Can a turned off HDD survive arctic temperatures?

Red Squirrel

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May 24, 2003
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I've been thinking about an offsite backup solution for my data in case of fire, flood, EMP, etc. But transfering that much data to a web host is tedious, and things such as security are a big issue, even if I encrypt it, theres the chance someone can crack it if it gets taken. Server is in the states, so RIAA is probably all over that in an instant if they find out such file exists on my server.

I was thinking of just getting one of those fire proof safes and putting it in the shed. I would probably want to bolt it to a chain that is hooked up to a block of cement that I'd throw in a 10 foot hole and burry it up, but physical setup is something I could worry about later on.

Only thing, it gets really cold here, and our shed is not heated or insulated, would HDDs survive this? I'm talking -50 Celcius here.
 

jonesthewine

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Dec 30, 2003
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I have no idea about surviving the -50 C temps...but if you bury it below the frost/freeze layer it will stay warmer than that. Why not put the HDD in a bank safety deposit box, or burn the data to dual layer DVDs at 8.5 GB per disk and bury those?
 
Oct 25, 2006
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Well, HDD's can be put into freezers and still work, but a freezer doesn't go to -50..

Anyway, if you put it into a dry, moisture proof bag and seal it completely, it should be perfectly fine.

And also its kind of funny you are willing to dig a 10 foot hole just so you can bury your HDD :p
 

Red Squirrel

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haha yeah the hole was just a random idea I came up with. I'm still living with my parents so I'd just be putting it in the shed but when I move out I'd probably get more creative. The hole idea was more to anchor the safe then to burry the drive, but guess that works too. Have a small underground passage, like those secret drug operations. :p

I've thought of DVD RWs as well, but think those would shadder in the cold.
 

Red Squirrel

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Mostly personal projects such as all my websites, programs, server configuration scripts, resources, documents, etc etc... Stuff that I've built up over the past 7 years or so which I can't afford to loose. Oh and can't forget stuff like family pictures etc...

setup files/movies etc is not considered critical, I can get that stuff back. Though with how cheap HDDs are these days I'd probably just back everything up anyway.
 

PolymerTim

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Apr 29, 2002
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Originally posted by: RedSquirrel
I've thought of DVD RWs as well, but think those would shadder in the cold.

I can't help you with the hard drive question, but I know a little bit about polymers. DVDs and CDs are generally made out of polycarbonate which gets its strength from a particular molecular motion that does not "freeze" until almost -100 C. I am not familiar with actual brittleness at low temps, but I think it is safe to assume that while the DVD would be a little more brittle at -50 C, it would get very brittle until below -80 C. Even then, it would probably be about as strong as polystyrene (think of the jewel case the DVD is stored in) so it wouldn't break just from touching it.

On another note, I vaguely remember seeing an article a couple of years ago where the Library of Congress was trying to determine the life expectancy of CD/DVDs so they know how often they need to copy their media to keep it fresh. Many thought the lifetime would be very long but it urned out that many of them start to kind of dry-rot after about 10-15 years. So just keep that in mind the next time you plan on keeping some really important backup data in a basement/attic/hole for more than a decade :)

-Tim
 

Red Squirrel

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Hmm thats always good to know. DVDs are easier to store, I could even just bring them at work. A HDD would look too suspicious, theres a policy against brining external hardware from home and using it on PCs. Even if it was a tray and not usb, it would maybe come up as suspicious.
 

Modelworks

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Feb 22, 2007
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Not a hard drive, but it got me to thinking about the voyager probes.
One of them uses a steel wire that is recorded onto magnetically like tape.
Its probably been recorded on and erased thousands of times.
Not sure of the temps inside the probe either, has to be pretty low that far from the sun.

Anyone know what the mars robots are using for storage ? Thats got to be pretty harsh on storage mediums as well. I wonder what they are going to be using for storage on the upcoming moon landers.

I suppose its mostly flash based storage now.

Do things like the space shuttle , space station have hard drives ?
 

Red Squirrel

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hmm that would be interesting to know about. I think the blast off of a space shuttle would be too hard on typical HDDs, so either they got some heavy duty industrial ones, or use a total different storage medium.

Maybe they use those green plasma chips like on Halo. :p Install Cortona 1.0 on all the computers.