DIYHiFi.org

Since Carlos' "Linn...." thread is locked out, I've gotta start from scratch…

Good article in latest New Scientist on the issue of data-media longevity: "Digital doomsday: the end of knowledge"

See my comments elsewhere in this forum for CD-R suggestions.

In the “Linn…” thread, rossl noted:
$35 - $40 burners may be a better option.
Yes, EAC’s Secure Mode is best, but slower. Also, Test & Copy seems to give better results. The hydrogenaudio.org forum has a lot of info on this topic.

LP 100+ years

I have had a set of 5 DVD r that gradually became unplayable after as little as 1year.
The longest lasting was about 2years. Neither DVD players nor PC DVD writers were able to read any data off the recordings, once they had deteriorated.

_________________
regards
Andrew T.

What brand were they and in which environment were they most stored?

I can read
DVD-R followed by 8X or BX.
and
TORe

They were stored in the cabinet under the TV. Little light and generally cool ~15 to 20degC.
They show a very distinct colour change in the starting tracks and at the end (outer edge) even where this outer edge is not recorded. They became purple.

_________________
regards
Andrew T.

Bad radiation from TV?
(aardvarkology)

Seems to be China stuff.
Stay clear of cheap media.
Good media usually costs only a little more.
Verbatim is a reliable brand, even those discs that are... made in China.

_________________
Carlos Filipe

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction." Albert Einstein

Special archival media is claimed to last for 100 years and yes, it is gold layer.
But $$$.
Nothing new there.

And oh, flash is claimed to last 10 years top (the graph is correct), so beware.

_________________
Carlos Filipe

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction." Albert Einstein

Verbatim is a good brand as Carlos mentioned. The problem these days is that even reputable brands are having their discs outsourced to cheap producers.

I like to backup to hard drives but to use them for long term archival is another story... I'm always paranoid that it will stop working in storage.

At work we have a lot of devices that boot / operate off of flash. The devices using cheaper MLC flash experience a lot more issues compared to the more expensive SLC devices. I wouldn't trust any critical data to the grade of flash used in USB flash drives.

No. Everyone just has to keep their composure.

Jocko

_________________
"Because, I hate you guys. I hate you guys so very, very much.

Yours,
General Cartman Lee"

I miss HDD's in the overview

Dude ...did you read the article? If not, go back to to orig post and click that link. Much of it dealt with HDDs. Here's one quote:
"Hard drives were never intended for long-term storage, so they have not been subjected to the kind of tests used to estimate the lifetimes of formats like CDs. "

Didn't read the article, just browsed through now. Point is that many people go that route (in general, maybe not on the forum) despite of any article. Or play music stored on the internet (so actually also stored on HDD's).

And i still miss HDD's anyway. People should have backups of their data on HDD's and they usually are replaced before they break or get of age. Or lets just say it is easy to make a backup.

And as you can see, the other media do age. How many people do you know with a backup of their CD's? I know i found bad cd's when i ripped my collection. So what is better, having a media which you know will break over time. Or having one which breakes faster, but is much easier to backup?

I guess, according to the article we should all use gold CD-R.

I also question the drives getting bigger and bigger phenomenon, as pointed out in the article.