Best Archival: Blu-Ray, DVD or USB Revisited

[TheLastOfThem]

Bumping this mad old thread...but don't know where else to ask. Can anyone comment on what to do then to ENSURE preservation of something for....well...at least 50 years? Is it really just a crapshoot. Are we all destined to lose all our files over and over or keep being slaves to constantly backing up and the randomness of it all? Seems like there is no answer to this madness

[ron spencer]

Bumping this mad old thread...but don't know where else to ask. Can anyone comment on what to do then to ENSURE preservation of something for....well...at least 50 years? Is it really just a crapshoot. Are we all destined to lose all our files over and over or keep being slaves to constantly backing up and the randomness of it all? Seems like there is no answer to this madness

If your goal is to backup and leave it alone for 50 years then use tape backup. Assuming you can find a reader. Honestly, just use hard drives and every so often backup the backup to whatever media is useful at the time.

[usually_quiet]

Bumping this mad old thread...but don't know where else to ask.

Gee thanks for making me skim this long, seven year old dead thread to get to your question.

You can always create a new thread. You even know how. Digging up 7-year old threads is lazy, rude, and inconsiderate. A lot of people who do it are trying to manipulate the forum for a quick answer. They can wait forever for an answer, as far as I am concerned.

[JVRaines]

Gee thanks for making me skim this long, seven year old dead thread to get to your question.

When I see an old date at the top, I just click the last page button. Nobody's making me read the whole thread.

If your goal is to backup and leave it alone for 50 years then use tape backup. Assuming you can find a reader. Honestly, just use hard drives and every so often backup the backup to whatever media is useful at the time.

That's right. Magnetic tape lasts at least 30 years under proper storage conditions. Keep the tape reader in the vault, too, and haul it out once in a while to exercise it. For shorter-term backup I use bare hard drives and an eSata dock.

[TheLastOfThem]

What is the relative humidity DVD-R's should be kept at?

Do cardboard boxes help buffer humidity from the outside environment? Is there any type of box that you can place items in ...and it retains the humidity internally of another environment?

Like I heard of "dry box"

[TheLastOfThem]

Bumping this mad old thread...but don't know where else to ask.

Gee thanks for making me skim this long, seven year old dead thread to get to your question.

You can always create a new thread. You even know how. Digging up 7-year old threads is lazy, rude, and inconsiderate. A lot of people who do it are trying to manipulate the forum for a quick answer. They can wait forever for an answer, as far as I am concerned.

You also know how to check the dates on posts too don't you? You could have just..skipped to the end of the page. You're very unusual if you read every post to this point. I don't know by what you mean by saying "trying to manipulate the forum for a quick answer". I posted on a topic that was very relevant to what I'm talking about - what's the issue with you and me bumping this thread?

And if I did create a new thread - then you get some wise-ass like yourself going "You could have used the search function you know...how rude/lazy/inconsiderate"

So basically..what I'm saying is...

As far as I'm concerned, whatever :P

[usually_quiet]

Bumping this mad old thread...but don't know where else to ask.

Gee thanks for making me skim this long, seven year old dead thread to get to your question.

You can always create a new thread. You even know how. Digging up 7-year old threads is lazy, rude, and inconsiderate. A lot of people who do it are trying to manipulate the forum for a quick answer. They can wait forever for an answer, as far as I am concerned.

You also know how to check the dates on posts too don't you? You could have just..skipped to the end of the page. You're very unusual if you read every post to this point. I don't know by what you mean by saying "trying to manipulate the forum for a quick answer". I posted on a topic that was very relevant to what I'm talking about - what's the issue with you and me bumping this thread?

And if I did create a new thread - then you get some wise-ass like yourself going "You could have used the search function you know...how rude/lazy/inconsiderate"

So basically..what I'm saying is...

As far as I'm concerned, whatever :P

1. Grave digging old threads is frowned upon in most forums. Creating a new thread is always preferable to grave digging. Writing "Bumping this mad old thread...but don't know where else to ask.", tells me you did know this is something you probably should not be doing.

2. Threads are left open because the moderators here expect members to know that they should avoid adding to very old threads without a very good reason. "I have the same question." is not a good enough reason.

3. The search function is used to find previous threads that would potentially contain answers to your question so you don't have to ask. It's not something you should use to find similar long dead threads on VideoHelp so you can post your question in one of them. If all you can find are years old outdated threads, that is a good reason to start a new one.

4. Anyone who thinks that skipping to the end of a thread and reading only the the last post is the best approach to thread participation is probably not going to to give an answer that adds anything new to the thread.

5. Some members here have specifically stated that grave digging is their way of getting a quick answer. They are aware that some of the more active members may have arranged their forum settings to get emails when new posts appear in threads that they have posted in before.

As far as I am concerned, you have proved yourself deserving of the criticism I gave you.

[TheLastOfThem]

Wahhh wahhh wahhh ;(.

Fixed that for you. And my reference to bumping this "mad old thread" was just that. It's mad old and people may go "oh why did you have tooo bring this back up" That's it. Nothing of what you're mentioning of people getting e-mail notifications. Not my problem. It's theirs. They should learn to unsubscribe from threads they no longer wish to be a part of.

So as far as I'm concerned, you're just blabbing and crying. And really I just don't care for what else you have to say (which isn't much of anything at all). Sorry! cry elsewhere.

[usually_quiet]

Wahhh wahhh wahhh ;(.

Fixed that for you. And my reference to bumping this "mad old thread" was just that. It's mad old and people may go "oh why did you have tooo bring this back up" That's it. Nothing of what you're mentioning of people getting e-mail notifications. Not my problem. It's theirs. They should learn to unsubscribe from threads they no longer wish to be a part of.

So as far as I'm concerned, you're just blabbing and crying. And really I just don't care for what else you have to say (which isn't much of anything at all). Sorry! cry elsewhere.

Well, then keep up the grave robbing by all means and see where it gets you. Some of the mods have gotten a bit tired of it.

[johns0]

Moved the posts to a new thread so other people don't need to read or navigate through older posts.The original thread is here if you wish to visit old memories.

https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/299641-Best-Archival-Blu-Ray-DVD-or-USB

[usually_quiet]

What is the relative humidity DVD-R's should be kept at?

Do cardboard boxes help buffer humidity from the outside environment? Is there any type of box that you can place items in ...and it retains the humidity internally of another environment?

Like I heard of "dry box"

Cardboard boxes do nothing other than protect burned optical media from light and dust.

I think somebody here stores his burned optical media in a running refrigerator for climate control. No I'm not kidding.**

...but if you didn't use quality media or the burn was not optimal to begin with, none of the above matters.

[Edit]** Real climate-controlled storage would be better.

[TheLastOfThem]

I see. Will not trudge up older posts. Usually quiet - my apologies to you.

I heard 68 degrees is the optimal temperature...but a lot of NIST studies referenced say it can be stored optimally up to 80 degrees....so much confusion on what to do about this.

A fridge is not an option...:/

[lingyi]

I see. Will not trudge up older posts. Usually quiet - my apologies to you.

I heard 68 degrees is the optimal temperature...but a lot of NIST studies referenced say it can be stored optimally up to 80 degrees....so much confusion on what to do about this.

A fridge is not an option...:/

The answer is nobody knows for sure since all "long term" testing to date as been artificially accelerated given that DVDs have only been around for just over 20 years and BDs ~10 years.

As for the best enviroment, I'd think that a storage in a safety deposit box would be the best that could be done on a practical budget given that the environment there is designed for long term storage of paper documents which are highly prone to degration.

QUOTE=TheLastOfThem;2452287]Are we all destined to lose all our files over and over or keep being slaves to constantly backing up and the randomness of it all?[/QUOTE]

In a nutshell, Yes. There's no ONE best backup media, that's why the 1-2-3 (and more) method of backup is implemented. Three backups (ideally on different media) with at least one stored offsite. Copy your data and run a checksum against the original, then repeat as often as practical to new media.

50 years is a long time for digital data storage (less than 80 years have passed since the first digital computers) and theoretically the punched data could be retrieved if you had the reader. Whatever you choose to store your data on, be sure to pack it away with something that can read it!


I just checked Digitalfaq.com and Lordsmurf has a recent directly related to this thread:

"DVD = archival
Why? Platters on both sides, data sandwiched. Optical, not magnetic. No moving parts.
Issues: Dyes can degrade, light, moisture, overly hot, overly cold, 2nd layer of dual-layer less safe.

HDD = semi-archival
Why? No dyes to degrade, enclosed media, not really subjected to high temperatures (though cold and moisture are still issues), no issues with light.
Issues: Moving parts, magnetic.

CD = NOT archival
Why not? No upper polycarbonate means the dye layer is easily exposed.

Blu-ray = NOT archival
Why not? It's an inverted CD in structure. But instead of no covering, you have a very thin polycarbonate. Unlike CD or DVD, all BD must have an anti-scratch coating (whereas DVD had premium anti-scratch "archival" discs that were sold). The non-archival nature of BD is well-known among manufacturers of the media. It's the main reason that HD-DVD was going to win the HD optical formats war -- until Sony spend $$$,$$$,$$$,$$$ (literally, to their own $billions losses!) to bribe everybody to adopt their inferior format.

solid-state / RAM-based (SSD, flash, SD, CF, etc) = NOT archival!!! ... worse than CD/BD!!!
Why not? The only benefit of solid-state is speed and no moving parts. It's completely electronic in nature, and far more affected by power issues (surges, overages, underages, etc). And contrary to popular online myth, it is still affected by magnetic fields. These all have finite read/write cycles as well, as each read/write degrades it over time unlike HDD (though similar to RAM/RW opticals.) SD and flash cards are well-known as unsafe for archival. CF fairs a bit better. Time will tell on the new RAM-based formats used in professional cameras (XQD, etc). Only use flash storage for temporary needs, such as shooting photos, or physically moving data from A to B (home to work, etc).



The safest way is to store archives is:
- Verbatim DVD (DVD5/SL) at location 1
- Taiyo Yuden DVD at location 2
- Seagate HDD at location 1
- not-Seagate HDD at location 2/3
- and maybe even an encrypted (perhaps also obfuscated) online digital locker, like Dropbox or your own server

Note that really important files should never be compressed (zip, rar, etc). That just complicates the matter. However, inversely, sometimes archives can be better recovered than tiny files. So do both. Never do just one.

Read more: http://www.digitalfaq.com/forum/media/7384-best-media-store.html#ixzz4ELqZlCud "

Note: I highly recommend NOT posting to the thread at Digitalfaq.com because it was started by gamemanico and his questions will never end!

[lordsmurf]

Note: I highly recommend NOT posting to the thread at Digitalfaq.com because it was started by gamemanico and his questions will never end!

We keep gamey in check, so post away. That's where you'll always find me.

[TheLastOfThem]

Note: I highly recommend NOT posting to the thread at Digitalfaq.com because it was started by gamemanico and his questions will never end!

We keep gamey in check, so post away. That's where you'll always find me.

Didn't know you were on here. Wrote on your other topic :P

[TheLastOfThem]

A friend of mine claims he has HDDs working that are 15 years old. Also claims he uses anti-static bags to "Seal" them from humidity and oxidation...thoughts?

[usually_quiet]

A friend of mine claims he has HDDs working that are 15 years old. Also claims he uses anti-static bags to "Seal" them from humidity and oxidation...thoughts?

Some here have stated that if HDDs are left sitting in storage for years at a time, the lubrication congeals and the drive may seize when it is restarted. I have never left a drive in storage long enough to know if that is true.

[lingyi]

I have a couple of 40GB hard drives from 2006 that have sat unused for years that I just confirmed “work” (i.e. able to write, read data). And others on this forum have much older “working” drives.

The catch is that data storage is a paradox ala the (much over and misused) Schrödinger's cat. The state of the data is both good and bad until it’s retrieved. In addition, the data on a “working” hard drive (optical disc, tape, flash drive, etc) may still be corrupted upon retrieval due to physical or non-physical errors.

The best that can be done is to compare the original and backup after writing, use multiple different media and store them in a controlled environment (constant temperature, humidity, away from light, no mechanical shock). A good general rule for storage of anything of value is to never keep it in an enviroment that isn't comforable for people.

As for anti-static bags, HDDs and other PC components are shipped in them so they’re likely to be a good storage container (HDDS are are often vacuum sealed). Also, keep the packing material your hard drive came in to store your archive drive in to minimize shock.


Interestingly, a quick Google search about “hard drive humidity” brings up a 2016 study that states that high humidity (in a Datacenter) may cause more hard drive failures than heat alone. Link to full document here

However, here’s the HUGE GRAIN OF SALT about the study. The study was based on research done at nine Microsoft Datacenters spanning 1.5 - 4 years, over a million HDDs and concluded that flucutaing high humidity and heat caused more HDD faiures than high heat alone.

How does this relate to HDD use and storage in a humid environment? It doesn't since the home environment and PC component usage is nothing like the enviroment in a Datacenter. The one possible takeaway is that airflow over HDDs (to cool and possibly keep dry) is always a plus.

Note that I decided to post this because someone is going to say “SEE…HIGH HUMIDITY KILLS HDDS! after just reading the headlines *SIGH*

[TheLastOfThem]

Lordsmurf said that anti-static sealed bags increase risk of moisture. And again not sure how efficient it will be to store hard drives. I intend to keep them in 20% Relative humidity. Upstairs is not entirely "comfortable" but I doubt they have to be treated as people...it will be in boxes after all which should buffer the humidity somewhat?