Hardware storage (was: Re: Corrosion pains)

Scott Stevens wrote: See, my wife would not have stood for that one bit, so when we went looking for a new house, I had a grand total of three stipulations: - Must have partially or fully finished basement - Basement must be fairly soundproof (ie loud music in basement can't be a nuisance in the kid's bedrooms) as I play a lot of early 1980's-era games with very loud BEEP BOOP sounds that are annoying to some members of the family - Must have a crawlspace ...and that narrowed our search considerably :-) I have 25+ machines plus monitors, etc. stuffed in the crawlspace. Critters are occaisionally a problem, so anything I truly care about gets wrapped in a plastic trash bag, then put into a box. This keeps the insects out, and smells are trapped so the rodents aren't tempted to gnaw through anything (although, just in case, I keep a poison trap in there and replace it every year). The crawlspace is hidden by what looks like a closet door in the finished part of the basement, about 8 feet away from my work area. When I need a machine, I get it out of the crawlspace and set it up, then put it back when I'm done. Eventually I'll need to buy some kneepads, though, since it's hard on the knees and back. I do back stretches every other day specifically to keep in shape for getting things in/out of the space -- some things can be slid along the carpet swatches I laid down in there but some lifting needs to be performed while you are on hands and knees. As for moisture; I live in a very medium-tempered climate so it's not a problem (I don't even have a sump pump in the house, it wasn't necessary when the house was built). In my previous house, it *was* a problem so all of the machines were on makeshift wooden shelves that guaranteed each piece of hardware was 3 inches off of the ground. The sump pump failed one time, and if it weren't for those shelves, all of my collection would have been 2 inches deep in water. The best part of the crawlspace is that the wife doesn't really know how much I have. She's too freaked to go in there (dark, occaisional dead mouse). -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/