I fell into owning LaserDiscs by chance. An ex-girlfriend of mine had a roommate who was using some as wall decorations (Out of their sleeves and covers) and I asked her why she had LaserDiscs on her wall. She thought they looked cool. To her credit, they did. I further inquired with her about them and she said her Dad had a fair number of them and that he'd probably give them to me if I wanted. I told her that of course I'd take as many of them as he wanted to get rid of, because my life had a 12" hole in it that could only be filled by pounds upon pounds of metal and acrylic. A few weeks later, a ridiculously heavy box shows up at my door with an assortment of LaserDiscs spanning a number of decades. I was ecstatic!

Some were in better shape than others, and a few looked like they had never been played and were even encased in a third-party cover protector. I was mesmerized by the beauty of the discs, because they are quite striking, especially the blocks and lines of CAV discs. If you stare long enough, I swear you can almost see the movie playing, they're quite amazing. There was only one problem with my new, small collection... I couldn't play them on anything.

So, being broke, and in college, I embarked on a journey to Craigslist, only to discover that players, especially good ones, were actually very expensive. Heartbroken, I nearly gave up. I was hoping someone would list something not knowing what they had for an abnormally low price that I could pounce on and grab out from underneath some other craigslist-browsing-LaserDisc-fanatic. Well, that never happened, but what did happen was me finding a really, quite amazingly functionless, LaserDisc player a few weeks later. It was a Sony LDP-1200 and it had two buttons. One turned on the player, and the other ejected the tray. The LDP-1200 was designed to be used in conjunction with a computer controller, and was used primarily for what I assume were advertisements that played on screens in airports or other locations like that, where all the player needed to do was cycle several still frames over and over and over. It made watching discs something you had to commit to. Do you need to go to the bathroom? No, you don't, not until this side is over you don't! It could only be connected to my TV via a British Naval Connection, which, for some weird reason, my TV didn't have. So, in my desperation, and knowing that LaserDiscs were primarily a composite signal, I got a coax cable, stripped it open on one end, and soldered it to the end of an RCA video plug. The other end of the coax cable had a coax -> BNC converter on it. To my surprise it worked! I watched all my discs on this player. Some multiple times. My friends thought I was crazy, but that didn't stop them from enjoying them right along with me.

Recently, I found my "premium" low-priced player by chance, randomly on Craigslist. A Pioneer Elite CLD-53. It opened up a window to a world of Digital Sound, functions like fast forward, rewind, and PAUSE! I didn't even have to get up to flip over the disks anymore... What?! Not to mention it looks worlds better, and this isn't even one of the nicer players! The medium was essentially born again in my eyes.

And then I found LDDB.com. How I hadn't earlier, I'm not quite sure, but the amount of enthusiasm and dedication displayed here is amazing, and to some non-LaserDisc collectors, probably flabbergasting. It has made me realize how many films I don't have that would be perfect additions to my collection. A family friend of mine who I see on Thanksgiving was an owner of LaserDiscs. I remember speaking with him and him offering his player to me a few years ago. I followed up, but he never got back to me. This year, randomly, my aunt contacted me and let me know that he had given her a box filled with LaserDisc stuff, and that she was bringing it up so I could take it home on Thanksgiving. I don't know what's in the box... but I think he said he had some Pioneer Elite player. I'm excited to find out what it is... *Crosses fingers for CLD-97/99*

I may not have a 500+ disc collection, and I was hardly out of diapers when the format was in its prime and just warming up for some of its highest quality releases, but I see my collection growing in the future... just as soon as my disposable income increases!

Cheers.

God day Petc,

I have just read your post sir

May I just mention that it's good to have you on this site, your enthusiasm is clear and I for one appreciate what you write.

I myself still have very much the same enthusiasm for LD, as when I did when I first embarked on this journey in March of 1998.

Thank you and keep up the good work

Kind Regards

Happy to know young people is still approaching the laserdisc world!

That was a great post, petc. It's always great to hear of someone discovering the format for the first time and you clearly have a lot of enthusiasm for it. I hope you enjoy chatting here too. Welcome!

Welcome petc, nice to see another enthusiast from my neck of the woods.

Thanks all for the welcome!

I just can't get enough. Watching some disks with my folks this morning. They've never owned a player or even see any LaserDiscs. They seem very surprised at the quality of a few of the disks. I'm not sure they understand my desire to collect them, but that's fine by me.

I am afraid that that is a danger with most collecting of anything - most people don't really understand it (even though they likely collect something that is odd in everyone else's mind - go figure) - and you can't really describe it to them. But as long you are happy what else matters? (Besides do you really want any more competition than there already is out there? )

that last thing of how everyone and everybody may not understand..but then again if it makes you happy, who cares?--thats exactly where i am at today with all this chatting and friend making and so forth.

This comment: "then I found LDDB.com. How I hadn't earlier, I'm not quite sure, but the amount of enthusiasm and dedication displayed here is amazing, and to some non-LaserDisc collectors, probably flabbergasting."...couldnt agree more...and I wish I had found this spot about 2 months ago when my curiosity gave way to my first purchase...B.C. Holiday Happenings...purchased because the only copy I could find to watch and show my kids was on youtube from an old BetaMax tape and it was not very "watchable" in that regard..so I decided to get my own copy...figuring at SOME point I'd find a machine to play it on!!

It may not be the world's most rational hobby, but it's (one of) mine (and I've gone on a rather educational journey that's taken me into the deep depths of the format and taught me a lot of digital signal processing)

I like LD's long history - that the format was locked down just after I was born and lasted on the market for ~20 years. It's a nice time capsule - if the disk hasn't rotted or been damaged, it's exactly how it was when new. And there's a lot of odd stuff that hasn't shown up again (sometimes for good reason... sometimes not!)

In the end it's all about content. Housemate and I just watched Air Force One on VHS. It was a sealed copy that cost 50 cents, played on a Sharp VC-H810 (nice player, actually) we got a week ago for $5. Not bad, considering all that.

Good morning Happycube,

Just been reading your comments around the laserdisc format and you are correct about what can be learned about this format.

Indeed Very educational it is to,

No other disc format has what Laserdisc has.

I could truly relate to what you expressed in your comments, please excuse my lack of additional comments from myself, as IO am tired and shall be going to sleep shortly.

A pleasure to read from you sir

Kind Regards