigger capacity, the better. I currently have 3 WD My Book 1TB, and frankly, it's getting too bulky around here, so I'm looking for something with as much space but smaller bulk.

I also heard that you can turn internal hard drives into external ones just by attaching it to some sort of case that lets you plug it in a USB slot. Any more info on this? If this is possible then I might just do it since it seems much cheaper.
 
All external drives are basically Hard drives and enclosures. Even your western digital one. The only difference between yours and others is that yours should come with a program (which you can really just copy and paste into any drive) for storage and stuff. It's really simple, really. You open up the enclosure, attach the HDD and close it up. At least the good ones are that easy.

The ideal enclosure is made out of aluminum, designed as a heatsink, and a fan for super cooling. eSata is nice, but it looks like you use USB. as for your HDD, you can get a cheap one easily. 5400 RPM is probably your best choice because if you're using it as storage, you don't need a fast RPM. Also, the slower the RPM, the HDDs tend to last longer, run cooler, and go cheaper.

The total cost of an external and hard drive should only come down to around $80 USD for a good one. The problem with externals is, how many ports do you need. If you got 2 external hard drives and want to connect it to one external, the price for the external jumps quite a bit. 4 HDD externals cost at least $250 and server HDD controllers cost in the thousands.

I prefer samsung HDDs cause I've had a lot of western digital, seagate, and cavalier HDDs break on me but none of my 5 samsungs ever broke on me. I currently have thermaltake enclosures and samsung HDDs.
 
Here's a better suggestion for storage: Only keep stuff that you know you'll be rewatching, and delete the rest. Delete all the stuff that you don't think is a masterpiece. Because there is really no point in keeping every single series from every season, nor is it very practical.

If you own a desktop, just buy regular harddrives, they're cheaper and take less space. For externals, I like LaCie, they're quite reliable. A friend of mine burns series on DVDs - a viable alternative method of storage.

But really, I think it's not so much an issue of how you store, but of what you store. Personally, I have one 1TB HDD and it's more than enough for anime, music, games etc. Plus, if I reeeally need some series I don't have, re-downloading is always an option.
 
I currently have 1 WD 500gb hard drive that's is "half-broken" and 1 Seagate 1.5 TB hard drive that's essentially like new. The rest of all my anime are on burnt DVDs. Basically I archive everything I watch for memories sake even though I probably will never rewatch even half these series in the long run.
As for solutions, I think the best way is in khael's case is maybe start finding a way to compress stuff if you don't like that many hard drives/dvds lying around. By compression, I don't mean using stuff like winrar or 7zip since they don't compress media files very well. You would have to go out and buy one of those products that huge corporations use to maximize space (e.g. like how video game companies compress their files for the games they make.)
 
QUOTE Here's a better suggestion for storage: Only keep stuff that you know you'll be rewatching, and delete the rest.

Sad to say that's not possible for me. You can call me a "chronicler" or a "scrivener" of sorts. It could also be possible that I'm just totally neurotic/anal. Basically, I'm like Kit here. I've also been burning some series to DVD's, but my dvd burner just fizzed out on me and I haven't bought a new one yet. I've burned a little over 50 DVD's now.


QUOTE eSata is nice, but it looks like you use USB.

I plan on converting to esata once I'm settled in. I use USB for now for ease of access, plus I usually watch on a laptop.


QUOTE The total cost of an external and hard drive should only come down to around $80 USD for a good one. The problem with externals is, how many ports do you need. If you got 2 external hard drives and want to connect it to one external, the price for the external jumps quite a bit. 4 HDD externals cost at least $250 and server HDD controllers cost in the thousands.

Well I'm actually fine with just switching out externals. Though I could also buy a usb hub to connect them all simultaneously right?


QUOTE 5400 RPM is probably your best choice because if you're using it as storage, you don't need a fast RPM. Also, the slower the RPM, the HDDs tend to last longer, run cooler, and go cheaper.

I'll keep that in mind, thanks.

I'll post back in here if anything comes up.


EDIT: I found a 1.5 Terabyte Seagate SATA 32mb that's around 80 USD. How much would the other components cost to turn it into an external HDD?
 
QUOTE You would have to go out and buy one of those products that huge corporations use to maximize space (e.g. like how video game companies compress their files for the games they make.)

Uhh, isn't that waaay too complicated? It's probably going to take less than half time and effort (and money) to re-download a series than to compress/decompress.


Also, not to sound like an ass, but "collecting" anime in fansub releases on HDDs or burnt DVDs is sort of a waste of time and money. Just start getting licensed releases and become a proper collector if you care that much.
 
I just have a 1.5 Tb Hdd filled with anime. gonna buy a 2 Tb HDD when i get paid.

QUOTE Here's a better suggestion for storage: Only keep stuff that you know you'll be rewatching, and delete the rest. Delete all the stuff that you don't think is a masterpiece. Because there is really no point in keeping every single series from every season, nor is it very practical.

But someone local might want to see it, and i like bad anime.
 
QUOTE (NeoScott @ Dec 28 2009, 10:02 PM) But someone local might want to see it, and i like bad anime.
Uhh, well, then only keep the really bad anime?
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I dunno, I guess I just have different standards from most people. I only really keep my "top 50" or so; and if someone local wants to see something I don't have, well, they could go get it themselves
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I used to buy anime. Still have a bunch in laserdiscs. I stopped buying when they started to "milk" it, by releasing fewer and fewer episodes and stuffing "director's comments" and other stuff in it.

Oh, and don't get me wrong, those 3 drives aren't for just anime alone. It contains all of my stuff, including work documents.

Still asking around the net for how much I'd need to turn the HDD into an external one.
 
I must be really different then...I don't keep ANY anime I watch. I watch and delete everything. If I really liked the anime I wait until it's licensed and uh, I don't know...BUY it? You know, the whole 'support the anime industry' thing? I find that - especially recently - you can get some really good deals. Just make sure to buy the box sets that come with the entire season.

If I want to rewatch something and it it didn't get licensed, I redownload it - there are lots of sites out there that not only have old torrents but also have old animes available for DDL. Never had a problem in the past. If it's been licensed I go out and buy it or see if it's available for rent (via a nearby video rental place or my University's Anime Club which I'm a member of).

For storage of everything else though, I have two internal drives (400GB and 1TB), an external drive (500GB), an old iPod Classic that I don't really use for music anymore and is now used as a pocket HD (120GB, I think) and that's about it. I burn discs occasionally, but that's relatively rare. Total of a little over 2TB and I tend to keep everything a little below 1/2 full
 
I also keep everything I watch, literally. Unless its so horrable that I hate the show (which so far has only happened once, and i still kept it) then its a possible deletion candidate.

I keep all my anime and other items on a Netgear ReadyNAS. I now have 2, one is at my parents place mainly for their use and for stuff that I couldn't take take abroad and one is with me.

The first nas has 4 500GB drives giving 1.5TB of storage, it uses a varient of raid5, If any of the drives fail, then all the data is still safe. My second nas has 2 1TB drives, but the unit has 2 spare slots so I can take it up to 3TB just by adding new cheap sata drives when needed.

The NAS has a torrent client built into it so i can let it download directly to it, it also has a UPNP and home media server built in, so I can flip on the PS3 and watch my anime on the big screen TV without a PC. (this works with any DLNA or other console/media player).

I mainly watch stuff on my laptop tho, so the nas just appears as another drive to it. The nas has a usb port on it and i have a card reader and usb on the laptop, so i can just use any combination of mobile drives or flash to copy a series or 2 on as well.

If i'm away out somewhere I also have a VPN, and my laptop has a Cellular/GSM modem so i can get online anywhere. I also run a private copy of my anime site that reads direct from the nas and streams it to the laptop, so i can watch almost anything anywhere. Obviously thats too slow to download a lot of it, so i often just copy the series i want to watch onto the laptop befoe i go somewhere.
 
Currently I only have a 300Gig external that is now being useful on freeing up HD space on my laptop. Most of my series that I view as rewatchable I am now storing on the external.

The down side is the transfer rate is rather sluggish though.

I'm hoping to obtain a 1TB or higher just so I have the space for many things one of these days of course.
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QUOTE (Kid-Wolf @ Dec 31 2009, 10:07 AM) I'm hoping to obtain a 1TB or higher just so I have the space for many things one of these days of course.
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Now would be a good time do so since its the holidays and all and everything is on sale. Not to mention that most 1TB externals (excluding the new Western Digital Passport) should be well under $100 now.
 
I got a 500GB external for christmas. I have been burning lately a lot to free my disk, now I can relax.
 
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