CD & DVD Media

Magnetic tape evolved into magnetic floppy disks, which evolved into optical compact discs, or CDs. Like the rest of the electronics industry, computer storage has changed fast over the past generation, and it keeps getting better. Modern blank media is inexpensive (especially at Overstock.com's prices), much safer and has much higher capacities than older generations of tape and disk.

Blank CDs are among the easiest ways to store data -- especially back-up copies of data on your hard drive. A blank CD-R is recordable once, becoming a permanent record. A blank CD-RW can be recorded over many times and is a great way to keep up-to-date copies of data that changes frequently.

These days, just about every computer has a CD drive. If your computer didn't come with one built-in, an external CD drive is an easy add-on (especially at Overstock.com prices). CDs hold about 700MB of data -- that's 75 minutes of music or thousands of pages of text and graphics. Newer models may have a CD burner, meaning you can create your own disc, not just play other people's stuff. For the more serious user, a CD RW drive can record the same disc over and over and a CD DVD drive can play (sometimes record) both CDs and longer playing DVDs. By the way, drives that play and record are correctly called CD burners. If you're looking for a CD burner, don't get a plain old CD drive by accident.

While you're picking up stuff for your desktop computer or laptop computer, don't forget CD cases and CD holders. CDs are tough, but a CD case is an extra layer of protection, and a CD holder is a great way to keep it all organized. Hey, at Overstock.com, it's one price for shipping. Whether you buy a lot or a little, might as well buy it all at once and save that much more!