<snip> >> Just a word of warning, and I am sure most of know this already: >> writeable DVDs and CDs make a very poor backup medium for periods >> exceeding 5Yrs. There are numerous sources of reference for this >> statement on the net but my personal experience comes from creating 13 >> CDs of mp3 about 6-8yrs ago now. They are of various brands but every >> single one has decayed now and contains read errors ! >> >> Handy to remember when you are just about to backup your lifetime of >> family photos ! >> >> Chris >> > A good word of warning, although the media have improved in quality > during that time. Came across an old one of mine where the film had > peeled off! > > Steve
Yup! I am aware of that, but thanks for reminding me. My backup strategy, such as it is, is to have *all* my data on my main machine hard drive (including photos etc.) and an external USB drive mirrored with rsync. It is suboptimal in that it doesn't maintain historic snapshots, but I am aware of the limitation I have imposed on myself. Since hard drives fill up over time I move all my data onto a new hard drive when it's full, and get a new external drive. That means that the old drives themselves are historic snapshots. The DVD copies are intended to be last ditch backups if I lose the laptop, the backup drive and the most recent retired drive. Oh, and by the way, I like using rsync for this as it means I can look at the directory tree on the backup drive verbatim, and not compressed up into some notional "backup file". For our readers at home using XP I recommend Microsoft's SyncToy power tool. It's basically rsync with a GUI. Best wishes, Andrew
