Will Your Files Last a Thousand Years? - Comments Page 2

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. I see no evidence here. It looks like snake oIl promotion from m-disc. None of my digital darks have failed in 3-7 years.

I think this is a very interesting concept and one that may be needed by many, particularly businesses and governments. While I doubt 1000 years is necessary, for a lot of reasons, 100 seems very reasonable.
However, I seriously question the premise that our current disks last only 3-5 years. I have disks I made in the very early 2000's and as far as i can tell they are still just as good as when created. And I imagine the technology of both drives and disks is far better now than it was in say, 2002. I am referring primarily to music, videos and pictures, but I don't see why it would matter what kind of data is stored. Frankly, this is the first time i've heard that written disks have some sort of "shelf life".

I have been using DVD-RAM disks for long term storage - how to they compare to a regular DVD for longevity? - I read that they were good for at least several decades - assuming I don't step on them!

There were several dye formulas common in the past and different dyes had different life expectancies. Cheap quality discs, especially those written at high speeds, died very quickly indeed; often within months. The quality of the reader, and I suspect the burner also has a significant impact.
I have several of the GOLD KODAK discs, both used and unwritten, all remain good even though the blanks are nearing ten years old. Time will tell if using these old blanks reduces durability.

Later Kodak branded some "silver" discs. While these are of high quality, I do not believe their durability will approach that of the GOLD discs which were rated at 100 years.

Sadly, in the more recent past I have found some discs in Dollar type stores that seem to be the Kodaks of several years ago, but these are completely FAKE.

While no consumer expects his data to be relevant for 1,000 years, it would be a relief not to have to worry about pictures & children's memories becoming unreadable within s few years.

(Bob, this is to YOU, but comments were inspired by your and contributor's apparent lack of current info on and curiosity about and interest in M-Disc technology. I don't care if any is published or not. I'm well aware it has run on way too long, but this is easier than farting out multiple shorties. DO write more about the technology though. I HOPE their pricing drops a LOT, as I suspect that would help consumer usage. That also applies to non M-Disc normal Blu-Ray DL, TL, and QL blanks, but that IS a different topic. I've never even seen a price on the 128GB QL blanks, but would love to have affordable 50GB DL and 100GB TL ones widely available. Thanks for all your good info!)

I suspect M-Discs are not well known because many retailers are not carrying them and not enough folks are asking for them yet.

MicroCenter certainly IS carrying the DVD version, but I have not seen the Blu-Ray version there yet. Unlike the DVD version that had to be written on LG drives and recently maybe a Sony DVD drive or two that all have M-DISC on the front loading door (though once written can be read by ANY DVD drive), the new Blu-Ray 25GB capacity blanks can be written by any Blu-Ray drive, and cost typically less than twice what the 4.7GB DVD blanks are.

You will find the Blu-Ray M-Disc blanks at about $5 each from M-Disc, but they are probably not trying to compete with retailers, so shop for better prices.

As for those that have dug out old discs and discovered that they can still be read, that is great, you treated them well! Apparently there were some military tests to find which brands of field writable optical DVD discs could withstand their 3 day simulated "combat environment" torture test, and M-Discs were the only surviving discs. I don't know what the tests included, but probably that is readily available info.

I use ~$0.40 cents each (frequent sale price $9.95 for a 25 disc pack) single layer (SL) 25GB WinData Blu-Ray blanks which, after WinRar's compression, will still hold well over a decade of my save-worthy emails in ~1000 IMAP folders and subfolders from my Communigate Pro email server's "CommuniGate Files" directory which also includes full configuration information and is all that is needed to fire up a replacement server starting with a freshly downloaded copy of the CGP s/w running on any of over 30 OSes. Those plain Blu-Ray backups I still do very frequently, but now with the M-Disc Blu-Ray option being affordable enough I periodically do an additional M-Disc copy and store that far away.

I NEVER any longer use DL DVDs which are only 8.5GB and cost almost as much as SL Blu-Ray blanks and take a LOT longer to write for backup. I'd only use them for passing a legally copyable DL size video (maybe MOV or MP4) to a friend that can't read Blu-Rays as a data (not video) disc.

If you have pictures of ancestors and family events, or anything else grandchildren and their grandchildren might wish to add to and pass on, give them the best chance to have them readable - currently M-Disc.

Some old 9 track EBCDIC or ASCII tapes were readable when last I tried after several decades, but not sure about older 7 track BCD ones because I could not easily find a working drive to use. Its mostly old programs written for almost forgotten computers, but having some small sentimental value.

Hopefully drives to read current disc types will still be around in a few decades if someone wants to copy the contents to some newer media type.

FWIW, an M-Disc person once said that they could have just as easily said 10,000 years for the actual medium they are etching into, but it is the plastic disc that made them decide to stop at 1,000 years.

Some of the better hard disk drives today have a 2 million hour MTBF of running (in a datacenter like environment, not cycling on/off as at home with crappy power and large temperature swings), and that sure beats a mere 1.2 million hour drive's MTBF that was only 136 years. Obviously any individual drive might fail in a week, but over many thousands some should exceed the MTBF.

So 1,000 years for an M-Disc with no electronics and no lubricants and no heads to crash or bearings to wear out, sure, why not?

With a SATA OEM packaged (plastic bag with Blu-Ray s/w CD and screws) 16x Blu-Ray raw drive that also does DVD M-Discs is often less than $60, and the DVD only version (probably no included CD) is at less than $16, anyone can afford upgrading to be able to be making longer life discs!