What's the best long term storage solution?

Doomer

Diamond Member
Dec 5, 1999
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I've got about 210 GB of family pictures and home videos I'd like to pass on to future generations. I've tentatively decided that Blue Ray is the way to go. 50 GB DL would be best but I'm not sure that DL is trustworthy. I remember reading about switchover issues in the past but don't know if this is still a problem or not.

Anybody care to over some guidance / suggestions?
 

ignatzatsonic

Senior member
Nov 20, 2006
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I'd use a small but new hard drive. Depending on the importance of the data, I might use two hard drives and keep them in separate locations. And maybe make fresh copies every 5 or 10 years. You'd have to make sure that the drive interface could be used on PCs 10 or 20 or 30 years in the future.

I wouldn't trust DVDs unless the stuff wasn't that important.
 

Doomer

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Dec 5, 1999
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I'm not sure I can trust HD's over the long term. Can it handle sitting idle for years and then spin up and perform normally?
 

Anteaus

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Oct 28, 2010
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Personally, I wouldn't use optical media. Even if you disregard the media itself, you still need to maintain drives that can read them. It's also more expensive per GB than hard drives. That's my opinion tho. I'm certain there are advocates out there.

Currently, hard drives seem the most cost effective media for long term storage. There are other mediums that are viable, but upfront costs are higher. With external hard drives so cheap, I would look into maybe buying a couple of 500GB external drives and simply keeping a complete copy on each drive. Every now and then it would be prudent to connect them and verify everything is still in order. There really are no hard and fast rules to this. Generally, the more important the data the greater the effort to keep it safe. Many people go so far as to make a second backup and maintain it at a separate location or in a safety deposit box. This can help prevent data lost in the event theft, flood, or fire.

The good news is that it is relatively cheap to duplicate the amount of data you are describing. For myself and others with file storage needs on the order of many terabytes, it can get expensive to maintain proper backups.
 

ignatzatsonic

Senior member
Nov 20, 2006
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I can't recall hearing any issues regarding HDs sitting idle.

It's hard to imagine the chances of failure would be higher for HDs than DVDs.

There's always SSDs--no spinning. If you can handle the expense.

USB flash drives seem to be too shaky and can just drop dead for no apparent reason. I'd probably use DVDs before flash drives.
 

Anteaus

Platinum Member
Oct 28, 2010
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I'm not sure I can trust HD's over the long term. Can it handle sitting idle for years and then spin up and perform normally?

Nothing can be trusted over the long term. Optical discs need drives to read them, and compatibility can break between brands. Magnetic tape is...well magnetic, therefore will fail eventually. Hard drives will also fail.

No matter what people use, it is still important to check the backups every so often, update the backup in the event of medium failure, or even create a new backup using updated methods. I'd say ever three to six months at a minimum.
 

ronbo613

Golden Member
Jan 9, 2010
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Hard drive for sure. Transfer the files to the current model of drive, probably every 3-5 years or so until something better comes along. Archiving is not a static process, that's why museums have curators.
 

Charlie98

Diamond Member
Nov 6, 2011
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I use two Seagate external portable HDDs, both 500GB, for my storage and backup duties (plus others, but that's neither here nor there.) I rotate them out each month, the off-duty one goes to the fire safe. All my non-video media files are on it... photos, music, and the odd family video converted to digitial. I'm currently scanning in over 10K 35mm negative images as well, all backed up in that manner.

The key is not to just file and forget... run the drives on a regular basis.
 

Torn Mind

Lifer
Nov 25, 2012
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Every method of backup has a way of breaking. Probably want to have a tape backup, a hard drive backup, and optical disc backup....
 

nwo

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Jun 21, 2005
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I'd use mirrored RAID drives tbh... If one fails, not only will you get a notification beforehand, but you also have the exact same data on the other. Just pop in the replacement HDD and let it rebuild.

I would definitely not recommend an SSD, especially if you do not plan on using it regularly.

I've had tons of optical media become unreadable after just several years, so I definitely steer clear.

For me, USB flash drives have been the most reliable, but if you have 210GB then that would be a costly alternative.... I have yet to see one fail on me. I have drives that lasted me 4-5 years of regular use and are still going strong.

If you want something portable, I'd recommend an external HDD and cloud storage as a backup.

Alternatively, I'd go with a RAID HDD setup.
 

Elixer

Lifer
May 7, 2002
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There's always SSDs--no spinning. If you can handle the expense.

No, this is not a valid option, since they require power every X months, or your data will be toast.
X varies, and I haven't seen anyone do long term tests on SSDs without having power.


Best would be to use multiple media backups, and then every other year, refresh them.
 

jkauff

Senior member
Oct 4, 2012
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I recently read a news story about Facebook standardizing on BD50 discs for their long-term storage needs. Didn't mention how many spare drives they bought.
 

ShintaiDK

Lifer
Apr 22, 2012
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Best long term is tapes (Up to 35 years). Anything else is just a mess. Other solutions are sub 5 year.
 

BrightCandle

Diamond Member
Mar 15, 2007
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There is no long term storage mechanism where you can rely on a single copy for any long term storage (where long term I am going to assume is say 50+ years).

The interface will change to the device, the media itself will degrade (burnt CDs self erase in about 5 years or so depending on the temperature and light exposure) and basically the entire thing will become obsolete. I know of only 1 strategy to maintain that data accurately for the long term and that is constant maintenance.

What you need to do is always have the following in place:
2 geographically different locations both storing the same thing.
Data held along with checksums and daily verification of checksums against the data and the verified checksums across locations.
Budget for new hardware every 5-10- years due to obsolescence
Expected software and storage format upgrades along the way

The more locations you have the better your chances of the data surviving. 2 is reasonable for standard home data but its unlikely to be sufficient for anything important. Geographically separated is important to survive wars and disasters (both reasonably likely in a 50 year period).
 

ithehappy

Senior member
Oct 13, 2013
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The interface will change to the device, the media itself will degrade (burnt CDs self erase in about 5 years or so depending on the temperature and light exposure) and basically the entire thing will become obsolete. I know of only 1 strategy to maintain that data accurately for the long term and that is constant maintenance.
Really? The first CD I wrote back in 2003 still works. And as I live in Calcutta, it has gone through extreme periods of hot surroundings!
 

Essence_of_War

Platinum Member
Feb 21, 2013
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Here are some thoughts:

https://superuser.com/questions/374...r-long-term-high-volume-data-storage-archival

I'd also look into m-disk:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC

But the major takeaway is that archiving digital data is absolutely not fire-and-forget. You need to consider maintenance of both the hardware and the software in the long-term. I would strongly consider converting to analogue media (35mm film, microfilm, etc) as these have some actual history to how long they can be stored, archived properly, etc if the price isn't too prohibitive.
 

pauldun170

Diamond Member
Sep 26, 2011
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Here is my piss poor, nothing fancy way of managing our 600gb of memories.

I have Computer A and Computer B, external hard Drive A, External Hard drive B.
Computer A has 1 SSD and 2 WD black drives
Computer B has all 2 WD black drives.
My externals are only plugged in and powered up when I'm loading them

Camera\Phones dump pics\vids to Computer A where pics directory is on WD Black storage drive. Back up copy resides on other WD black drive

When new load of data\changes occurs, (vacation pics loaded up to computer) copy is synched (incremental) to external drive A attached to computer A.
On a periodic basis computer B is powered up and computer A and B are synched up. External drive B is also synched up.

Fortunately I haven't had a drive fail on me in years so as drives fill up and need new space, I'll replace them with larger drives and toss the old ones on the shelf, each one dated.
Pics that are actually WORTH looking at will get printed, shared and uploaded to all the webz.
Same with videos.

I had stacks of cds, in the end they weren't worth the effort.

If I wanted to go nuts I'd rotate an external out of my safety deposit box at the bank.
As standards drop off the map, things get chucked. No ide drives lying around.

I'll eventually set up a proper strategy.
 

corkyg

Elite Member | Peripherals
Super Moderator
Mar 4, 2000
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Lots of interesting and useful ideas so far. I have done a combination of these for my photos, etc. My concept is based on planned redundancy. IOW, I am using opticals, and HDDs, It amounts to almost 4 complete sets in different locations, one of which is a safety deposit box at our bank.

Keep in mind that imagery you consider valuable may not be valuable to your heirs. A few years ago, I was party to clearing up my wife's parents estate. One of my tasks was to review about 250 carrousels full of color slides. I had one main criterion. Unless the photo involved a family member as subject, it was toast. Out of those several hundred slides, I retained about 50, digitized them, and sent them to relevant family members.

I only mention this because the ultimate decision maker will be your estate executor. Make it easy for him or her. :)
 
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Phynaz

Lifer
Mar 13, 2006
10,140
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Lots of redundant copies. BR media, off-site hard rives, cloud storage.