cassette racks

[Roy1]

Does anyone know where I can buy a rack for MiniDV cassettes. The firm that used to make them now say they are discontinued. Is it a sign of the times that The Mini DV cassette tapes are on the way out?

[tom hardwick]

The MiniDV tape itself is not on the way out but there has been no new MiniDV cameras for sale for about two years now - well, certainly not in the domestic domain.

[Mike Shaw]

I have three types of rack bought over the years, and frankly, they are all space wasters. A while back I hit on another idea ... you can buy metal filing cabinet things with very shallow drawers: there are some that are more of a 'desk top' nature, and some with multiple drawers that are floor standing. You MUST make sure the drawers are deep enough to take the miniDV tapes standing (at least) on their long edge, rather than just laying flat (I made the mistake of measuring, rather than taking a boxed tape along with me: the measurement seemed fine, but the drawer was .1mm too shallow, which meant the drawers wouldn't shut. Currently I have a floor standing cabinet with 6 drawers that are 3" deep at the front, but the drawer sides taper down to just over the height of a miniDV in its box. The drawers inside have slots on the side walls to take dividing partitions (but the partitions didn't come with the cabinet for some reason) - and amazingly, those divisions are spaced so that a boxed tape fits quite snugly. I used sheets of thin balsa wood to make 4 partitions in each drawer: one can store 13 tapes within each of 3 partitions - and about another 18 in the spaces front and back of the partitions - over 50 tapes per drawer, nearly 400 tapes altogether in the cabinet.

This is actually a lot cheaper - and far less space consuming - than the wall mounted things that hold respectively 9, 24 and 50 tapes. I believe the cabinet cost me £45 (Makro), the balsa wood I already had. The 50-tape rack cost me just under £20 if I remember correctly - so to hold the same number of tapes with those racks would have cost £160 - and filled a huge chunk of wall-space into the bargain.

The drawers are categorized so I can very quickly lay my hands on any tape.

And ... the cabinet is now nearly full ... I will be looking to find room for another before long ... (I never record over a tape, keep all shoots, and a master copy of all made films).

That was the short answer ...

[chrisk]

Mini Dv tape storage cases are available here:

http://www.keene.co.uk/electronic/bryco ... ACK8P.html

http://www.keene.co.uk/electronic/bryco ... CK836.html

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hama-Storage-Dr ... B00005QFAS

Chris

[Roy1]

MIKE. Your idea seems to be a winner. I'll hunt around to find filing cabinets which will suit. Come to think of it, I used the idea to store bits of super 8 film clips. That was forty years ago.