Burned CDs Last 5 years Max -- Use Tape? 664
Lam1969 writes "Computerworld has interviewed Kurt Gerecke, an IBM storage expert and physicist who claims burned CDs only have a two to five-year lifespan, depending on the quality of the CD. From the article: "The problem is material degradation. Optical discs commonly used for burning, such as CD-R and CD-RW, have a recording surface consisting of a layer of dye that can be modified by heat to store data. The degradation process can result in the data 'shifting' on the surface and thus becoming unreadable to the laser beam." Gerecke recommends magnetic tapes to store pictures, videos and songs."
If you say so... (Score:5, Funny)
Anyone know where I can download an MP3 jukebox for my Vic 20?
Re:Museum Archives (Score:5, Funny)
The only permanent solution (Score:2, Funny)
I've known about this for years...that's why I store all my important data exclusively on punch cards. Nothing will degrade my precious bales and bales of punch cards! My data will outlast the Apocalypse!
See, look at all these wonderful punched cards....they'll last fore...waitaminit...where did all these silverfish come from???
NNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Re:I guess it depends on how you treat them (Score:2, Funny)
Some things that degrade CDs (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Conflicts with other studies (Score:5, Funny)
Tapes, yes, but... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Museum Archives (Score:3, Funny)
Re:If you say so... (Score:4, Funny)
Screw that - I'm going back to stone tablets (Score:5, Funny)
The article says to use magnetic tape because the CDs degrade.
So does tape. Unless you're the BOfH, in which case you have a tape safe. But you can't use that to store tapes - its not climate controlled, and you've got too many bodies hidden in it anyway ... but ever tried to read a 10-year-od tape on a new machine? I gave up - it was easier to connect to a serial port and just dump the whole database over the course of a week, its that bad. Then another day for updates. Todays USB and Firewire will be the next generation's serial ports.
So, use a hard drive?
Leave it sitting on a shelf too long and you get "stiction" - so that's no good either. And have you even TRIED to access a 10-year-old drive in todays machines? The bois tries to auto-config, and the machine won't boot.
Zip disks? Hahahah click of death hahahah (I've got several zip drives that are "unzipped")
Paper printouts? Well, those are good for a few decades, but not exactly portable ... anyone care to figure out how many acres of trees a hex dump of a 200-gig drive will take?
Nope, stone tablets - to hit anyone over the head with who thinks that there's any real long-term solution other than to just re-copy to the latest format and pray.
Re:The only permanent solution (Score:4, Funny)
Re:5 years max? (Score:3, Funny)
A good drive burns clear thru the media making the distinction between a one and zero very clear.
Re:Conflicts with other studies (Score:5, Funny)
Umm, the tape backup consortium?
Just don't drop them! (Score:3, Funny)
This thread also strikes me as funny because I'm in the middle of archiving about 800 VHS tapes to DVD. Many are 15-20 years old, and I've been surprised at how well most of them still work. I wonder if the DVDs will last as long, but I figure it'll be easier to move the data off them since it won't have to be done in real time.
Besides, it's more of a space issue at this point. Which I'm guessing would be an issue with the stone tablets too!
Holy shit. (Score:3, Funny)
SMALL TEXT NO GRAPHICS LOTS OF RANDOM PARENTHETICAL STATEMENTS USAGE OF FAKE WORDS OMFG I'M SO COOL
"stop. unchain. (chain reaction)"
I only have one thing to say about this. The last line. [bash.org]
Re:What's wrong with... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:5 years max? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Tapes, yes, but... (Score:2, Funny)
Me:
[long pause]
Customer: Really?
Me: Yes.
[long pause]
Customer: Well thank God I retire in two years.
Re:Photography's loss (Score:3, Funny)
LOL
Get outside of your technology world for a few minutes and look at the HUGE boom in a multi-million dollar trend called "scrap-booking."
Re:Just don't drop them! (Score:2, Funny)
The way I heard it, it was originally supposed to be one commandment (God didn't want to make it too hard on his people), but Moses had to ruin it. Here's what ACTUALLY happened, before they edited the Bible:
Re:Screw that - I'm going back to stone tablets (Score:5, Funny)
So, the moral of the story- it'll take a ton of work, but it's worth a shot.
Video Records, vinyl then, gold now (Score:3, Funny)
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Re:Museum Archives (Score:5, Funny)
Re:OMG 30 Year Optical discs: (Score:3, Funny)
Great - so how am I supposed to even load those monstrosities into my thumbchip 'puter in 30 years? p Especially since all optical lasers will have been banned as potention "terr'rist weapons" under the laws passed by Emporer Bush the First in 2016?