Hey guys, I just had a curiosity on the multiple ways of storaging stuff and how long would that hold, take backing it up to a newer storage after some years out of the table.
So how did this come in my mind, I was just reminiscing about how I used to play games with inserting a CD or Cartridge onto the device and how I miss that flavour.
I would like to do it again, I already like having my games dependancy free (praise mr goldmountain), and I am saving up some money to spend on hoarding possibilities. I would like to know what would have the longest storage life, would burning games into bluray discs be too unhinged or is something I am missing?
Thanks in advance in helping me out witht his brainstorm.
You must log in or register to comment.
Discs aren’t very suitable for long term storage. Really the only thing truly suited for long term storage of digital media is archival tape. Which isn’t cheap or accessible. The only accessible solution is to keep it alive in a raid and keep rebuilding as disks fail over the years.
Discs aren’t very suitable for long term storage.
M-DISC may well be a good option for long term storage.
Might be an option, but I bet these things aren’t cheap.
I still backup on DVDs, make multiple copies so one doesn’t go bad. In adition, I also have a storage, so I think I’m good.
Get Blu Ray discs from a reputable brand (Verbatim, Sony). They were designed to be a lot more resilient than DVDs. Nothing wrong with DVDs either btw, if the smaller size doesn’t bother you, just make sure they’re stored properly either way.
BR discs are still very expensive and will most probably be for a very long time. So are the BR drives. That’s why I still use DVDs.
Over here a 25 GB BD-R is about 60 cents USD and a 4.7 GB DVD-R is 30 cents so it makes sense to use Blu Ray.
BR drives are more expensive than DVD drives, true, but I consider it a good investment.
Here, 25GB BR is about $4. DVDs are about $0.20.
Ah, cool, quite expensive (I see prices in my area around $20 USD / 100 GB) but uses no electricity.
Thanks for informing me. If you have TBs of data it’s not a sustainable solution unless you’re really into indexing. But for family photos and other long term archival its pretty great actually.
It claims that.
Well let’s look at some actually verifiable data. I have optical discs of all generations (CD-R, DVD-R, BD-R) going back 20+ years that are still fine. They don’t spontaneously decompose or anything. As long as they’re properly stored I see no reason for them to stop working for another 20 years.
Do you periodically verify them?
I do sample them every few years out of curiosity. They mostly contain very old software and game kits from the late 90s and early 2000s so the data is only interesting for historical reasons. I also check them visually for disc rot but so far there hasn’t been any. Which makes sense because they’re not scratched, and they’re stored inside CD wallets put inside boxes put inside a dry cupboard at room temperature so environmental contamination is not likely.
There’s a rule I was always told in A+. Either a hard drive is going to last you less than a year or it’s gonna last you five. Usually any problems with a hard drive you’ll see right away. However after the third year is when I’d start checking the drive. There are tools out there that can let you know when a drive is in the caution level and that’s when you should think about replacement. I’ve had hard drives like one I have to replace soon last me eight years with constant use as a Plex drive.
LTO most probably… but the tapes are expensive, so are the devices.
EDIT: We use them at work. They’re enterprise grade, so long term storage is not a problem, the price is though.
Contrary to what people suggested, I would advise against optical discs or tapes and would go with HDDs you check every few months. They don’t rot like optical media, the only thing you have to worry about are the motor spindles getting stuck and other mechanical failures.
It will also be the cheapest option. With tapes you need expensive drives and they change the version every few years. Tapes only are better if you store hundreds or thousands of TiB of data.
Which data so you want to save? Mostly games and media? If so, consider giving them to your friends and family to copy and enjoy, which some people call a ‘friend backup’.
Most recent iteration of optical media (Blu Ray) doesn’t rot. Actually older media didn’t rot either if stored properly. I still have 20yr old CDs and DVDs that are usable. And if you’re going to let something sit in moisture or dust or whatever, a HDD wont fair that well either.
The storage medium you choose really isn’t as critical as making multiple copies, storing them in separate physical locations, and testing that you can recover the data when you need it. Diversity in the physical medium you choose is probably a good thing too long term. Archival discs aren’t really that long lived though. You could try, but unless you are regularly checking the discs and making additional copies, you’re going to loose data eventually. I gave up using discs as any kind of backup because it was too much hassle. Copying hard drives was much more straightforward and reliable.
Optical discs are the least likely medium to degrade by just sitting in a drawer for long periods of time. HDDs have lots of moving parts and SSD data degrades over time. If you find a disc and an HDD in a box after 20 years and wonder which will still work, my money’s on the disc.
Well, I’ve tried both (yes over twenty years) and writable optical discs have been pretty flaky in comparison to HDDs. I never suggested SSD was good for anything but temporary storage. But you’re totally missing the point about medium mattering much less than consistently making copies.
Thanks for all the input everyone! I got really interested in that M-Disc!
Don’t bother with M-discs. They only provided a meaningful advantage in the DVD era. I’ve researched this a bit myself and consensus at least in the data hoarding community is use 2 Blu-ray Discs from two different batches (bought 6 months apart). Which still comes out cheaper or the same as branded M-Discs. (Though that may be overkill and truth be told as long as you test the disc and it’s data done months after writing you’ll tend to catch any rare bad ones)
Truth is, quality Blu-ray Discs have all the features that would engender M-disc type longevity in the design spec. Just make sure they’re not low to high (LTH) discs which are inferior but always marked as such at least.
Don’t get no-name cheap ones either, get Verbatim, Sony, some other good Japanese brand. For Verbatim specifically their discs marked MABL on the package are better.
Always burn data at lower speeds too, less errors.
Always burn data at lower speeds too, less errors.
Doesn’t help the fact that the discs degrade over time.
