[Recovered Thread: 38970]

[hedwards]

I tend to like dvds myself, but checking that many files can be a pain. so i use dvd sig. http://members.ozemail.com.au/~nulif...ezip/freeware/
automates the process of checking integrity; all in all quite painless.

[eric s]

Thanks for the tip on that program. Very handy.

Eric

[calr]

If you use DVD's for backup, a word of caution.

I used to burn all my images to CD's. Most of these CDs were multi-session in that I added to them periodically until they were full and then started another. I could read these multisession CDs just fine.

When I got my DVD burner, I found that I could burn multi-session DVDs so I copied my CD collection on to DVD's but a little voice said don't get rid of the CDs just yet. Over the weekend, I discovered that I could only read the first session on the DVDs. I tried many things to extract the files from the other sessions but to no avail. Roxio 6 acknowleges that there are five sessions on one of the disks and even has the ability to copy those sessions to .iso files. I did that but the iso files were not useable.

I finally went on line and found a program called IsoBuster whose purpose is to recover "unrecoverable" files from a cd or dvd. I tried it on my WIN98SE system and it didn't work. It reported numerous read errors. I then tried it on my wife's laptop with WIN XP Home and it worked great. I was able to extract all the files from the DVD and copy them to CDs.

Needless to say, my confidence in DVDs for data storage has dropped significantly.

Cal Rasmussen

[Pekkle]

Willyjeen wrote:

I was referring to the best format for storing on a cd for lastability (is that a word!

I think longevity is the word you were after

[marokero]

calr wrote:

Needless to say, my confidence in DVDs for data storage has dropped significantly.

I haven't had that experience, yet, but I also don't do multisession on my dvd's. Haven't had problems reading back from them. Since I first back up on cd's I can afford to wait a while until there are enough files to fill a dvd. I just sellect an approximate ammount of pictures that will fit in a dvd, then burn it single session. I just found out B&H has the TDK armored plated dvd's on sale, I may give those a try

[Setiprime]

Personally -

I like "Lastability"it has a certain authority to it !!

[hedwards]

Cal, additionally with _any_ optical media try to avoid udf or packet writing. It is probably the most reliable way of losing all your files. :evil: I haven't had those problems(yes), but keeping them in a cool relatively dry environment and taken in and out of jewel cases as seldom as possible is still the best bet.

In general the strategy i use is a copy on dvd + 2 copies on a pair of harddisks. Added in checking regularly there isn't much of a chance of loss of the catalog.

[Setiprime]

well - it's been a couple of days and I still like "lastability" - so there!