On Mon, Dec 03, 2018 at 03:29:28PM +0100, deloptes wrote:
Last week I looked at about 20 CDs and few DVDs with backups from 2000-2004 - perhaps 1/2 of them had errors. I had also some USB sticks from that time, that do not work, but most of them still do or CF cards and similar, I use for 10y+ without issue. I tend to store on CF or SSD recently - feel better, but I was asking, because I think someone would have argument for/against.
For this reason, I am gradually moving towards keeping all my data, including backups, on "live", powered drives, so I can catch failures very fast. I am mid-way through importing all my old CD-Rs and DVD-Rs, and finding plenty of unreadable or partially damaged discs in the process. My current "live" disk regime (one live data disc, one live backup disc, a hot-pluggable USB backup drive that I sync monthly and store in a different building to the first two) seems to be working well but I've only had it up and running for a couple of years. If I were to consider optical discs again, I would need a bullet-proof regime that ensured that written discs were regularly read-checked to catch degradation. This feels like it would be a lot of work. -- Jonathan Dowland
