Millie, if you live in cold country, try leaving it outside to freeze, then stick it in a sturdy paper grocery bag & whacking it with a hammer. This is not the voice of experience with CDs, but I accidentally ran over a plastic Rubbermaid stool when it was frozen (not much below 32F) & it shattered beautifully! 'Pup

We have several cd case "binders" that are the soft plastic pouch but they are lined with a soft felt type material to keep them from scratching and sticking. We store all of our DVDs in them and toss the original cases- it saved us so much space. It's unbelievable how much space the cases take up and organizing them in the dvd binder is so much easier.

Did you format the discs? It all depends on your software and the CD Drive. Some drives and software will format as they write, but you then may have to manage 'closing' and 'opening' a disc. I keep a few formated discs around so that I can burn a file in a jiffy when I need to. I use re-writable discs and format those as "data" discs. Once formatted, those will operate just like and other data drive. Everything is different when you use a CR write-once disc. Carefully read the CD Drive manual. If you have been sucessful in the past, it may be as you suspect; The drive is dying. Just a thought: Check to see if the blank disks are compatible with your drive. Look at the rating of the write speeds. For example, if your drive is rated for 1X to 4X speed and the disks are 6X to 16X, it is likely that the drive will refuse the disks.

No, maifleur, you're on the wrong track angel, there's a procedure called a "tax free rollover" which is what's used to move an IRA balance from one financial institution to another. As the name says, it's tax free. There is no dollar limit on how much can be moved but it may be doable only one time per year (that's unclear but it's the IRS's position) and I think a rollover has to go to just one destination, and not three, but on that I'm not sure. It is a procedure, it needs to be done a certain way, but this is vanilla and a daily event to any institution holding IRA and other retirement plan balances. Your local bank should NEVER let you do what you did, they should have cautioned you. My suggestion at this point is you may need to get a CPA to help you, and expect in advance than many will have no experience with this. I would also go to the bank, tell them you relied on them and they let you down. Next, try to completely unwind what you did by closing the accounts you opened and getting the money back into the local bank IRA in its entirety. The local bank needs to cooperate with you to allow you to do this. Then, start all over again. When you do a tax free rollover, the check for the full balance is usually made payable to the institution the new account is located, not to you. Send the check to one place - Vanguard is a good choice. If you're not able to unwind and start again, you won't be happy with the outcome. What you've done is called an "early withdrawal of the IRA" since you're not yet 59 1/2. In addition to the gross amount being subject to income tax for you this year (which is always the case when an IRA account is distributed), the early withdrawal causes you to be subejct to an added 10% penalty. That's why you want to unwind what was done and start again. I hope it's possible but maybe not Good luck, report back how you fare.