What’s the Best Long Term Storage Media? Tips to Avoid Losing Data in Your Lifetime
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- Опубликовано: 8 июн 2024
- ⏱️ Choosing the right long term storage media is part of protecting your data from degradation or other forms of loss. But there's more to it than just media.
Common storage methods like CDs, DVDs, memory cards, and thumb drives are susceptible to wear and data loss over time. Even SSDs, a pricier flash memory option, aren't guaranteed to last for decades. The more reliable option seems to be traditional spinning hard drives, which have shown durability over extended periods. What's critical is to periodically transfer data from old storage mediums to newer technologies to prevent data loss. Also, consider the longevity of file formats. Ubiquitous formats like .docx and PDF are likely to remain accessible in the future, but obscure formats might become unreadable. Cloud storage is another useful solution but should be treated as an "additional" backup, given potential account hacks or service failures. Lastly, while paper retains data without tech interference, it's vulnerable to environmental damages. In essence, the key to long-term data preservation is redundancy and regular data migration.
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To everyone reacting with some variation of stone tablets, please see askleo.com/stone-tablets/ and/or ruclips.net/video/eC8YNhLbMqQ/видео.html . 🪨
Also, one of my points here isn't really to say one particular form of media is better than another (though of course some will be, and as the comments point out there's a wide variety of opinion 😱). The real takeaway here is that there is NO "best" media, and that in order to preserve data long term it should be a) backed up, and b) 👉🏻👉🏻periodically migrated to then-current storage technology👈🏻👈🏻.
You're absolutely right 👍
Stone tablets are the best long term storage medium. They last for thousands of years. They might be destroyed, other media will be for certain. The only ones that won't are the golden records on the Voyager probes.
@@Nikioko Only because there's almost no friction in space and no oxidation, but in itself, it's a very soft metal and we truly have no idea if the info is still legible as there's no way of checking. I'm going with granite tablets😁
@@psylentrage Oxidation isn’t really a problem for gold, unless you use Aqua Regis.
M-DISC (Millennial Disc) have a lifespan of 1000 years. They are CD size and write-once. You can buy an external writer for your PC/laptop for a reasonable price.
Wikipedia: "In 2022, the NIST [National Institute of Standards and Technology] Interagency Report NIST IR 8387[20](Page 12), stated that M-Disc is an acceptable archival format rated for up to 100 years+.
The difference between local storage and cloud storage is that local storage can't change its terms and conditions at any time, unless YOU feel like changing the terms an conditions.
Yes.... thank you very big.... you know have 1TB of cloud storage for one year Free....
11 months down the line Your free storage will be coming to an end in 30 days upgrade now to either a 6 month contract or a 1 year contract for £90 for six months or £150 for a year.....
I found that out when i bought my Htc phone all those years ago...
That's why you should have both, to give you a true backup instead of simple data redundancy. The cloud portion is for catastrophic problems, local is for more mundane problems.
I'd never use cloud storage for backups as it requires an internet connection. If the net goes down, you're screwed. Not to mention the fact that it's simply not practical or reliable to backup thousands of files totalling many gigabytes or even terabytes. I also want active working backups, not files that are stored away that have to be downloaded/uploaded every time I make a change. I can't think of anything more tedious.
You’re forgetting the bigger difference, a whole lotta money.
@@FlyboyHelosim there are automated solutions for this, no need to manually keep them updated. I use Backblaze and it's good for what it is. But yes, you do need to download for recovery. Or have a drive shipped to you.
"What’s the Best Long Term Storage Media?" Clay tablets. Or stone if you're out of clay.
Language dies too. I have no idea what message those giant dinosaurs were trying to convey with that 50 yard long track of footsteps in what is now turned to stone. It has lasted through the millennia but we have no interpreter. :-)
@@cosmicraysshotsintothelight That's just because our mammal-to-reptile translation efforts are still in their infancy. Give them another couple millennia.
@@prycenewberg3976 Naw... I know what they were saying... "Run! Or I will eat you as a casual snack!..."
@@cosmicraysshotsintothelight The report on my desk reads that there was nothing casual about dinosaur snacking...
@@prycenewberg3976 That must have been what happened to those poor poor Neanderthals. They were all minors, not miners. :-) Their footprints stopped after only 20 yards and it looks like the Snack-on-u-saurus didn't even miss a step.
The ONLY solution to keeping important data is, multiple copies stored at diverse places on various media - AND scheduled rewrites every 10 years or so. It is not about media type or file format, it is about due process.
well said
True. This also solves the problem of compatibility with new technology interface
this
YES! This is the only answer.
100% correct
"their backups are for them; my backups are for me" awesome line. so many people forget this when picking a cloud company and rely so much on them.
Good advice! Remember, “The cloud is just someone else’s computer.” I use a 4 bay NAS with two drive failure protection (RAID 6 or Synology SHR-2) and replace bad drives as they fail. I also keep backup hard drives in cold storage and update/verify quarterly. I keep another hard drive at one of my kids houses, updated annually, in the event of fire or theft. I have data going back to the early 1980s with no loss.
> "Remember, “The cloud is just someone else’s computer.”
That's really not a problem, unless you rely on cloud backups only, and refuse to encrypt your data with strong encryption, before sending it to a server.
Cloud backups are ideal for your most important data, stuff you don't want to lose in a disaster, it's far more reliable and flexible than storing a hard drive at your kids place and only checking it annually. I go as far as saying that cloud storage is far more reliable and secure than how we store things at home. Mind you, I'm of course not telling people not to make any backups at home, because that wouldn't be very wise.
> " use a 4 bay NAS with two drive failure protection"
That's not a backup, it only protects your working data against a drive failure, it's basically a system that was invented to keep a server or client working when a drive fails, that's not the same as making a daily backup.
How often do the drives fail?
@@Jake-mn1qcHow to encrypt data before backup?
@devil96221 Depends on the drive. The most reliable are WD Gold and their 'Ultrastar' doppleganers. These things are literally THE most reliable drives on the planet currently. I use the 14TB, 18TB, 20TB and 22TB. They all use the CMR method of manufacture so they have ultimate flexibility and compatibility. Not the cheapest but worth every cent.
I am happy someone mention NAS. This is the perfect solution.
I can share some of my experience with USB, SD Cards, and SSDs since I actually tried this out.
5 years ago I decided to test this out, so I bought 10 USBs, 10 SD cards, 5 SSDs and stored the same 50 images on each one without compressing it. The plan was every year I would test 1 of each of these and check if they died.
Year 1:
- USB 1: First Test - nothing wrong
- SD: First Test - nothing wrong
- SSD: First Test - nothing wrong
Year 2:
- USB 1: Second Test - nothing wrong
- USB 2: First Test - 17 images were corupted
- SD: Second Test - nothing wrong
- SD: First Test - 28 images were corupted
- SSD: Second Test - nothing wrong
- SSD: First Test - 3 images were corupted
Year 3:
- USB 1: Third Test - Worked, but 36 images corrupted
- USB 2: Second Test - Worked, but no data
- USB 3: First Test - Didn't work, wasn't recognized
- SD: Third Test - Worked, but only 39 images corrupted
- SD: Second Test - Worked, but no data
- SD: First Test - Worked, but no data
- SSD: Third Test - Worked, but 38 images corrupted (2 more than last time)
- SSD: Second Test - Worked 14 image corrupted (11 more than last time)
- SSD: First Test - Worked, but no data
Year 4:
At this point every device has lost data.
The only devices that worked were the first tests.
They all worked, but had corupted images.
Year 5:
The only devices that worked were the first tests.
Nothing else worked at all and most the computer didn't even see.
Summary:
I think the first tests kept working because each year they were getting a charge when I tested it, but they still had corupted images, so it wasn't perfect. These were all just sitting in my closest during this time, so there wasn't any special environmental control.
On the other hand I had a hard drive sitting in my trunk for 8+ and it still worked.
One program didn't work after all this time and I'm not sure why, but all the individual files, images, music still worked.
excuse me but by hard drive do u mean the external hard disk we still use nowadays? :3 (sorry, not that tech savvy here)
@@akabaneaki The SSDs are the same ones you would put in your computer. External drives are typically just cases with a little dotter board to pass the signal over USB.
You can even get USB -> SATA cables that do that same thing. This way you can just plug it into the drive.
Thats because you need to turn on your flash drive(ssd/usb/sd) every once 6 months to refresh the charge. If you did that, your data would prob not be corrupted after 5 years.
if i store my data on eksternal hdd and eksternal ssd(plugged every month) which one last longer ?
oh no, i have a flash drive thats been sitting here since 2019, i only power it on like once a year, i wonder how many files in it are corrupted now, omg
Redundancy! That's the key. It always has been and always will be. I fully believe that no matter how fancy or reliable we think a storage solution is, having a single instance of data will always be a risk not worth taking. The reason the old saying "Don't put all your eggs in one basket" is an old saying in the first place is because it's completely true, and is as relevant today as it was centuries ago. Great video! 👍
The most important thing is to store your data multiple copies on different types of devices stored in different physical locations. The probability of them all getting annihilated is pretty slim so you are good.
Constant rotation of your data via evolving media is the best way to ensure your data is secured.
I used to backup to floopy, migrated to zip drives, migrated to CDs, migrated to DVDs, migrated to external drives, duplicate to cloud while keeping copies on external disks. Replacing older drives after about 3 years for new ones is a good way to make sure your data is safe incase your disk dies.
I agree with everything you state and would add, having full backs ups in three (3) different formats in multiple resting places.
I have had hardrives for nearly 10 years and they show no sighn of any problems. Don't forget you can just check stats on the drive. The most alarming problem would be the drive not booting up at all.
That's my luck...
Hah. You said floopy. 😂
When the warranty runs out, around 2 or 3 years
I have got cassette tapes I recorded onto in 1970 and they still play back ok today.
Same with reel to reel tapes, as with cassettes. They still play fine from the late 60's. A few that I had were on crummy quality that cased a lot of breaks, but otherwise the sound on them was still as good as when I originally bought them. Some of the ones I had were stored in a hot garage for years too and they still played okay. Magnetic tape seems to last a very long time, especially if stored properly and recorded on good quality tape.
@@D7H777 If some bits are lost in the analogue signal recorded for music, you won't notice as the errors are smeared out. It has to detoriate a lot before your ears will notice a change.
However, digital information stored on tape can't accept bit errors to the same degree.
I have DVD's that I burned in 2009 and they are garbage.
go digital. Eventually your player will brake and it will take a fortune to repair it.
Same here. I have many cassettes form the mid 70s that play perfectly today.
As a collector of vintage computers, I have extensive experience with aging consumer grade hard drives. No, the magnetic image doesn't begin to fade. Rather, the bearings seize on the disc spindles. Or the head stepper motor seizes because the lubricant dries out. Or the rubber bumpers inside get brittle. Or the head sticks to the platter. Or any number of other failure modes. In any case, hard drives from the early 1980s and newer are becoming unreadable, and these drives have been stored in conditions that are dry and relatively temperature stable. Of course, the jury is still out on SSD's so we'll know the answer to that in 2060. The answer is not just to back up, but back up with redundancy.
Could explain the redundancy part please
Redundancy, as in more than one copy. You want to have multiple copies of the backup so that if one or more become unreadable you still have copies with which you can successfully reassemble the data.
@@Mr.BrownsBasement ok thx
I'd like to ask your opinion and advice since I'm still not sure what is best for me.
I'm looking for something that I can store a backup of all my digital data for long periods of time.
Things like personal & family photos and videos.
I'm not a professional or youtuber. But I do like to take & keep high resolution photos and videos.
I want it for personal use mainly for memory keeping and backup storage that can withstand time.
I want it cost efficient but durable as well so I don't have to worry about it getting dropped or wet or data getting lost or corrupted over time.
What do you think is best for me to buy?
I'm going to base my purchase decision on your recommendation.
Thank you so much in advance.
First, please, do not base your purchases on a single persons opinion. Not even mine. You owe it to yourself and to your data to get much more than one opinion.
Please keep in mind that nothing is “permanent” in the real sense of the word. Your data might be permanent for 10,100, maybe even 1000 years. But we won’t be around to argue about it if your data only makes it to 800 when it should have lasted to 1000.
The storage conditions under which your archival copies are kept will make a large difference to their longevity. Ideally, your data will be lovingly kept in a climate controlled vault. But it’s also possible that your data will be eventually kept outside on a rock. You have no control over this.
There is one technology which boasts a lifetime of up to 1000 years and that is a variation on the compact disk called M-disk. I suggest you research it. There is no guarantee of course that there will be media readers in 1000 years that will be able to access data stored on an M-disk. But that’s another issue that we have no control over.
I hope this answers your question and gives you some food for thought. This is my chance to blow my own horn: Cone check out my RUclips channel!
Very interesting analysis. I spent 40 years in archiving business data for commercial customers. We converted digital information to microfiche, until the late 2010 era, then everything went to CD and DVD. Microfiche last up to 500 years and archival DVD's are rated well over 100 years. Your concerns on file format and file type are well founded. As part of our service we kept backup copies of the microfiche or DVD and were put to the test when a number of our customers were in the twin towers that were destroyed on 9/11
What is microfiche and how do you use it for storing digital data?
@@servus_incognitus Microfiche is a microfilm format that stores pages in a grid arrangement, with rows and columns. It was designed to store more pages on a single piece of film. It usually stored 200+ pages and often contained an index page at the end. I don't know of any specific way to store digital data. We produced it from computer tapes that contained output in page format, These were what would have been printed on a paper printer.
@@woodwaker1 thank you
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Concerning PDF you should consider, that PDFs may rely on your operating system (for example for fonts), may contain propriatary data, etc. So what you want for archival is PDF/A, which is the archival PDF format, which was specifically designed to include all data required to display the PDF and thus is intended for archival purposes.
Printing to pdf basically makes an image file too, so that could be useful.
Unless the PDF has security related attributes, there is no OS dependency. PDF was designed to emulate printing to paper.
@@wilsonfreitas8418 R u sure
To be sure I also save a copy of an important PDF file to .png and archive both versions.
@@wilsonfreitas8418 Yes, the P in PDF stands for Portable. Unless there are advanced features like that, then it should open fine on any computer. You may have issues with forms data, or filling out the PDF, but I've never encountered a PDF that wouldn't open at least enough to read on random other OSes.
NASA had this problem several years ago when the mag tapes holding mission data started to deteriorate. They were lucky to find some collectors who had tape drives that could read the data off of the tapes. And lest we forget the old nitrate movie film stock that's not only highly flammable, but it rots with time
Yes, this is why using HDD is such a good idea and why you need to copy those files to a new drive from time to time as there's new formats available. But, that being said, storage formats for HDD and SSD are pretty stable at this point, you're not likely to be in that position any time soon. You're far more likely to have the disks themselves fail before the lack of hardware to read and transfer them becomes a problem.
I'm not NASA. Why keep all this junk?
that's actually kind of ironic given LTO drives are probably the most archival-focussed data storage method on the market today.
@@SmallSpoonBrigade
Modern tape is still better at archiving your data, and more efficient than HDD/SDD. If you are accessing that data constantly and need the speed of course you use HDD/SDD, but once you need the data archived where you will only use it 10-20 times maybe use tape.
Most modern tape can be rerolled in the unit 200-300 times which is more than plenty for generations.
@@BroonParker Because they are NASA. The government. We own the government and the results of all their research. We don't even have the original footage of Armstrong landing on the moon. We have a poor copy from somewhere else. It's data that can be used for future decisions. I guess if it's not porn, it must be junk to you.
I once washed in the front loading washing machine - water set at 60 degree celsius, 90 min washing cycle - by accident a cheap 4GB thumb drive. Got it out, dried and it worked fine, no data loss. I was quite amazed. 10 years later still works. Dropped it on the floor countless times. Still works fine. :)
What’s the thumb stick and how is doing now?
@@znatnodobre I meant USB memory stick. It still works.
@@znatnodobre oh i did not read the question properly - the usb stick is a Sandisk, and yeah it still works fine.
@@filipbarabas8941the Nokia of thumb drives 😂
Well, my GF's mind is by far the best. The way she enumerates my faults when we have a fight is amazing.
LOL
That doesn't sound like a loving or healthy relationship to me dude. I don't know your situation but if she pulls out the past and supposed flaws during arguments, that's an indication she isn't good for you.
Online storage feels too much like taking all my private photos and putting it up on my neighbor's fridge.
Online/cloud storage is encrypted.
Your neighbor will just see a locked box.
Encrypt it before upload.
@@Otto45 But if your neighbour wants to throw the fridge away, you have no way to stop them.
The cloud is trusting others with your stuff.
No thanks.
Be it elite business or govt... Are you going to trust???
What has history shown??
Will pass the cloud to others
There's a reason it's called a ☁️... Vapor!!
@@mcb9976 Same can happen to one of your local backups, like the drive going bad.
15 years ago, I started out with a 1.2 TB media server with 200 and 300GB drives. Over time as larger drives became less expensive, I upgraded, 500GB, 750GB, 1TB, 1.5TB, 2TB, etc. which allowed me to stay ahead of potential drive failures and keep up with ever expanding library of movies, TV series, etc. Today I have a 72TB media server I backup onto Seagate 5TB external portable drives. They can be had on sale for as low as $130CAD. I backup every 3-6 months which ensures I don't lose data from degradation of the magnetic bits on the platters. I never lost any media except during those questionable Seagate drive times 2011/2012. Portable backups allow me access to my media via OTG cable in the event of a blackout, etc. Personally I don't look for a format that will last 40-50 years, I keep up with/move to newer smaller drives. A single 1TB micro SD or 2TB NVME in an enclosure can hold as much media as my original large media server from 15 years ago.
In 2013 I lost every photo and movie I owned after transferring them all to a brand new Seagate 2tb HHD, which crashed in two days. Seagate offered a replacement, but that didn't get my data back. I vowed to never again own a Seagate product as long as I live!
THINGS ARE ALWAYS CHANGING…
@@justdoingitjim7095 THAY ARE GARBAGE I USE WESTERN DRIVES SO FAR NO TROUBLE…STORED IN EMP/CME CERTIFIED STORAGE CONTAINERS !!
@@justdoingitjim7095 Yup, I haven't touched a Seagate, except for portable backup drives. It is Western Digital black/gold for me or nothing. More expensive, but never had an issue in 10 years.
I bet it wasnt even seagates fault it was yours, maybe you accidentally formatted it. Dont hate on seagate, its not 2013 anymore.
Great advise. Thank you. By the way, it's refreshing to, finally, hear somebody use "You and me" and "You and I" correctly. Most people are ALWAYS using "You and I" even when it's supposed to be "You and me". Thank you for that, as well.
Sincerely, Rich Williams
Astor, Florida 32102 USA!
There's also another alternative: the Millenniata MDisc "rock disc", supposed to resist 1000 years...
The key part with hard drives is to transfer data regularly to newer formats, to ensure the interface is still usable. I have an st-506 drive without a controller, I less care about the data now, but it is a cautionary note to ensure your offline drive has the supporting HW and SW to be readable.
There are plenty of old MFM 8 and 16 bit slot HD controllers out there. You could build an old machine just for reading your old media.. Like an old foggie NAS.
Welcome aboard General Seagate. Ha ha ha, these kid's must think we're nut's huh ? Hey, you want to see a new IBM 360 I got ?... :-) PS, I may have that Controller you need...
@@3DLasers Don't forget to go over the debug sequence instructions.
That’s why it’s also a good idea when you create multiple copies of data on a hard drive to use the exact same model of hard drive for each multiple copy and but a court extra drives that you don’t use that are saved for spare parts use in case the controller board goes bad in a drive. As cheap as drives are today it’s now to expensive to do this.
Or just keep one of your old computers.
The cloud for long term backup is a scary idea. Not to mention these clouds does not stays that long and/or will be expensive to keep. Harddisk getting bigger and cheaper still the practical solution.
Eeeh. The bigger the disks gets the more single point of failure they become. And the more space one have the more one collects. Making the problem just bigger. 1TB or even 512GB drivers are replaced with 4TB drives. But Having 4TB on 4 disks running in mirrors (2TB usable) is far better then 8TB on 2 disks. (4TB usable) Not to talk about 8TB drives and bigger. You need to buy so much storage just to get redundancy and it makes no sense when you are trying to keep as little as a 1TB cap on your stuff.
Simply putting more data into a single drive just makes it harder to not put all eggs in to few basket. And the HDD speeds are not improving even now the space is increasing. IF anything big HDD's are making it harder to make real redundancies even now technically they are cheaper per GB. More heads and smaller head tolerances. Asking for stuff to go wrong. ;c
There is no push in making more reliable drives. Just big big cheap. And anyone that cares to spread out copies on multiple drives has to pay to get the lower grade stuff with questionable reliability.
@@TheDiner50 i thought I was finally able to understand what to buy and what not to. But am just getting more confused now. Aaaa. Send help!!!!! I have gazillions of photos and videos, and five 64GB HP pen drives. But they're all full. My laptop's storage is also full. I need more storage. But am confused as to what should I buy. Hard drives? SSDs? CDs? Or just, some more pen drives?!???
@thediner50
Just raid your drives. Look it up.
@@abha1240 I haven't lost a single file in over 30 years of hard drive use. Hard drives will last on average 8 years if they get through the 1st year. I don't push it, so I retire drives when they are 3 to 5 years old, depending on whether the new drives are enough larger and cheap enough for me to purchase. I used to save files on CDs, DVDs, then Blu-rays and memory sticks, but I have too much material now. The only way for me is multiple hard drives. To be extra safe, store extra hard drive backups with friends or relatives as far away as possible, in case of major disaster.
@@abha1240 I'm in very similar situation as you.. I'd like to ask how you solved it?
A convenient and reliable long term storage solution has always been my wish. Having to transfer terabytes of data every few years is a hassle.
But every few years it has to be done. I have over 100TB of hard drives. But I won't replace them all at the same time. I will replace one or two drives a year. As my box holds eight drives, that will get all them replaced within my five year limit.
I think that any file format being actively used by Institutes dedicated to data archiving is a pretty safe bet. For instance pdf, tiff & wav are listed as Primary Preservation formats in "Recommended Preservation Formats for Electronic Records" from the Smithsonian Institution Archive, while rtf, txt, xml, jpg, png & flac are all listed as Secondary Preservation formats, so all of these are probably quite safe.
How about video file format?
I gave my source as a reference so anyone could look up any other types themselves (just google for the quoted text), but for video it's Motion JPEG 2000, MOV and AVI for primary, and MPEG-4 for secondary.
I always thought that AVI was the standard.@@markbooth3066
The Smithsonian Institution Archive article I referred to goes into a lot more detail than my summary, @@chesshooligan1282, such as the use of uncompressed tiff for certain things, or pdf being a Primary in some categories, while being Secondary in others.
I also presume that when they are talking about TIFF, they are talking about Baseline TIFF, rather than arbitrary TIFF extensions. People who are a lot more invested in this than us have thought about this way more than either of us ever will. *8')
It's disappointing that SIA doesn't specify a format for archiving scientific and industrial data, where metadata can be almost as important as the data itself, but many communities have already standardised on hdf5 as the go to format anyway. This format can store terrabyte size datasets which can be efficiently accessed with common data analysis tools such as pandas or Jupyter notebooks.
@@raymond9290FFV1
You still there Leo?
Bill Kenney here, retired Computer Engineer. Career mostly involved with the capture of, editing of and ( long term ) storage of digital data. Back a few years ago I was contracted by DC Comics / Time Warner ( NYC office ) to do exactly what this video is about. What is the best media for very very long term storage of data. Task at hand. Two warehouses out on Long Island filled with decades of drawn images from historical DC Comic Books. ie the original Superman series.
I engaged the engineers at 3M and we came up with a suggestion and solution for DC Comics. What media can be used to store digitally scanned images for 100's of years. And be still be able to play it all back.
Examples. We can still playback Thomas Edison cylinders. We can stil play 78rpm records. We can still play 33 1/3 records. The first Edison cylinders were made in 1877 and we can still play them. The playback device will not be the same as what Edison used but we can still play them.
The Optical CD standard is well defined and has already been around for over 40 years. We will be able to read data from a CD or Digial CD 100 years from now and likely much much longer. So that's not going to be an issue. It's the Consumer grade CD media that is in question.
So 3M and I suggested to DC Comics to just scan the images and store the data on plain old write once read many CD Discs and send those to 3M. They in turn will burn "Glass Masters" from those discs. The Glass Masters are the first steps in the production process of all optical media.
It was, and still is, the opinion of myself, and 3M that the read data reliability of those Glass Masters is at least the age of the pyramids. Keep them stored vertically and in a temperature stable dark lock safe and your data will be able to be read many millennia from now.
Absolutely. A laser burned datagram has the highest longevity, depending on what it got burned into. So a burned glass master will last a long time because glass does not degrade or shift over time. However, obtaining a glass master is not a cheap process, Maybe they will revisit the holo-cube as a storage medium, but the holo-layers would still suffer the same degradation vulnerabilities as a single layer platter does. With a lot of redundancy perhaps they would remain reliable. But for shear storage capacity and longevity that is quite acceptable, old or new magnetic surface platter hard drives are the king and will remain so for a long time. Multiple Terabytes of data made into multi-gigabyte optical glass masters (all must be single layer too) takes a while and takes up more space as well. But sure... they will keep the longest. I'd bet that a platinum or gold plated disc(of whatever substrate) burned directly then overcoated like they do Blue Ray DVDs would last a seriously long time too, no glass required.
@@cosmicraysshotsintothelight "However, obtaining a glass master is not a cheap process" If I remember correctly 3M quoted DC Comics about $100/disk for the process. Something that was well within their budget at the time. I moved on in my career so I can't tell you where things went on after I exited the project.
If I was to recommend today the AWS solution would be the best by a long way. FWIW I store about 11GB of data on AWS S3 and modify around 10's of megabytes of that every day. My monthly invoice from AWS is less then 25 cents.
@@wilcalint I am sure that the scans are finer resolution and therefore a larger file as well... or could (should) be.
@@cosmicraysshotsintothelight That was an incredibly fun little project. The reception room had an enormous statue of SuperMan leaping out of the wall. Great fun.
Great video!! what an important subject! My take is that, as Hard drive capacity keeps getting bigger and bigger, memories and important data are worth transferring and updating to new drives every year / 2 years. Always 2 copies. And one of them kept in a safe place as a backup. During lockdown I went back to the place where I grew up, and I took the time to go through all my "old stuff" boxes. I checked the contents of around 300 cds and DVDs, and every HHD and memory card I could find. As a very young musician, I bought a tape deck and transferred all my early demos, songs, to digital audio in my computer. And so on with everything. It felt good, really good. Buy an external drive every 2 years, and move everything there. keep the previous one as a backup, and just keep doing that.
Thanks for this video. You just won a subscriber.
Funny. Pics from my childhood, over 50 years ago, still look fantastic, provided they are kept in photo albums. Vinyl records from my teens, 40+ years ago, still play great, provided you keep them in their sleeves and don't play Frisbee with them. Books I've read, and kept, are still perfectly readable, so long as your house doesn't burn down.
All this is OLD 'technology', but they've lasted my entire lifetime. These days, cables that connect things come and go every few years. So you have to continuously RE-copy everything to the newest equipment.
Old fashioned books, pics, & vinyl stand the test of time.
More than likely though, almost everything you feel is worth saving won't matter to anyone else once your gone... unless you are from a historically significant family.
Upload your digital photos to a photo lab and get real photographs and put that shit in a safe.
Yes and No. Yes, once you pass away only some, not many personal documents pictures will be kept. However this is not only about personal files. Paper degrades considerably. In 100 years paint fades away, paper start to decompose and become a lot more fragile and prone to tear evenif kept in good conditions
That’s what the people who lost their homes and all those things to natural disasters used to say.
@@Zimmsters Photos printed on Fuji Crystal Archive C Type Paper will last for at least 200 years if stored correctly (dark and dry, like in a personal saftey deposit box at your bank). I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that a photo printed on Fuji Crystal Archive C Type Paper will last for at least 2000000000000 seconds! Let's check it out in a few thousands years or so?
Bro, Is trying to take them afterlife 😂
I once decided to punch software into mylar-backed stainless steel tape. By gum, that stuff would last. The tape held 10 6-bit characters per inch. Assuming the tape was 0.005 inch thick, it would have required 386 cubic feet of tape to hold 1 GB. This was in the1960's. Times change.
You can't even get a usb or sd card with only 1 GB anymore
That’s amazing Bob, what was the software for? As someone who grew up in the age of the internet it is truly amazing what people accomplished with what seems like such small data storage.
@@Calyrekt
The software digitized the locations of little blobs on film. The blobs were images of sparks produced in detectors used in particle physics experiments. The computer was a DEC PDP-1 -- 12K 18-bit words, nominal 100K/200K instructions/second, depending on which instructions. The setup illuminated spots on a CRT, and cast an image of a spot onto exposed/developed film in a movie camera. A photo tube behind the film would set a bit if it saw the spot through clear film, and omit setting the flag if the image of a spark blocked the light from the CRT. The software measured the spark images and recorded their locations on magnetic tape. Other software executed calculations to figure out what happened in the "events" that produced the data. The system processed data from studies conducted at Harvard's Cambridge Electron Accelerator.
The computer used germanium logic, drew about a kilowatt or two, and was painfully unreliable by today's standards. It measured about 20" W x 6' Long x 6' H, plus two six-foot-tall "magtape" drives, plus the desk-sized Type 30 CRT. The CRT's display was 10" x 10", 1K x 1K pixels. Programming language: assembly.
The system was invented by the late Martin Deutsch, who named it SPASS, for SPark chamber Automatic Scanning System. (Yes, he knew the German word Spass...)
(DEC - Digital Equipment Corp.
CRT - cathode ray tube
Magtape - 10" diameter reels, 1/2" tape, 2400 feet, 200 characters/inch)
@@archygrey9093 Yeah! I still have the 128 MB USB thumb drive I purchased from Micro Center in Tustin, CA in 2001 for the bargain price of $39.95! (It still works, BTW, although I don't store anything on it). At the time, it beat those terribly unreliable Iomega Zip drives we were using to store and share files!
@@Calyrekt In the early seventies I was using this tape to provide the ipl (boot)for Burroughs mainframes. Not totally indestructable though, it was pulled through the read head bloody fast using very fine sprocket holes running the lenght of the tape and this would wear.
FAT has been around for 40 years, and I'm sure it will be around for another 40 years. The reason is it's kept updated, and the updated version is an expansion of the old version, a.k.a. backward compatibility. So the original format is still inside the current format.
Backward compatibility was really a feature that let us use old data and programs, and it's a hallmark of IBM - Microsoft collaboration (you don't have that kind of treatment with your old Apple products).
The fact that it is updated with backwards compatibility has to do with each time looking back a shorter period and get users on the new thing easy because it was compatible with the last thing. This strategy will be broken when backwards compatibility is in the way of important new things like say performance for example. And even more if competition starts to do things without backwards compatibility and is getting ahead more and more. It's very hard to find examples but one of them might be that although WIndows as a OS for example is always been about backwards compatibility so users would have a way to migrate to the next version. But running 8 and 16 bit code form many versions ago is left out in the latest releases of Windows because there was less need for it and it hindered the reliability of newer version of the OS. Another example is that currently Apple has shown with release of their M1 that as a newcomer on the desktop CPU market they can produce a arm chip that is extremely competitive in performance to the x86 CISC designs Intel and AMD are making. NVidia even did buy ARM recently so it's is like people are starting to believe again that ARM (RISC design) might indeed be more effective then CISC. Might be that this is because faster chips keep getting bigger and bigger and keeping the thermal output under control by shrinking the size is getting more of a problem each generation that the solution of a simpler design (RISC) is the short term answer to going forward. Which might end the era of x86 compatibles something many of us find hard to believe. It's just examples of what might happen and that backwards compatibility is only done because the easy of transition from older to newer stuff is easier with backwards compatibility and therefor backwards compatibility has to be economic. As soon as not backward compatible new technology disrupts the economics then the flow of backwards compatibility will be broken. So your guess that FAT will be here for another 40 years is just a guess nothing more nothing less. And the whole story in this youtube episode was about the most sensible strategy being having copies (redundancy) and renew your media and formats when needed.
@@chinesepopsongs00 The thing about backward compatibility is access to a ready market. Adding FAT functionality will cost Microsoft .. how much? All I know, Linux has it for free, sooo ...
Well concidering I have some of the earliest camera phone footage the videos still play on the latest Android phones no problem, so.
@@WATCHINGTHEWATCHERS Of course it will.
There are software formats and hardware formats. Because of Moore Law, the cost of software formats (FAT, NTFS, exFAT, etc.) are diminishing toward zero.
Hardware formats though, have to be manufactured. If for example, nobody manufacture cassette tape player anymore, it will be hard to read what is in it. That's where the need to "refresh" came from.
From my own experience, the data inside my IDE hard drive are still readable after 20 years, but there are no more motherboard that support IDE. Thankfully, the cost of IDE to SATA converter is just a dollar or so.
This video is a MUST a must read/must hear/must view for anything wishing to preserve data over time.
I agree 100%! I ALWAYS dupe ALL my dvds to hard drives!
I started my career in the storage industry in 1978. Leo's focus is on consumer media but you should look beyond that if you are really serious. I do agree that your data should be migrated about every 10 years. The media with the best shelf life is TAPE. All the cloud providers archive to digital tape. Leo didn't mention many of the archive cloud providers like Amazon Glacier, hmmm. You can upload data there and they do have SLAs covering the protection and long term accessibility.
I will look into your suggestions - thank you. I was thinking similar. How do professional film makers, photographers, museums, etc., store their data? I was heartbroken when the external hard drive failed. I couldn't believe it. I had no idea they were so fragile.
This man is totally correct and speaks the truth. I personally save copies of my data both to HDDs and to good quality DVDs for long term storage. Files I use fairly often I keep on "thumb" drives, after first storing them on the previously mentioned long-term storage media.
I've done everything you mentioned. All that I can add is I use Fireproof boxes or Safes to store the backups. Another folks can use are offsite Bank Safety Deposit Boxes. Just keep backing up your backups.
I like DVD-RAM. It's easy, drag and drop, and because of it's slower write speed of 3x, it's very stable and reliable and can be written to many times. The discs are of high quality and can last under 30 years. And unlike DVD-/+RW, they're scratch resistance.
The downside is, it's only 4.7 GBs. But that makes it good for documents.
Deteriorating film, fading photographs, decaying CDs, demagnetized media - not to mention file formats - what's going to be readable 50 years from now? Your thoughts?
What about the CD's and DVD's that we buy that have the software burned to them such as Windows or Microsoft Office? I own a few Dell computers and those used to come with recovery and/or driver resource discs. Will those hold the data for a long time? Thanks.
@@williamjones4483 Longer than the discs you can write yourself, yes. But even so, if something is key, I'll often back up the original disk either by duplicating it, or copying it to a folder on a hard drive.
@@askleonotenboom Thanks for your speedy reply! As I stated before, I have some older Dell computers that still perform quite well. I wish to preserve the contents of the DVD's that came with those computers. I have also had some dangerously close call with losing or files and I have become paranoid about that. Right now I am looking at M-Disc and traditional HDD's for long term storage.
@@askleonotenboom thankyou respected sir,take care
According to some other channels like Linus Tech Tips, it's leaving SSDs and Hard Drives *powered off* that will be the problem and result in data corruption. Also, running old software on new gen computers 10+ years from now will be probably impossible, thus people will also need to preserve their old machines on top of the data, if they want to access it... keeping in mind that emulators don't always work 100% and sometimes not at all.
As an company owner. My systems get new drives every 2 years, needed or not. I have 2 drives that I alternate full images and file backups. one goes into a safe deposit box. one readily available for use. Also take advantage of online backups.
from the 90's I always backed up every year until my files, videos from tapes, scanned film photos and old digital media from the early 2000's until present now reached 11 terabytes and counting. Hard drives are really reliable with proper storage, i put them to an airtight glass container
This was quite timely. Before I migrated to HDD's for backup around 2001 I was burning everything to DVD+ media. I went through those discs today and some of them are 25 years old now. While a few were difficult to read the majority of them were still fine. I last checked them in 2006 and didn't really concern myself with them because everything has been carried along with successive HDD's since then. The discs were highly regarded media back then made by Japanese company TaioYuden? Which was the oem for a lot of upmarket brands back then. You always got what you paid for with DVD media and some were junk within a year.
I believe for documents and stuff, Archives take a photo (microfiche), film negatives. For two reasons; the materials that modern polyester film stock is made of will last like 100 years; also if Civilization collapses and person can hold a negative up to the sun and see what's on it. But may not be able to access a disk.
Excellent point. For any solution to work, you not only need a long-lasting format; you’ll also need equipment to read it.
As far as long term media formats, you might have mentioned virtualization. Maybe you can't run the application with the proprietary format natively but you could run it in a VM. VM and other virtualization like containers I suspect will be around for a very long time. In any case, this was a very thorough coverage of backups. Thanks.
Good thing to point out. If that really is ones plan to read data long term. Maybe just maybe keep the software together with your data then. Since it is really fun going around searching for a dead companies software that is 10 years old. Or a alive company that have no reason to help you. Mmm.
Or my favorite one for the last couple of years now. Software requiring internet access to a servers across the ocean. That shutdown 4 years ago. I shit you not there is stuff that you backup and think you got sorted. Just to find out later that on a fresh install system the software you are trying to install needs internet access to access a server for something completely irrelevant but mandatory to work. Dependencies are so fun! And having installers not bundled with all the required stuff like server access and DRM whatever whatever.
If something can not be done offline from scratch you do not have a backup. There is real scenarios where backups where completely useless due to software being incomplete. Braking data that cost allot in upkeep that proved to be unusable...
The best archival format ever - MiniDisc. The magneto-optical method uses a magnetic head on one side of the disc to record data into the substrate of the disc when the laser is turned up high enough to heat the substrate to the curie point. In simple terms the data is recorded in little metal filings (oversimplification) that get melted into the recording media to make the ones and zeros. These can then be read back by a low-power laser that doesn't re-melt the substrate. It's still possible to get NetMD and Hi-MD portable drives, mostly pre-owned at this point, that can be accessed and used just like a hard drive if enabled. It would take an extreme super magnet to re-align the magnetic particles without re-melting the plastic or extreme heat that would melt the disk to really erase the data. It's really too bad that this format was never well adopted and is all but obsolete.
Some sound advice here. Periodically transcribing data onto new media is good from both a future proofing stand point, but also as a data recovery test. And let's face it, over time not all of your data maintains the same level of importance. Stuff I cared about 10 years ago I don't care about now. Also, selecting open file formats (like JPG, PDF or TXT) as mentioned is sensible.
In terms of long lasting data storage in business, this is why I still like tape. When managed properly that stuff can last for decades, so long as you still have the appropriate drive mechanism. I spent several years managing data in the mining/oil and gas industry and the business I worked for always made sure we had different tape drive technologies available to save and transcribe important data, because quite often our clients didn't! We're talking all the way back to 9-track reel tape hanging off a Vax all the way to the latest and greatest LTO.
I've been around so long I have a 1/2" digital tape of work from the early '80s that was created on a Digitial Equipment Corporation VAX11/780 system - way before the PC became ubiquitous. I still have the tape but it's just an artifact these days. It would take a lot to even find a place to read it. The same thing is true for a couple of 8" floppies from a CP/M system in the late '70s.
There are also file formats such as when we used EZ Writer for Word processing in the early '80s which would require that software to be found and loaded (on MS-DOS).
More critical to me are diagrams done in the '90s using Micrografx ABC Flowcharter. I still have that program but it will only run on 32-bit Windows. I have to keep a 32-bit Windows virtual machine to get to that data now.
Yep, I remember those 8-inch floppies well in the Navy and at Bechtel -- and they really were floppy to handle, too! And, yes, I remember ABC Flowcharter, too, which I recall using at JPL.
ABC Flowcharter.. What a memory, and what a fine piece of software that was
underrated video, thanks for the clear-cut explaination!
Great video and am loving all the comments and valuable tips. I used to have everything in Google photos and had auto backup but the 15gb limit has given me sleepless nights.I need to dedicate some time every week to backup my files to my hard drive.
This is a thought that I have kept coming back to throughout the years as I think back to how technology and storage media have changed precipitously even within the last decade. Thank you for addressing them and I’ve pretty much come to the same conclusion… diverse mediums and multiple backups are the only insurance policy. We don’t often think about catastrophic events that lead to data loss but it’s always within the realm of possibility. 😬
Hello, Mr. Notenboom;
Thank you for all you do.
I've followed you for quite some time.
You answered a question for me, maybe 10 or 15 years ago & I haven't forgotten.
I'll say it again; "THANK YOU!"
I was pleasantly surprised to find your 'tube channel today.
Have a GREAT day, Neighbor!
Good advice, I have hard drives in multiple locations, also DVD & Blu-Ray backups plus major holiday photos printed as coffee table books which are also stored in the cloud by the printer company in case another copy needs to be ordered ... I have to admit most people don't have any back ups at all 😳
I love this video and is an excellent topic. I have always said nothing lasts forever, nothing!
Thanks Leo.
Excellent video. I used multiple media to store video and pictures. I had 2 HDD that failed in a year. But luckily i made BluRay backups that saved the data. My suggestion is, if your going to uses optical media, store them in a zip bag to keep the air out. I have 20yr old CDs that are still readable today
How about M-disks ? They should last for 1000 years. I saw a movie where they put an M-disk in boiling water and in ice and it was still readable.
M-Disc tech is dope. They are able to be so reliable because they actually etch the data in the plastic, which won't degrade easily like regular optical media
I just bought M-disk. I’ve had good look with hard drive backups though. but years ago at a jobsite. We had developed bad data on some sectors. When I went back to my archives, turns out,,the corrupted data had been copied on backups. I had to go back about one year old archives to get good data although some new data was missing. Drive had been overused, but I learned my lesson.
Good luck finding a drive that can read this disks in 10 or even 20 years from now. Most fairly new pcs today already don't have an optical drive anymore.
Torsten Johann mine is USB /portable drive
The very fact that M-disks were not mentioned kinda moots part of this discussion.
Regarding flash memory, at least my old SD cards from around 1998 are no longer readable, most of them are corrupted to the point where the file system isn't readable due to degredation. As for magnetic hard drives, they lose their magnetic cohesion after like ten years. I have a 430 mb IDE drive from 1992 here, the drive is fine, but produces lots of read errors. Formatting it makes it usable again
Some years ago I connected some 110mb and 700mb Maxtor HDDs (from the 90s) to and they were still rocking solid. With windows files and everything. Then again, in 2003 I had some maxtors that died on me and some ATA seagates that I can still power on on my Celeron. But after that only trusted WD. But heading to 2020s WD started to lose reliability.
Which only means that you can have luck with media but you should back up frequently, if not to different media, to fresh new media.
Last year in lockdown I bought 2 external drives to reduce the size of my massive CD/DVD collection. I'm probably going to buy more HDDs in the future to mirror those 2, just to be on the safe side.
@@zonaloca you know how we say in Germany? SeaGate, sie geht oder sie geht nicht(sie geht rimes in SeaGate and it means SeaGate - it works or it doesn't)
@@zonaloca If you're going to store files on hdd. Create parity files. That way a few bad hdd sectors won't ruin the entire file. I like to use WinRar's parity feature myself.
@@q-_-p.d-_-b well.. Thank you for your advice. I will have a look into it. I never ran into those kind of errors in HDDs. I did on DVDs or CDs but that's why I transferred everything to external HDDs.
Most of my cds from 10 year ago are fkd
Wonderful 'walk along the waterfront.' Covered 99.9 percent of most people's concerns. Thanks!!
I keep copies of all my files on hard drives that are not in a machine, and just stick them in a docking station when I want a copy of something that's there.
I keep flash/thumb drives for the things I use the most, then regularly back the files up to the HDs.
I think the strategy is to copy regularly - be it with a photocopier, a disk or a clay tablet. The only way to keep up with the effects of entropy is to continuously rebuild.
I hadn't considered "entropy" as a concept for this - it's perfect. Thanks!
You explain so well. Hope you get more views.
Thanks for the video! Glad someone else thinks about this as much as I do. You validated the way I was thinking about this subject. Thanks to the comments below who mentioned the PDF/A - Archival and looking up what the Smithonian Uses for digital information- I will look into these items too.
This has always been a topic close to my heart and I'm sure to all like minded techs. I don't comment that much, but this post has been most enlightening. Thanks so much and enjoyed subscribing to your channel.
That is Really HELPFUL and definitely THOUGHT-PROVOKING, Indeed.
Thanks for all the efforts and kindness Sir.
This video is exactly what I needed/wanted to hear
Thank you Leo! Happy new year!
This is a topic I truly love, .. personally, I began burning to gold quality DVD-R. After an exhaustive job, I had on disc my most precious items. Yet, as safe as that media is, long term, .. I still hold my breath when inserting an archived disc hoping it will read perfectly. Eventually, I altered my plan by using a combination of HDD, highest quality consumer SSD .. and even incorporating new high end USB thumb drives. I have thumb drives holding videos and photos that are over a decade old and are perfect. I mix and match and "re-record everything" on an annual basis .. or more often. Duplicate copies, varying types .. at least three of each. But as time goes by, I am drifting away from the tried and true DVD's simply because of lack of space on the media and the fact that reading these discs does become more difficult to set-up over time. I'd rather burn it "more often" on a top of the line SSD or even HDD than keep fiddling with the archival gold discs and readers.
Yup. Remember IOmega drives? I have stuff stuck on those old disks that I can't retrieve.
Me too!
Excellent discussion, I have been using a somewhat similar strategy I call "laddering" .. just like people who buy Certificates of deposit in "staggered fashion" where they get the five year interest rate, yet individual CD's mature every year .. or even every month giving continual access to funds .. yet, they are all five year CD's getting the highest interest. I stagger my transfer of data, photos and videos, where the oldest, likely one to two years, gets re-written to the latest technology and is then refreshed. I save the older original just in case I later notice a transcription error .. which hasn't yet happened. I have everything on HDD and also on quality SSD in this fashion and the 2.5" device archive slowly grows in size .. manageable size.
I have had hardrives for 10 years with no problems. One tip is to only fill the drive to about 80%.
the problem is when you start having to back up terabytes of data. Each back up takes a ton of space.
My answer would be...multiple. Just copy everything irreplaceable into at least 3 locations and different types of storage/backup. The more spread out and diversified the better. All forms of storage can fail, even storing something in a self-storage warehouse, with an iron-mountain style archiving company, or a bank vault, all can fail.
I really enjoyed watching this video, thank you for your useful info! That helped a lot
Tape.
I used to work for a company which offered transcription services and _properly stored_ tape on _quality media_ from as far back as the 1960's was absolutely fine. Even checking using an oscilloscope showed good amplitude and consistent timing.
I've heard some tape based archive systems can have as much as 14 terabytes per tape, pretty interesting how that forgotten format has evolved
Spinning rust at the moment is still the best at the moment as long as you spin the dive up and access every now and then. I have ide drives that are all but 20 years old and the data is good, and I'm glad you agree.
My miniscribe mfm drive from 1987 are still working and have no bad sectors. 😁
@@brostenen thanks for the reply and it's nice to prove to some idiot that thinks we are all morons that it's not possible and that rot, wear etc kill the data and drive..👍
@@kevinkirkby1484 Well.... The drive is a rarity. 90 percent of miniscribe drives died back then. 😉😁 But yeah. Spinning platter drives or tape streamers are the best storage for long term data saving. Eventually everything will fail. Even the casettes that I have for my Commodore64 machines. Early floppy disks are the most reliable of floppy disks. Here I am thinking about 3.5 inch 3M disks from around 1987 to 1993. The Sony, verbatim and others that I have, are starting to fail. Only early 3M before they were branded Imation, are still error free. At least the ones that I am using for my Amiga's.
@@brostenen the old floppy, those where the days, as for the commodore, back then couldn't afford one but did have the old spectrum for home but where I worked we had an old mainframe with tape reels it was like being in a Bond movie and was used for accounting etc. A second hand 486 was my first real forea into the pc of today, some many £1000s of pounds and years later now they're just tools to use. Thank god spinning rust got cheaper.. The oldest drive I have now and it's been kept as a momento is an 80gb ide.. one day I might buy the adaptor just for the fun of it to see what happened to it.. that was from 1996..👍
@@kevinkirkby1484 Yup. I was able to look into the computer/mainframe room on my mothers work place around 1987 or something. She worked with drawing transformer stations and high voltage power lines. Those spinning tape reel's were something to behold.
Personally I worked and saved up for my first computer in 1993. It was a Cyrix 486 slc2 50 megaherz. ET4000 gfx, Sound Galaxy soundcard and 120 megabyte harddisk. And of course 4 megabyte Ram.
My parents bought an Unisys PW/2 Series 300 workstation in 1987. It was a 286 8/10 megaherz, EGA gfx, 640kb Ram and 20 megabyte harddrive. The most mind blowing was an optical mouse that needed a special metal plate as mouse pad.
My friends and family members all went with Commodore. Cusin had a C64 in 1984-ish and my friends used Amiga500 from around late 1987 or early 1988.
Just strange how things have evolved, some kind of ride, and I am happy and gratefull that I have been able to be on the ride. I remember all the social stuff around C64 and Amiga. Something that are let out today, when we see youtube videoes about old computers. I mean. A young person the age of 25, talking about Amiga today, can not know how we actually used Amiga's back then. It was like totally different back then.
Actually quite satisfying hearing this from someone with some experience, so thank you!
This is a very well informed video that goes straight to point and covers all of them. Thanks Leo!
A great lesson for all of us who once did the mistake to not backup data, ending up crying for nights after the lost of a truckload of data... Thanks for keeping sharing your knowledge with us !
For a rly long time storage format, maybe carving all datas as binary onto gold plates could be a way out haha... if any of us can even afford to do so ! Joke aside that kind of way could be pretty sturdy against time? as long no one melt down these rare materials for another purpose ofc !
I'm lying in bed now, crying. Called in sick from work just so I could continue crying. Lost 4 TB worth of data from a WD hard drive that fell on the floor.
I'm surprised no mention of M-Disk although it's capacity is not great it will last centuries.
100 GB BD-R M disc will work just fine for photos and documents. Videos not as practical but you can always buy more M discs. I store my M discs and original copies in my 1600 degree Fahrenheit proof safe.
From what I gather about M-Discs is that it was only the DVD M-Discs that was thoroughly tested and verified by US Department of Defense. I can't find any reliable testing data on the higher capacity ones.
@@ryanvacation7319 I was under the impression that it was the BD-R M-disc they tested. That`s why I went that route.
I run a studio. Every time I go back to an audio project that's just a few months old, many of the audio tracks are corrupted with glitches - clicks, pops, dropouts, and some audio is partially missing. This is when opening the file off the NVMe SSD drive the projects are stored on.
Daily, I run a backup of my system (new files ONLY) onto two mirrored spinning disk drives. When opening the very same projects off there, after having been backed up when in good condition, all projects open perfectly.
So, I'm now in the process of replacing all of my SSD project and sample drives with spinning disks, reinstalling all my libraries as they also become corrupted every few months and any software installed fails. SSDs are extremely vulnerable to bit rot, and it's much worse than most people imagine.
Just saw your video on how to make an image file. Absolutely well explained, also your pleasant personality and soft tone, adds to the atmosphere. Thanks
Agreed on all points! I do think SSD could be a good backup medium for the coming 10-20 years. There's always an external enclosure you can buy to get it to work on the current connection technology. Even hard drives from 20-30 years ago can be accessed. With emulators and abandon ware software archives you can access a lot of old file formats, and if you're a developer you can create your own converter or even a floppy capture device as I have done. I've still got the first basic program I saved to tape as a kid, 99.8% of all floppy data from MSX, Amiga and PC era. One of the most important things is that you look after your data by always having multiple checked copies, in different physical locations at least 10km apart and move your data to fresh new media every 3-5 years. Available connection types and media will migrate at the same time. I went the same way from tape to floppy, to hard disk and plan to go to ssd soon. I don't like my data in the cloud though, doesn't feel right with some personal sensitive data. I own 6 SSDs over 10+ years and none have failed so far, wear level not even scratching 20%. It's also worth noting to have offline backups as well, to protect against viruses, ransomware and other data theft. The only thing you can be sure to last is pornography leaked to the internet, that will remain in this world indefinitely ;)
Ssd degrade when stored offline if temps are high, like 30-40C. They are rated for 1 year max, by Jedec.
So don't rely on them for three years, unless every year you read them once fully, to allow drivebto refresh weak cells.
@@nilsfrahm1323 never heard about that before. Many ssds run at 30-40 degrees in the computer case so that would mean many ssds are at risk. Do you have a reference to the source material describing this issue?
@@imqqmi I would say 30-40C is low. But temperatures do effect how long the data is safe. The mitigating factore here is that data on the SSD is often re-written when in a PC. With a decent drive, at not silly temperatures, you should have nothing to worry about.
What do you mean by move your data to new media? And also how does one rewrite the data?
@@ombhamare522 newly bought storage device, a harddisk, ssd etc. Ssds are often smart enough to refresh the data periodically, or if you wish to force it, wipe a second drive, clone the data and use the second drive as primary. Repeat the process every year or so.
You can ALSO use a utility like parchive to create parity files that will help restore the original files if they go south and YOU decide what percentage to use.
Store the original file on one and the p-files on another. It lessens the concerns but there are still a chance of loss.
The only thing I can guarantee that will last hundred years barring physical damage, is making a siliver halide print(ie a black and white photograph) and washed for 30 minutes to get rid of the fixer in flowing water on photographic paper, AND treated with a toner solution that changes the silver to an compound is extremely stable such as selenium. This process was done in the early days of photography. Treated in this manner which is called museum archival quality, ie the photograph is said will last like 100+ years according to the experts.
Thank you for sharing this. Got me started thinking about this stuff
Sensible comments in general, although optical discs have lasted quite well in my experience. If you want a future-proof file format for storing text, I suggest plain text files. I've been keeping my diary and other records in plain text files since the 1980s: the format is very simple and should always be readable.
The only problem I have with HDDs are them being fragile.
Surprisingly enough, their physical size isn't an issue for me...
actually, hard drives are not that fragile when turned off, assuming you dont drop them on the floor. The heads are parked and can take quite a bumb without issue.
@@nilsfrahm1323well that's good to know
I have always thought of my digital presence and my presence in this world as a whole as a transient thing, that I should strive to leave as little behind as possible but as I grow older I start thinking of the old adage about "planting trees under whose shade you will never sit". This has given me something to think about.
Do double backup is the best thing to do.
One is everyday, one external and unplug unless need to backup
Cloud storage problem is that despite the promises when they fold their tent or change the business model, how do you download 4 years of backup to your pc. I have a flock of externals plus cloud x 3 because I learned the lesson of no backups the hard way...as usual...3am and the project was due at 730am... floppy..I have usb but file formats ...be careful in that backup software use proprietary formats...if the app is discontinued...the backups are no longer usable.
So well done.
Copy to the 'new' media, and keep the previous format.
Rinse and repeat.
Thank you for making this informative video. Been thinking about this all week on how I will make my favorite old pc games last for decades to come
Pretty good video Leo. Tape drives would have been nice to discuss. I heard it's one of the best for longevity. Consider mentioning number of years expected for all devices from Floppy to the most advanced. Thank you.
I use tapes for archiving my data.
I backup 100s of TB worth of data on tapes, two tapes one for archival backup and one for necessity backup. The archival backup is only touched ONCE, that is when I put the files on it, and other tapes are used for backup data every year. I use different tapes for different things of course, example I have one 20TB tape that holds all of my [C] Drive backups from when I bought my gaming PC.
Tapes are great, but the initial unit is expensive.
All my cheap DVDs I've burned more than a decade ago are fully readable without even slowdowns.. BluRays should be even more reliable since they use inorganic layer (except the mistake which LTH is) so optical is my first choice for backup to this day - it stood the test of time 😀
I have programs on 3.5 floppies (from the manufacturer) that is still working.😂
For DVDs and all recordable optical discs, storage environment is critical. They can be ruined by just a few weeks of exposure to sunlight, so keeping them in the dark, and at normal room temperature or slightly cooler, is necessary.
@@marianneoelund2940 You may think I'm joking but last summer I was moving and I forgot two at least decade old dual layer DVDs (one of the cheapest brands at the time - Ridata) in my car glove box for the whole summer. At the end of the summer I realized my mistake and tried to copy them. To my surprise both read perfectly. Keep in mind the temps around here are hitting 40°C during the summer and in the car was much hotter due to heat accumulation. Yes, good storing conditions are ideal but sometimes you may get lucky even with cheap discs (mostly depends on the individual disc quality).
i started doing backups of photos back when digital cameras were 640x480, on CD-Rs, then eventually on DVD-R when they became available. they're all very much readable in 2023, just checked them recently.
Same here. I have tons of CD/DVDs from the early 2000's (15-20 years old) and I've yet to find one that is unreadable. I haven't had them out in the sun, but they have certainly not been taken care of beyond the protection a drawer offers.
Man, you're one wise and respectable dude. I've noticed this phenomonon of myself and others habitually assuming older people are not good with trchnology, and if instead it was a picture or video of a young giy, it would be more believable, but nah man, you break this stereotype/the trend. Well done and thank you Xie Xie
Since 2002, I have used diskettes to store my business documents and files. Then I used digital data discs or CDs. Then I tried DVDs. Those two media technologies were unsatisfactory. Now I have more than one flash drive. I hope the files in the flash drives will last longer, even though I do not write files to save frequently to prevent flash card wear and tear. Your forum will bring to me a change of mind.
I suggest: M-Disc. Lasts 1000 years. Basta. Stores up to 100GB per disc. GREAT invention for that purpose.
But, cost per TB is high.
As for proprietary format files, in addition to storing alternative formats, consider saving the installers for said programs with your files. Better yet, a virtual machine + hard disk with said software installed activated etc frozen in time.
Today we’re emulating machines all the way back to commodores and Apple I and before, I’m sure we’ll be able to emulate Windows XP with QuickBooks 10 somehow in year 2070 if we really had to.
But what if in the future, the virtual machine or said software can't be executed because devices or softwares using the needed architecture, or compatibility layers are completely missing?
...what if, in the future, all electronic devices get EMP blasted by the sun and the only thing that survived, is some reliable long storage device inside a really thick concrete, copper, lead layered wall, filled to the brim with all memes of mankind since the digital age?
What if the core of the earth stops spinning and the electromagnetic fields of the earth don't work anymore, causing lightning storms, suicidal pigeons bombers, and the the heat of the sun literally scorching the surface of the earth, as holes start expanding in the ozon layer?
What if....
....
Tldr; i don't know why i wrote this, guess i was just bored :d.
Anyway, i do think it's a good idea to preserve your media and also the means to evaluate/read that media in either original state, or as close to original state as possible, what good would it do, having a Nintendo 64 cardridge, if you did not have a Nintendo 64 or a emulator that near perfectly emulates the dumped ROM. There being pages that deeply describe how a file, os, hardware, mechanism is structured and done, would help future reimplementations.
And same applies for the tools, what it need to function, does it need DirectX9, can those calls be answerd through some compatibility layer? Or some API's that were removed years later, even custom compatibility layers are gone?
And what about the hardware, does the OS tou virtualize rely on how that hardware works (will the architecture and hardware be emulated for it to work properly?). Will the format of the virtual image even be supported by any virtualization software in the future?
Proprietary formats are probably risky, unless there is some open source program that can evaluate/read that format, written by someone who reverse engineered it. And some description how the format is build and needs to be interpreted ro be read, for future reimplementations.
Good advice. For archiving on hard drives, I'd like to add something... Intuition tells me that drives using shingled magnetic recording (SMR) technology to increase capacity may be less reliable for long term storage, because any magnetic degradation is more likely to cause data corruption. In other words, I'm inclined to think they are more fragile.
THANK YOU for this. It is fantastic! I stumbled across it looking for the Toshiba 18TB hard drive. I think family photos and sentimental stuff is the average person's most important item. I pity people who had the photos of their kids lost to some problem. For me, it is my movie/TV recordings and my CD collection. I have my 300 CD's backed on three different drives as full Wave files. If my drive recordings got wasted, resaving them would take a week. Some TV I have involves shows that I can not find ANYWHERE online anymore. HD Video recordings are HUGE. I save every Bears game for instance and those are 15-25GB each!
Funny enough, a few weeks ago I pulled out my floppies from 1986 (5.25 inches) C64 and all the data is still there. They were stored in the garage, so no heating, and at the same place I also kept my 3.5 inches floppies (Amiga) from 1989, and the same thing, no data loss at all. Yes, true, those are not HD, so little ticker track, only 880K, but still... it is there!
I still have an Amiga 2000HD and 4000 still operational as well as an Apple II GS. Much of the amiga files and disks still work. The 5 1/4’ floppies for the apple are not all working anymore but most still do
I use 3 copies of everything - M-Disc BDXL, hard drives, and cloud. I have several standalone players for the M-Discs. My biggest problem has been the sunsetting of data formats - I have a lot of projects in Flash format for example. There is really no alternative to Flash so those files are useless now. I can still play the Flash files if I jump through a lot of hoops to do it, but what use are they now? I also had lots of 3d animation projects in various programs that are now defunct.
Agreed, M-DISK is the only data storage system that will survive a EMP.
I was backing up old pictures and files the other day. I used SSD cards, quality thumb drives, and external hard drives. Redundancy is the key.
Thank you for covering this subject. I am in the process of building a new PC and opted to install a 6TB mechanical HDD for storing all my personal files as well as larger programs. I have always used external HDDs for backups and will continue to do so. Like you said, I keep my data in more than one location. I never know when a storage device will fail.