What backup strategy for AVI files after burning MPEG to DVD

[nzo]

How do you folks manage your hard drive space consumption as you capture/transfer your video content to hd as AVI files?

I have a biggish library of VHS tapes which I'd like to transfer to a 200GB hd via an ADVC-100. Even 200GB won't last long, judging the size of AVI files done so far.

Would you usually ditch the AVIs once they've been mpeged to DVD?

I've catalogued my VHS collection, so I guess I could always transfer the stuff again if I need to. How would you handle it?

With appreciation ~ John

[FulciLives]

After you create the MPEG you go ahead and author and burn a DVD and then test it.

If all looks well then delete it all except the DVD that you burned.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[jimmalenko]

What Fulcilives said, and add that every few captures, make sure you defrag your drive for optimum efficiency.

[mpack]

I sympathise with your reluctance to throw away the AVIs, especially if you've just spent a good long time capturing it and then cleaning up the noise in both video and audio. It's all very well to say throw them away when you are happy with the DVD, but so far I am never completely happy with the quality of the DVD... in any case it just seems wrong to throw away the digital master.

Unfortunately, I don't know of any practical alternative... A 1.5hr movie (PAL, YUY2, Huffyuv) takes around 40GB of space. I suppose DAT might be an option, but I've never checked it out. When recordable Blu-ray is available for PCs maybe that will be the best way. Or perhaps by that time the typical hard disk drive will be many terabytes! In the meantime I have to delete them when I need the space...

[nzo]

Thank you all.

Yes, a bunch of terabyte USB sticks would be great Bring on molecular holographic storage!!

In our audio studio we NEVER thow out the master, but with AVI...alas.

John

[Ron B]

I have a lot of original analog material, the only cost effective way to save any of it as AVI files is to send them back to a DV tape, if you have that option. The tapes only hold one hour each so you can't save everything. I try to edit out the waste and only keep the best stuff.
My computer has over 600G of hard drives, it's not enough.

[ZAPPER]

I feel for you too. And as of yet I know of no best way to save all of your AVIs. Tape may turn out to be the cheapest, but I fear that at the point between the tape and the tape head there is the risk of loss and you don't have the ability to "jump" straight to the point that you want. I figure about 18-20 tapes to save 200GB of full blown AVI DV. With about 50 DVDRs you could save a little over 200GB but you could only jump to points that were on the DVD that was in the drive at the time.(personally I hate DVDs the more I mess with them) Harddrives seem to be the easiest to use and the fastest to use but I have to admit that I fear the failure of a harddrive and their cost is about 50% more than I am willing to pay.

I am assuming that you are talking about saving your home movies or other irreplaceable sources. Personally I wouldn't waste time or money saving too many comercial flicks you can always replace them if you had to.

[edDV]

"Tape may turn out to be the cheapest, but I fear that at the point between the tape and the tape head there is the risk of loss "

I wouldn't worry, DV tape recording is very robust and well proven. Digital recording eliminates any copy losses and even if dropouts occur, the cameras have good error correction. The tapes will degrade after 10 years but by then, other larger capacity storage will exist. Conside tape or hard drives as temporary storage until high capacity optical storage is available that can also handle greater than 25Mb/s direct stream recording.

[mpack]

Although I suggested it myself, the reason I've never checked out tape storage is that I've never trusted tapes: they are just too fragile for my liking. Plus that kind of technology isn't stable, and doesn't last - I imagine that by the time I need to recover data off the tape the tape drive technology is obselete and I'll no longer have a drive hooked up to any PC. What's needed is a everyday storage medium that everybody uses - so won't be gone by next year - and which just happens to store massive amounts of data in a non fragile format... and doesn't cost the earth!

[ZAPPER]

"Tape may turn out to be the cheapest, but I fear that at the point between the tape and the tape head there is the risk of loss "

I wouldn't worry, DV tape recording is very robust and well proven. Digital recording eliminates any copy losses and even if dropouts occur, the cameras have good error correction. The tapes will degrade after 10 years but by then, other larger capacity storage will exist. Conside tape or hard drives as temporary storage until high capacity optical storage is available that can also handle greater than 25Mb/s direct stream recording.

I hope that you are right, because that is where I am keeping all my raw footage. It just doesn't seem high tech enough to go around bragging about though. But it is what it is. Home movies made in the Fifties still play pretty much the same today as back then and still hold their charm. I just hope that in 50 years DV will still have the same kind of charm. (I do hope to transfer them to something different before that) I can see my kids complaining about the old timers using that crappy old AVI DV format when they try to watch the old family movies during the holidays.

[Ron B]

I am assuming that you are talking about saving your home movies or other irreplaceable sources.

Mostly Hi8 tapes of sports; the history of mountain biking, a couple Olympics, the best surfing footage of the 1980's, irreplaceable for sure; and those analog tapes get worse with every pass through the VCR.
I think the DV tapes are pretty reliable, at least enough to make it through to the next level of storage. I think the digital format is more important than the actual media it's on.
It's an age old problem; the archiving of images to preserve them for whatever the future may bring. For example; the grainy black and white and color film footage that preserved history from about 1900 still delivers the goods about the subject matter. The quality is poor, but the message is clear.