Long Term Storage Options

[bigoman]

I have about 60 gigs of files on my hard drive right now that I would like to store away for the future. I know none of the storage formats in use today will be around in 50 or so years, but I would like to get the longest lasting storage I can.

CD-Rs are obviously not a great idea.

Can someone help with this?

Thanks

 

[PhoenixOrion]

External HD?

 

[Matthias99]

Assuming the form factor doesn't go away, DVD-Rs are probably not a bad choice. Even with Blu-Ray and HD-DVD coming soon, I think regular old DVDs will be commonplace for at least 10 years (and most future players are looking to be backwards-compatible, at least for the next generation). Any new format looking to replace DVD is going to be a hard sell if the players aren't backwards-compatible with the basic DVD standard.

The only other thing I'd really consider would be DLT tapes. They're widely used in the business world, and so readers will likely continue to be available for a long time.

Now, storage longevity (in terms of actually being able to retrieve your data) is another question. I'm not sure *anything* has been proven 100% reliable for 10-20+ year storage -- you can only do accelerated lifespan testing (obviously), which only gives you estimates. Tapes are magnetically stable for decades, but the physical material can break down or stiffen, making reading it back difficult or impossible. DVDs are *supposed* to be good for a pretty long time, but then again, that's what they said about CDs...

If you're really serious about archiving digital material over the long term, I'd suggest burning onto DVD for now, and re-copying it onto fresh media every 3-5 years. Odds are you'll also be able to consolidate onto larger, cheaper future media at the same time, thus neatly avoiding the whole "oops, now I've got a drawer full of Y2K-era media that no computer can read" problem.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: PhoenixOrion
External HD?

For regular backups (especially of large amounts of data that won't fit on other media easily), I think external hard drives are great. But I'd be worried about doing long-term archival on them. You might plug it in a year or three from now and find it no longer functions (or, worse, the head crashes into the disk platter and destroys all your data), whereas (IMO) there's less to go wrong with something like a DVD or DLT tape (since the moving parts are in the drive).

 

[zodder]

Great answer.

 

[iwantanewcomputer]

put it on a small hard drive and store the drive in a cool dry enviornment away from electronic devices. i imagine the magnetic disks hold their data for at least 15 years when not operating. that's just cause i've seen computers that are not extensively used with 8 year old hard drives with original data that hasn't been corrupted

also burn it to a dvd. the format should be backwards compatible for a long time. blue ray will replace it soon enough, but a lot of the things made will still be dvd's because thereis not much that the blue ray minimum of 25 gigs will require. it's tough to make a 25 gig movie and blue rays are expected to support up to 200 gigs of data

 

[piasabird]

Could make a little file server up and just unplug it when not in use so it stays Virus Free. Either that or copy it onto a SATA Hard drive and put it up somewhere for a while. Hard drive's can last a long time in storage.

 

[bigoman]

Thanks for all the replies so far.

Sounds like I'll keep it on this hard drive and store it away, and also burn some DVDs.

Any other ideas?

Also, any ideas on safe ways to store hard drives in addition to whats already been mentioned?

Thanks a ton.

And incase you are wondering, I am storing old home videos (of myself) for my parents.

Thanks again

 

[Auric]

Glass-stamped optical? DVD-RAM? A mix of HDD and optical is a good idea. I certainly would not want to risk everything to loss by magnetic interference or even mechancial failure where recovery costs are exorbitant.