EchoLocation said:I'm a big music fan and archived a bunch of concerts(maybe 500cds) on the highest quality cd's I could buy(at a reasonable price, maybe $30 for a 50pack) about ten years ago...sony
I made double copies and kept the second copies in jewel cases in a box in a cool, dry closet. I never played them, or touched them.
ten years later, almost half of them have lost their sony paint on the top side and are now basically clear, and totally unplayable. I'm super pissed.
don't believe that cd's, dvd's or blu ray will last 100 years. that is 100% BS.
I now have triple backups of everything on different external hard drives in different locations(one at home, one at my mom's house, etc)
When I ran my business I would do backups onto rewritable CDs weekly. Two different manufactuers disks copy of the backup on each type each week, swapping disks every week so I had 4 disks going with this weeks and last weeks backups. I wound up the business some years ago, and found the disks when unpacking when we moved into our new house a couple of years ago, about 7 years after writing the data.
All data was unrecoverable.
CD-ROMs might have been better, but I'm not sure they'd be good for a decade.
IMHO there are three ways.
1. Keep data in a current live format.. i.e. in immediately accessible backup drives, ensure your data is stored with one set in a fire safe or in an alternative building (what I'm setting up)
2. Print REALLY valuable data using best inks/dyes onto paper in 2D barcode style. last time I looked it was about 1Mbyte per A4 page, you should easily get 20 years from top of the line printing, probably far more with no digital degradation.
3. Print the images you really want to keep using top end inks/dyes and store carefully, as we always did with those couple of pictures of Great Great Grandpa... and those lasted >100 years.. this is what I'm starting to do for those family pictures we have so we don't suffer digital amnesia.
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