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#280175 - 03/31/16 06:30 PM Archiving Tools
LCranston Offline
2
Enthusiast

Registered: 08/31/09
Posts: 201
Loc: Nebraska
Bridging off the "on the go charging article"

I am looking for a method of keeping important data safe.
This ranges from useful data- manuals, books, teaching stuff,
to Emotional/Valuable stuff- family pictures, etc.

At this point in time I have a NAS-a network storage box, on site, and use several cloud based backups- Google + Sugarsync, but I would be more comfortable with a more portable solution.

I saw what appears to be an interesting solution MDISC, like a hardened DVD/Blueray, but not sure if worth the time/trouble.

Looking for comments, suggestions.

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#280178 - 03/31/16 07:23 PM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
Russ Offline
Geezer

Registered: 06/02/06
Posts: 5357
Loc: SOCAL
Interesting -- http://www.mdisc.com/

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#280179 - 03/31/16 07:29 PM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
Alex Offline
Old Hand

Registered: 03/01/07
Posts: 1034
Loc: -
I think, we had that covered very well in the past. The conclusion - diversity is the key. I have the Cloud archives in the open, NAS with RAID1 - in the house, External HDD's - on the shelves, T-Flash Cards - EDC in my pockets.

The M-Disk looks interesting, especially their subscription (so you don't have to buy BD-writer at all. The only caveat - you will have to pay for the Dropbox account as well, as the content allowance on a free one will barely fill one DVD disk, and then upload your terabytes for many weeks to build a library for M-Disk archiving there... Also, it would be nice to see a third party knowledgeable opinion on M-Disk technology itself, as so far I don't see how it's better from an ordinary BD/DVD disk, especially having the same ordinary BD/DVD writers capable of dealing with these M-Disks.

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#280187 - 04/01/16 02:29 AM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
chaosmagnet Offline
Sheriff
Carpal Tunnel

Registered: 12/03/09
Posts: 3819
Loc: USA
Both format and media are important.

If MDISC meets your requirements for permanency, can you be sure that DVD-ROM and BD-ROM drives will be available when you need them? Will you be able to buy a new one or repair the one you have? Are you sure that you'll be able to read the filesystem? And the files themselves?

I'm neither for nor against this technology or service, but these are questions you should have answers for if permanent storage is your goal.

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#280201 - 04/01/16 08:57 PM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: chaosmagnet]
LCranston Offline
2
Enthusiast

Registered: 08/31/09
Posts: 201
Loc: Nebraska
Chaosmagnet,
If I get what you are saying, this tech will only be good as long as there are optical drives that will read it..

That does make sense, I remember having to search around the house for a PC that was old enough to have a 3.5 inch floppy drive at one time.

I think as long as they are selling blueray drives I am safe-- it will be when (not if) they move to a new format, or get rid of physical media that I have to do this again//

Biggest issue with darn near ALL other media is rot-- floppies, read/write CD/DVD, hard drives, SD cards, USB drives-- leave them alone for 5 years and as often as not, they are trash.

I have been toying with a Blueray drive for a few months, to burn stuff for my inlaws-- taking movies they legally own, and moving to a different format, This would just limit me to Bluerays that supports this format.

I will try to report back in 5-10 years if they will still read....

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#280204 - 04/01/16 09:09 PM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
Russ Offline
Geezer

Registered: 06/02/06
Posts: 5357
Loc: SOCAL
How/where//under what conditions are you storing your CD's & DVD's? I have CD's I bought in 1986 that are fine -- Beethoven/Mozart/Boz Scaggs... all good.

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#280207 - 04/01/16 10:03 PM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
LCranston Offline
2
Enthusiast

Registered: 08/31/09
Posts: 201
Loc: Nebraska
Factory bought CDs-- music and movies are sealed units- they last a long time.

CD/DVD read/write- the ones that let you burn your own stuff are NOT they are plastic on one side, and a dye or a surface that is burned on the other; these are NOT a sealed, and die much faster, though not consistent from brand to brand.

I have found good information on Blueray read/write, still looking-

This is why I opened this-- I have several disks that used to have pictures that are trash.

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#280208 - 04/02/16 05:31 AM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
Phaedrus Offline
Carpal Tunnel

Registered: 04/28/10
Posts: 3148
Loc: Big Sky Country
Mitsui Advanced Media Gold Archival CD-Rs are purported to have a lifespan of over a century. I have MAM discs that I burned almost 20 years ago that are still perfect.
_________________________
“I'd rather have questions that cannot be answered than answers that can't be questioned.” —Richard Feynman

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#280256 - 04/11/16 11:23 AM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
Brangdon Offline
Veteran

Registered: 12/12/04
Posts: 1204
Loc: Nottingham, UK
How much data are we talking about?

I'd agree with Alex that diversity is key, and I'd add, continually update media. I would not expect to be able to store stuff on a CD, put it in a draw, forget about it for decades, and still be able to read it when I needed to.

I keep most of my "live" data, along with archive data, on a solid state drive in a desktop PC. I have a script that runs nightly to compress and encrypt it and write it to a spinning disk drive in the same machine. It writes another copy to a micro-SD card. Yet another copy is written to DropBox, where it syncs to my phone. From time to time I swap the micro-SD in the desktop for another one I keep in my wallet. Sometimes I make another copy onto a USB drive.

So I have multiple copies, on multiple media, with varying eases of accessibility. DropBox counts as off-site backup in case my house gets hit by a meteorite or something. The other copies should survive if DropBox go out of business. Hopefully both those things won't happen at the same time.

If you are taking this route then you need to think about encryption and password management. I wouldn't trust a company like DropBox not to peek at the data I store there, nor would I keep it unencrypted in my wallet. The downside of encryption is the risk of forgetting the passwords, or losing access to the software that does the decryption.

Which is a general point: you need to be careful about file formats. Plain text is best for longevity. PDF seems pretty safe now, but might not be in 20 years. Archiving a copy of a PDF reader may help, but even that might not run on future computers. You may need to convert formats as new technology becomes available and old technology becomes obsolete and stops working.

For my needs, current technology is pretty good. A micro-SD card is tiny, and can store 64 Gb which is plenty for me. I also have good internet access.
_________________________
Quality is addictive.

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#280258 - 04/11/16 01:41 PM Re: Archiving Tools [Re: LCranston]
LCranston Offline
2
Enthusiast

Registered: 08/31/09
Posts: 201
Loc: Nebraska
I have a 6TB Nas with live copy, + Sugarsync-- a paid cloud company.

I think you have a good point about formats- sticking with really popular formats makes sense. All pictures are .jpg

I think that txt ans rtf are safe enough. I do wonder about epub and azw files...you raise a good point- my library is running off freeware software that will not last forever.

I have not worried about encryption of most of the files; the pictures and books are all legal and non-threatening- if somebody wants to look at a picture of a pinewood derby, more power to them. Heck, I am sure that google has sent me ads based on them. honestly, the biggest concern is not encryption, it is reading them later.

I encrypted some stuff for awhile, just to play, then truecrypt went belly up. I was able to recover files using older version, but it made me leary about encryption .

the whole point of this post was to uncover flaws-- I appreciate the insights, and am adjusting as I read.

If MDISC proves to be stable, that would delay format creep until discs/optical go out of style. I like the concept of something that can withstand STABLE. No delaminating CDRs, USB drives that flake out.

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