Packrat or Archivist? [ was Adventures in GPG ]

[Ben Scott]

On 3/22/07, Tom Buskey <tom at buskey.name> wrote:
>
>
> On 3/21/07, Ben Scott <dragonhawk at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 3/21/07, Tom Buskey <tom at buskey.name> wrote:
> >
> >   I *have* heard horror stories about optical discs.  Manufacturing
> > defects have lead to problems after only a few years.  Apparently,
> > those giant spindles of unmarked media you can buy for ten cents a
> > disc suffer from poor quality control.  Whodathunkit?  ;-)
>
> I've been putting my photos on archival gold DVDs.  They have a special
> scratch resistant layer as well.  Along w/ multiple cheap copies.
>
>
> >   Good quality optical media, properly stored (not just light --
> > temperature and humidity matter, too) is probably a pretty safe bet.
> >
> >   I would be interested to see hard data of actual performance in this
> > area, though.  Not simulations in test chambers, but actual longevity.
> > From an unbiased source, not a CD-R manufacturer.  With a decent
> > sample size.  Something like "FooCo has a library of 5000 CD-R discs,
> > over 2000 of which are at least ten years old.  They tested 50 discs,
> > and found no failures.
>
> NIST has a paper out on CD archival stuff.
>
> Photographers are very interested in the topic.  They used to being able to
> "store slides in a shoebox for 50 years".  Now they have horror stories
> about losing all the photos on a drive.  Workflow and inventory management
> is key for a pro.
>
>
>


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                                                  -- Rush, "Far Cry"