Article on data rot on CD's

From: Teo Zenios <teoz_at_neo.rr.com>
Date: Wed Jul 28 15:38:20 2004

----- Original Message -----
From: "Doc Shipley" <doc_at_mdrconsult.com>
To: <General_at_mdrconsult.com>
Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 2004 4:14 PM
Subject: Re: Article on data rot on CD's


> Paul Koning wrote:
>
> >>>>>>"Doc" == Doc Shipley <doc_at_mdrconsult.com> writes:
> >
> >
> > Doc> Umm, no matter whether those CDs in my garage are still good, I
> > Doc> vote for magtape or acid-free paper for any long-term archival.
> > Doc> There's no comparison and no debate in our company. We use CDR
> > Doc> for easy retrieval in the short term, and tape for the real
> > Doc> backups.
> >
> > Unless you're *very* careful, magtapes aren't much good beyond a
> > decade or so.
>
> Yep. I worked for a research lab at University of Texas for a couple
> of years. All "relevant data" on state-funded projects must be archived
> for 40 years. At the time, the Library of Congress was the accredited
> authority on proper media and storage. (I expect that it still is.)
>
> My department had always followed those guidelines faithfully.
> Still, soon after I took over the subnet, the very first time they were
> asked by the state to provide archived files we were unable to produce.
> All the *tapes* had been stored properly, but all the machines with
> compatible *drives* had been surplussed long since, and the backup
> software junked. It was my first experience in data recovery and
> migration, and one that I've since learned is very common. Perversely,
> I seem to have developed a taste for it. :)
>
>
> Doc
>

You would think the drives making the backups and the original software
would have been removed and placed in the vault with the media. Did some of
the older tape drives have problems reading tapes from different machines
because of head alignment?

Back when I was young and broke I used a utility to format 360K 5.25" DD
disks to 800K to save money (720K 3.5" disks were expensive back then), I
was smart enough to save the program (and the TSR that made the computer
able to read the disks) on a standard 720K disk so that even now I can read
the 800K formatted floppies as needed.

I keep all my old tape backup drives on the shelf, and that came in handy
last year when an old buddy sent me 100 Colorado QIC 120mb tapes with old
games stored on them since early 90's (he had junked his drive a long time
ago). I was able to read every one of them no problems on my dusty old
drive. Finding media for old drives is easier then finding the drives
themselves.
Received on Wed Jul 28 2004 - 15:38:20 BST