Best medium for long term backup

[Calculator83]

Price per Gig is about the same nowadays between DVDs and Hard drives. Which one will be better for the long term,, IF we're assuming I'll turn off the HD if I'm not using it.

 

[RebateMonger]

No matter which media you choose, if the data is important and these are your ONLY copies, be sure to have TWO copies on two different disks.

If you are talking about just "backups", then a hard drive is much more convenient and doesn't normally require disk swapping.

There's been at least one person on these Forums reporting that he/she lost most of the data that had been stored on a set of DVD backup disks. Having lived through the early days of CD and DVD disks, I don't trust any BURNED disk for long-term storage.

Hard drives used as backups have been quite trustworthy for me. I test all my client's backup disks once a month to ensure that their backups are readable.

 

[Calculator83]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
No matter which media you choose, if the data is important and these are your ONLY copies, be sure to have TWO copies on two different disks.

If you are talking about just "backups", then a hard drive is much more convenient and doesn't normally require disk swapping.

There's been at least one person on these Forums reporting that he/she lost most of the data that had been stored on a set of DVD backup disks. Having lived through the early days of CD and DVD disks, I don't trust any BURNED disk for long-term storage.

Hard drives used as backups have been quite trustworthy for me. I test all my client's backup disks once a month to ensure that their backups are readable.

If they're not readable, What do you do?

How long can a hard drive maintain data integrity if it were off?

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: Calculator83
If they're not readable, What do you do?

How long can a hard drive maintain data integrity if it were off?

These are JUST backups, and we'll use multiple backup drives, so we'd just replace the hard drive.

Here's a discussion of the archival life of CDs, hard drives, and magnetic tapes.

"Unlike pressed original CDs, burned CDs have a relatively short life span of between two to five years, depending on the quality of the CD," Gerecke said in an interview this week. "There are a few things you can do to extend the life of a burned CD, like keeping the disc in a cool, dark space, but not a whole lot more."

"Hard-drive disks also have their limitations, according to Gerecke. The problem with hard drives, he said, is not so much the disk itself as it is the disk bearing, which has a positioning function similar to a ball bearing. "If the hard drive uses an inexpensive disk bearing, that bearing will wear out faster than a more expensive one," he said. His recommendation: a hard-drive disk with 7,200 revolutions per minute. "

"To overcome the preservation limitations of burnable CDs, Gerecke suggests using magnetic tapes, which, he claims, can have a life span of 30 to 100 years, depending on their quality. "Even if magnetic tapes are also subject to degradation, they're still the superior storage media," he said."

I recommend stone tablets for truly archival data storage.

 

[Calculator83]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger

Originally posted by: Calculator83
If they're not readable, What do you do?

How long can a hard drive maintain data integrity if it were off?

These are JUST backups, and we'll use multiple backup drives, so we'd just replace the hard drive.

Here's a discussion of the archival life of CDs, hard drives, and magnetic tapes.

"Unlike pressed original CDs, burned CDs have a relatively short life span of between two to five years, depending on the quality of the CD," Gerecke said in an interview this week. "There are a few things you can do to extend the life of a burned CD, like keeping the disc in a cool, dark space, but not a whole lot more."

"Hard-drive disks also have their limitations, according to Gerecke. The problem with hard drives, he said, is not so much the disk itself as it is the disk bearing, which has a positioning function similar to a ball bearing. "If the hard drive uses an inexpensive disk bearing, that bearing will wear out faster than a more expensive one," he said. His recommendation: a hard-drive disk with 7,200 revolutions per minute. "

"To overcome the preservation limitations of burnable CDs, Gerecke suggests using magnetic tapes, which, he claims, can have a life span of 30 to 100 years, depending on their quality. "Even if magnetic tapes are also subject to degradation, they're still the superior storage media," he said."

I recommend stone tablets for truly archival data storage.

How much would you charge to Engrave a 3.5 mile long string of bits on say, idk block'o granite. LOL