Long term storage

[n1x0n]

Well, the good old storage problem...

I think that it's about time for us to demand a solution from hardware companies.
It's not do hard to write a specification and mass-mail it to them.

[macgyver]

Long term storage?

Easy, my employer technically owns everything I shoot  

[61Dynamic]

Well, the good old storage problem...

I think that it's about time for us to demand a solution from hardware companies.
It's not do hard to write a specification and mass-mail it to them.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=80299\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

...but inventing a brand new technology that matches those requirements is.

At this point in time there is no truly archival solution and based off technologies present and still in R&D, I doubt there will be one for at least another 10 years. Until then, we will just have to regularly update and maintain the technologies available.

[Mark Graf]

I have settled on the use of hard drives with backups to a NAS RAID5.   For me, it seems the most flexible, least time consuming, and accomodating of future needs and growth.  The NAS isn't even on most of the time, which should extend its life greatly - only operating during backups and occasional storage use.  Backups can be done automatically overnight, as well as restorations if something were to happen.   Hard drives provide the speed of access, and the NAS the flexibility to backup from anywhere on the network unattended.

CD/DVD is just too time consuming of a process - from burning/swapping to the nightmare thought of having to restore them to another media.

I just haven't figured out the system I will stick with in managing multiple hard drives.  I am hoping Lightroom will address this in the released version, or I will continue to use Imatch.

[danag42]

I also recomend Peter Krough's book (the DAM book).  One of the important ideas he puts forth is that you need to find the images when you need them.  

Using iView Pro has made it easier to sort and find images.  I put a catalog on my laptop, the actual images aren't there but the thumbnails and EXIF data are.

I  transfer everytning through the DNG converter as a first step.  It not only serves as a consistency check, all my different RAW formats are now residing in one single format.  The EXIF data lives in the DNG files, not in sidecar .xmp files.  This makes life a lot easier.

I use SATA RAID1, internal to my main machine.  It can hold up to about one terrabyte, then I have to add external drive cases.

I also make copies to Archival Gold DVD's, and keep them off-site.  The computers are in my studio, but the DVD's sit in a cabinet in my house.  This is about the best I can come up with for the moment.  Perhaps someone will make archival Blu-Ray??

The only constant is change.  We have to keep up with the storage technology.  Or make an archival print of every image for storage!

[DiaAzul]

I also make copies to Archival Gold DVD's, and keep them off-site.  The computers are in my studio, but the DVD's sit in a cabinet in my house.  This is about the best I can come up with for the moment.  Perhaps someone will make archival Blu-Ray??

[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=81255\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

You may want to consider using DVD-RAM instead of DVD-R or DVD-RW discs. They are more suited for long term archiving and are claimed to have a longevitiy of approx 30 years. Part of this comes from the design of the disc, a further part comes from the redundancy built into the disc format which is tolerant of disc defects and spot failures over the lifetime of the media. Even if you have what are claimed as archival DVD-R or DVD-RW they do not have as much protection as the DVD-RAM format...beware of the marketing hype, there is no conclusive proof that a gold disc will last longer than a silver disc, you just end up paying more for a format which is intolerant to failures and fundamentally floored in its design as a backup media.

[61Dynamic]

I wouldn't trust DVD-RAM any more than a gold-archival disc. Granted DVD-RAM has data-verification built in, that isn't a full solution to the problems I've mentioned earlier. What good is data-verification if the whole media it's written on has rotted? DVD-RAM has it's own slew of issues as well. Compatibility isn't as good as DVD-/+R, it's harder to come buy, slower and quite a bit more expensive.

The life span of DVD-RAM is theoretical and unverified. Until an unbiased third-party actually age-tests these mediums, no one can say one way or another how long they will last. At least gold-archive discs can be logically believed to last longer than a standard DVD-/+R due to the testing that did take place for the standard discs. Will they last 100-300 years? Possibly, but not likely. At the very least, they should be able to last 5-10 years if stored properly, deductively speaking of course.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dvd-ram

[ddolde]

Panasonic creates 100GB Blu-ray discs to last 100 years

[DiaAzul]

What good is data-verification if the whole media it's written on has rotted?

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None whatsoever. However, the entire strategy is to test your media regularly to detect when a fault has occured and to copy the data onto new media and not to wait until the entire disc has multiple failures throughout its structure. My recommendation for DVD-RAM is not based upon internet reading, but the experience from our own organisation in making archival backups and our own recommendations to our users based upon global best practice developed over a number of years. DVD-RAM is not perfect, but is more suited to archiving (especially when purchased in sealed cartridge form) than DVD-R,RW discs.

The following link may be of interest to those looking to select archival disks as the first link (article) on the page lists disk manufacturers by quality.

[a href=\"http://www.digitalfaq.com/media/index.htm]Digital Media faq[/url]

One aspect that hasn't been discussed is how do you know when a file is faulty? One way to do this is to create a CRC-32/MD-5 check number for each file that exists on the CD and then to do an integrity check by comparing the stored check number against a recomputed value at a later date. The following piece of software enables this to be done relatively easy for CD/DVDs.

Integrity Checking Software

[billh]

It you want to determine the approximate life expectancy of an pigmented ink jet print, this site rates them:

http://www.wilhelm-research.com/

You can use storage boxes and papers containing activated carbon and zeolites to keep harmful molecules like pollutants out of the stored material (one of the big problems with all but those select gold CDs and DVDs ) pollutants penetrate the plastic and oxidize the aluminum so the laser does not read the material):

http://www.conservationresources.com/Main/...icroChamber.htm

http://www.conservationresources.com/Main/...LOG/default.htm

but for the TBs of digital files I have, I have been using RAIDs. I did not realize some of the other potential problems that have been mentioned here.

The 100GB Blu-ray disks sound promising, except for the very slow write speeds. Are any of the HD manufacturers/brands more reliable than others?

Format/software obsolesce is another issue....

[to-mas]

I am do it like this>
1.I make folder with 4.5gb name it ( DVD-5D-0005 )
2.then use quicksfv http://www.quicksfv.org/ to make md5 checksum
3.then burn folder + md5 together on dvd
4.when i want to check disk I just start that md5 checksum

but thanks for that link, i will check it

One aspect that hasn't been discussed is how do you know when a file is faulty? One way to do this is to create a CRC-32/MD-5 check number for each file that exists on the CD and then to do an integrity check by comparing the stored check number against a recomputed value at a later date. The following piece of software enables this to be done relatively easy for CD/DVDs.

Integrity Checking Software
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[D. King]

This discussion has been enormously helpful.  Now I have a slightly different but related  question.

Forgive me if this has been covered somewhere else, but once you have your images archived on either your external HDs or DVDs or whatever, what is the most efficient way to keep track of where everything is?

I find using Retrospect and other backup programs that the cataloguing doesn't  give me enough information and flexibility.  

Any thoughts?

Thanks