DPChallenge: A Digital Photography Contest You are not logged in. (log in or register
 

DPChallenge Forums >> Hardware and Software >> DVD that last 1,000 years
Pages:  
Showing posts 1 - 11 of 11, (reverse)
AuthorThread
07/17/2009 11:08:11 AM · #1
Don't know if this was posted yet, but:

Springville company introduces new DVD to protect data 1,000+ yrs

BTW, when writting to CD or DVD, always validate/verify the data. There is usually a setting to verify the data, but it takes longer. After traveling to China and writing images to DVDs, when I got home, one disk had write errors. I lost that days photos.

I'm a little worried about my images stored on CD/DVD from a few years ago, but at least I have prints.
07/17/2009 11:18:26 AM · #2
Very intersting article. It made me wonder how long flash data is expected to last? CF cards are becoming so cheap that depending on your settings and size of pictures it's almost as cheap as film used to be to just buy the CF card and leave your pictures on it permanently.
07/17/2009 01:37:32 PM · #3
Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Very intersting article. It made me wonder how long flash data is expected to last?


When I first started using the technology in the early 80's flash memory was thought to be able to survive for about 99 years. Since we've not had the time to test that limit I'd be a bit skeptical. In the late nineties I used PCMCIA cards containing flash memory to load firmware into ADSL subscriber units. We'd generally have about 20 of these PCMCIA cards for use by the production crew manufacturing the ADSL units. On a regular basis we lost at least two of these cards a month. About half of these losses were connector problems. The other half were sent to a diagnostic engineering firm to determine the mode of failure. Results: unknown. If a cosmic ray or other energetic particle strikes the MOS gate that forms the capacitor storing the charge/lack of charge representing a data bit, the bit is lost. So, if you fly with your CF cards at high altitudes, the increased incidence of cosmic rays and other nasties will increase your loss of data. Flash memory also has a limit on the number of write cycles. Some are limited to 100,000 cycles, but I've seen some rated at 1 to 2 million cycles. For long term archival use, I'd rate flash memory right alongside writing with a stick in mud.

07/17/2009 01:52:44 PM · #4
So, the dvd may last 100, 500, 1000 years. But will there be a dvd drive to be found in 25 years? That shoebox full of dvds may be as immediately accessible as that shoebox full of floppy disks is now.

I have not done this yet, but it seems like the best solution for archival data/image storage is online providers. If you want to go belts and braces, duplicating backup with two independent providers. As memory tech changes & improves, they will upgrade as a matter of course. Of course, this works primarily during our lifetime: who will be around in 500 years to pay that subscription? :-)

The cloud, dude, it's all in the cloud!
07/17/2009 02:03:33 PM · #5
Originally posted by chromeydome:

As memory tech changes & improves, they will upgrade as a matter of course. Of course, this works primarily during our lifetime: who will be around in 500 years to pay that subscription? :-)


More importantly, who will care? 1 second after I'm gone, the longevity of what I leave behind is someone else's problem.

Yes it would be nice to leave something behind that someone else values, but it is up to them to decide what to keep. Almost anything we find of long past civilization, we treasure. But that is because so little has survive. If we find the grocery bill of a pyramid worker, we ooh and ahhh. Not so much over a grocery bill from last year. There are plenty of them.

Although I am loath to discard almost any image, even the bad ones. I know that I will probably never look at the vast majority of them again. Neither will anyone else. We are storing massive amounts of data worldwide. But I fear we are like the packrats on TV who get their houses cleaned out. Not much of it is all that important to keep through the ages.
07/17/2009 02:34:47 PM · #6
Film wouldn't last 500 years, but I didn't hear a lot of people worry about that back in the day...
07/17/2009 02:45:27 PM · #7
Originally posted by FireBird:

For long term archival use, I'd rate flash memory right alongside writing with a stick in mud.

Ah, but if you bake that mud it's been proven that you can retrieve the data after 5000 years, and it's a useful medium for recording binary data.
07/17/2009 09:06:23 PM · #8
Originally posted by FireBird:

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Very intersting article. It made me wonder how long flash data is expected to last?


When I first started using the technology in the early 80's flash memory was thought to be able to survive for about 99 years. Since we've not had the time to test that limit I'd be a bit skeptical. In the late nineties I used PCMCIA cards containing flash memory to load firmware into ADSL subscriber units. We'd generally have about 20 of these PCMCIA cards for use by the production crew manufacturing the ADSL units. On a regular basis we lost at least two of these cards a month. About half of these losses were connector problems. The other half were sent to a diagnostic engineering firm to determine the mode of failure. Results: unknown. If a cosmic ray or other energetic particle strikes the MOS gate that forms the capacitor storing the charge/lack of charge representing a data bit, the bit is lost. So, if you fly with your CF cards at high altitudes, the increased incidence of cosmic rays and other nasties will increase your loss of data. Flash memory also has a limit on the number of write cycles. Some are limited to 100,000 cycles, but I've seen some rated at 1 to 2 million cycles. For long term archival use, I'd rate flash memory right alongside writing with a stick in mud.


On the other hand, if you're writing data to the card fewer than a dozen times, then sticking it in storage in your basement, most of the issues you mentioned above shouldn't be much of a problem. I suppose that for extra security, you could always put the cards in a lead-lined box :-)
07/17/2009 09:31:29 PM · #9
Thats why I use discs! My SD cards are unreliable, lost info on one once before.
07/17/2009 10:25:33 PM · #10
Originally posted by RulerZigzag:

Thats why I use discs! My SD cards are unreliable, lost info on one once before.


Love your screen name. Wu forever.
07/18/2009 03:10:29 AM · #11
Originally posted by GeneralE:

Originally posted by FireBird:

For long term archival use, I'd rate flash memory right alongside writing with a stick in mud.

Ah, but if you bake that mud it's been proven that you can retrieve the data after 5000 years, and it's a useful medium for recording binary data.


Certainly. I would expect much of the data on a CF card to be in good shape after 80 years. Maybe 90. Who knows. But I know that the loss of just a few bits in a very sensitive place would destroy the complete raw files. But maybe we could recover them.

As far as mud goes, I suspect some of the triobites found in shale are 100s of millions of years old. But you won't be able to read their DNA.
Pages:  
Current Server Time: 03/29/2024 09:37:52 AM

Please log in or register to post to the forums.


Home - Challenges - Community - League - Photos - Cameras - Lenses - Learn - Prints! - Help - Terms of Use - Privacy - Top ^
DPChallenge, and website content and design, Copyright © 2001-2024 Challenging Technologies, LLC.
All digital photo copyrights belong to the photographers and may not be used without permission.
Current Server Time: 03/29/2024 09:37:52 AM EDT.