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Questions about Longer-Term Storage (drives)
Posted on 4/21/20 at 10:37 am
Posted on 4/21/20 at 10:37 am
I do a fair amount of photography and my raw files are starting to fill up drives. This is all personal/family stuff so no real business interest, so it's not worth any big investment to retain/safeguard.
Right now I'm keeping photos on an external SSD which is backed up to a separate external drive (HDD). But over the next year I imagine I'll max those out. I envision buying more storage and then just putting one/both of my current drives somewhere safe, firing them up every year or two until they get copied onto something else or I just don't care too much anymore.
Should those drives last in storage for 10 years or so until I copy them to something else or the data can be lost without any real issue? I'm not terribly interested in having some enclosure in my home office if it can be avoided. Ideally, I'd just keep redundant copies on large HDDs in storage (cheaper and bigger, thereby freeing up my SSDs) - would that be a reasonably safe way to go?
Right now I'm keeping photos on an external SSD which is backed up to a separate external drive (HDD). But over the next year I imagine I'll max those out. I envision buying more storage and then just putting one/both of my current drives somewhere safe, firing them up every year or two until they get copied onto something else or I just don't care too much anymore.
Should those drives last in storage for 10 years or so until I copy them to something else or the data can be lost without any real issue? I'm not terribly interested in having some enclosure in my home office if it can be avoided. Ideally, I'd just keep redundant copies on large HDDs in storage (cheaper and bigger, thereby freeing up my SSDs) - would that be a reasonably safe way to go?
2
Posted on 4/21/20 at 10:58 am to Pettifogger
see the other thread on here.
i just paid to convert all of my Hi8 and D8 tapes to digital. my strategy is as follows:
* upload everything to google cloud (free unlimited for video and up to 12mp for photos)
* store DVDs with the videos and hard drive with videos mp4s in my office filing cabinet
* keep the original tapes.
this gives me access to everything anytime i want and at least 2 redundant local backups.
i think you may want to burn hard-copy disks as well as the HD because your HD may not be easy to access in 10 years. see: zip and jaz disks, SCSI drives, etc etc.
in short, burn cheap disks with the files as well as a 'living' hard drive.
i just paid to convert all of my Hi8 and D8 tapes to digital. my strategy is as follows:
* upload everything to google cloud (free unlimited for video and up to 12mp for photos)
* store DVDs with the videos and hard drive with videos mp4s in my office filing cabinet
* keep the original tapes.
this gives me access to everything anytime i want and at least 2 redundant local backups.
i think you may want to burn hard-copy disks as well as the HD because your HD may not be easy to access in 10 years. see: zip and jaz disks, SCSI drives, etc etc.
in short, burn cheap disks with the files as well as a 'living' hard drive.
This post was edited on 4/21/20 at 11:00 am
Posted on 4/21/20 at 11:50 am to Pettifogger
quote:Probably, but I wouldn't trust them. There are several things that can go wrong and either corrupt data or make them unreadable. First, data is stored in magnetic fields, which degrade over time. 10 years is probably not long enough to make any real difference, but I believe there is a decent chance that at least some files would be corrupted. Second is the fact that HDDs are mechanical, and like every machine they tend to seize up if not used for long periods. Lubricants dry up, parts stick to each other, etc.
Should those drives last in storage for 10 years or so
But if you fire them up every year or two and write new copies like you mentioned, you should be fine.
Honestly, though, archive management is a real pain, and you might want to look into cloud storage options. Amazon AWS has a "cold storage" option called Glacier for about $1 per TB/month. Also, Backblaze has an unlimited data storage plan for $60/year. I probably wouldn't trust a 3rd party service to be around forever, but it might give you some peace of mind vs. trying to manage all of the data locally. It doesn't matter how many copies you make, if they're all in the same physical location, one disaster can take them all out.
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