[darkstarjunkie]

Originally Posted by ColinM

It's very very difficult. Once you get to a point where you have dozens and dozens of shows, it becomes important to have a system so you don't lose them.

That's a very good point! I also had to do that (I guess most traders do), and my system is very much like ColinM describes:

1) Put all new stuff into a folder.

2) Once you listen to it, remove it from your bittorrent client and palce in another folder; keep or discard.

3) At that point, burn your copy for long term storage if you're going to keep it.

4) Restart the .torrent file at its new folder.

I recommend restarting the show even if you didn't keep it.

An important point that can't be stated enough is: use GOOD DVD-R MEDIA! I made a bad mistake when assuming that the cheap-o brands were probably "good enough" - but i soon found out they weren't and tons of discs had small unreadable areas. So i bought a new 200 GB drive, and after a few tries I fortunately managed to copy most of the backup'ed shows onto the HD. Luckily, if you've downloaded or traded for the show, there's always someone else out there with the same fileset, and most likely you can replace the bad files if you experience that shit.

Now I only use good brand DVD-Rs (TDK is the best I can find here in Norway) and so far things seem fine.

My 200 GB drive is now getting very full, so I'm also gonna get another, probably a 250 GB. That should keep anyone satisfied for a while, unless your bandwidth is insane...

Also, if you plan on downloading DVDs (Video-DVDs) you definitely want a fair bit of space.

Also, keep in mind that hard drives can fail. I haven't experienced that yet myself, luckily, but be aware that it can happen. Therefore: A backup never hurts!