So of course, as soon as I dumped them I needed an article on the SD50, and I figured I would just go online and buy the 75 year DVD collection right? Wrong. Out of print and none in stock anywhere. Turns out Kalmbach have replaced the DVD collection with a subscription service that runs alongside their regular subscription for an extra $3 per month. Naturally there is no way to subscribe just the the archive, so the only way to read old back issues is either pay $36 per annum on top of a $60 subscription, or purchase back issues on eBay.
Good job Kalmbach. Good. Job. Why not allow us to download individual issues for a small fee? Or give the option for a standalone archive subscription?
So I've been looking on eBay for a second hand copy of the DVD set for over a year and they just never seem to be listed, until finally this week someone put on up for sale. £30 later and I have almost 900 issues of MR at my fingertips, including all the issues I missed in the 2000's while I wasn't active in the hobby.
The set comes on three DVDs housed in a regular plastic DVD case, with a single sheet of installation instructions. The software is on the first DVD and the other two contain the actual magazines as individual locked PDF files. Compatible with Windows Vista and Windows 7, the set is slightly cumbersome to use, and very slow to install, but as long as you know the issue you want (the Kalmbach website index comes in useful here as the DVD set search function is not much use) then it does work fairly well.
The magazine scans are a little low resolution and fuzzy, but perfectly readable - on a par with the Trainlife scans of Prototype Modeler, and apart from the plan drawing being a bit soft, they are mostly pretty good. It definitely beats having a massive stack of heavy paper issues cluttering up the garage.
