11mo ago

Do you still use older storage for archives/backups etc?

For me I had a stack dvd blanks left over, I decided to save a little bit of money and used them to back up folders of childhood photos, documents etc and place them inside their own jewel cases.

I do have a 2TB external HDD, But that I throw on LARGE steam game back ups and movies.

Sure, the "cloud" exists and I use that too but what if your intewebz goes down, good luck getting your backups until it's back up.

What do you use? Optical media, tape drives etc?

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I prefer optical media if possible. Should survive a few decades, assuming good quality discs.
But I'd much rather use LTO tape if it wasn't so expensive to get the drive.
- Just the other day I came across some CDs that I used to back up some important data about 15 years ago (and which I thought I'd lost). They were absolutely pristine 👌
  
  I found my secondary school Video Production movies I made with my best friend 20 years ago haphazardly thrown into a spindle and I was able to rip it perfectly. I was ELATED. They are even better than I remembered before watching them again.
- DVD's will last about 15 years tops. I bought the highest quality 100 year rated AZZO dye DVDs. I used special tools from cdforums to make sure I burned at the speed that resulted in the lowest pi/pio errors rate ( the errors you don't normally see because they're corrected in drive). The ideal speed isn't the slowest or fastest based on the drive and the media. I stored the DVDs in black dvd cases in my temperature controlled basement.
  They all started having errors after 10 years.
  
  Email the company -- out of business? Lol
- Second vote for LTO. Stable and cheap medium. If only drives were cheaper.

Burnable discs have a limited life span. Make sure you have duplicates, and test them regularly.
- Iirc it's about 20-25 years for DVDs. But like 75 years for Blu ray
  
  10-15 years for DVD. I have extensive experience with DVDs. I don't have experience with Blu-ray but I would expect it to be half the rated lifespan too.
  
  M-discs are supposed to last longer
  
  A few years ago I went through a 15-year-old collection of DVDs and a surprising number of the burned discs were no longer usable.
  Size-wise I'd probably just get a handful of 256 gig USB sticks and make multiple copies keep them in a temperature and humidity controlled environment.
- M-Disc Blu-rays last a thousand years literally. It will outlive all of your other mediums a hundred-fold.

I have a couple of older drives used to back up photos and MP3s. They're mirrored in case one falls.
I transferred my optical media to those drives just for accessibility but the discs are still in my garage somewhere. Lol

Why not? As long as you have more than one copies, and you validate their integrity over time, it shouldn't be a problem.

I just made a DIY NAS, i mean I bought a cheap Intel N100 based minipc, installed xpenology and called it a day, I have backups set up, home assistant, jellyfin, immich etc

I have like 5 USB drives which I save stuff on, I happen to have a lot of games on the one hard drive I store the majority of my games on, and that drive has made it emphatically clear in recent months that it is on its way out. Uploading to the cloud never quite piqued my interest.

I have a 2.5” drive with music that I made that’s ten years old and probably full of bit rot. I should replace that.

32 comments