best archiving format

[shredhead]

I have about 200Gb of DV AVI captured from my Sony camcorder some time ago. I would like to know the best way to archive this without loss of quality. My hard drive is getting full and I was thinking of converting this to another format to save disk space. I've never zipped any of these big AVI files, but if that's a good choice I could go that route instead of converting. Just looking for recommendations here.

[smrpix]

The best format for archiving DV is DV. Get another hard drive and copy the material.

This will ineveitably lead to a discussion here about how hard drives eventually WILL fail, so you should make two copies and hide one in a bomb-proof salt mine and check it every couple of years. You get the idea.

Compressing will lose data. Period. Zipping will not save you any space.

Make a copy.

[SixFiftyThree]

200GB is nothing to be concerned about. You can easily and inexpensively house that data with another drive. But if you choose to convert your videos, not only will it take a long time, but you will lose their original quality forever. That's no alternative IMO.

Also consider secondary backup options for your videos, such as Blu-ray data discs. You can use dual layer BDs that will house 50GB per disc. Additionally, there's the option of printing back to DV tape from an NLE, which is also a lossless process.

It's true that all hard drives will inevitably fail, but so will all other storage. So I see no discussion to be had, be smart and don't rely on just one type if you have precious data to store.

[Cornucopia]

Also, it should be noted that DV already incorporates a form of LZH encoding (like the kind used in zip files), and because it has already gone through the process, a further attempt at compressing in this manner would just as likely see the files GROW.

I agree with the 2 previous suggestions: keep in DV format, copy to other, newer, larger HDs, and also copy to BD or other similar consumer medium.

Scott