longterm storage of photo's

[Guest longrifle]

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I hope that this is the correct place to post this question , I've been taking many photo's with my D-lux 4 and was interested in some way to store these photos for long term . I've been told that CD's are short term ? I've have now on an external hard drive but would like to do something more secure with them any suggestions would be greatly appreciated

[andybarton]

CDs and DVDs can be stored for long periods IF you buy the best quality ones AND they are stored correctly.

 

But, in order to protect your files indefinitely, you will have to make multiple copies, stored in different locations and you will need to transfer all these files to new forms of storage as time goes by. Stuff recorded onto floppy disk is pretty much useless nowadays, tape carts from 20 years ago are no longer readable, no one even remembers Zip carts...

 

You also need to store the files in a file format that will be readable easily in the future. How long term were you thinking?

 

Basically, after you are dead, the chances of anyone opening up all your files in the future is pretty slim, I would say, so think in terms of a life-time storage. That is true of 99.9% of photographers, btw, and isn't a personal comment

 

In 100 years time, your great grand children will not be opening up a shoebox full of old prints from Box Brownies as we do today. Because they won't have them.

 

Store your prints in archival boxes out of the light.

[wparsonsgisnet]

Long, you are correct that CD's and DVD's are not known to be archival. Also, if you scratch them, they are useless.

 

Many here use *multiple* external hard drives. I maintain 3 copies of my images, 2 on mirrored external drives and another on still another external drive kept in a fireproof box offsite.

 

If this seems like overkill, ask yourself how you will answer your client, wife, *mother-in-law* when they ask how come you can't make another photo for them.

 

As Andy comments, you need to be able to utilize any storage device in the future. If you do a search here for backup you will find many interesting threads.

 

One other comment: if you are making prints, an archival process should be considered. That's another discussion at a higher volume level.

[jhluxton]

I currently also use multiple external drives with mirror copies though some are also backed up to CD.

 

Just a little tip - for added security if away from home for more than 24hrs I usually take one drive with me and leave another with a friend who lives nearyby - just in case!

 

However, I do think digital images are, due to the ease of making multiple copies, much easier to safeguard than slides my own previously preferred film medium!

 

John

[tobey bilek]

Multiple ways, some offsite as above.

 

If you depend on CD, buy quality and make multiple copies. It is unlikely both will go bad in the same place.

 

Fill a box with prints of what you like.

[SJP]

I got this recently 29/10/2008: Secure data backup with Verbatim | Verbatim Europe - Data Storage, Computer & Imaging Consumables

 

If you set to RAID 1 then you have two identical harddrives so nothing is lost if one of the two crashes.

 

With eSATA it should be compatible with the latest & fastest PC's. At present I am using USB which is fast enough. Can't get the eSATA to work & apparantly I need to mess around with the BIOS for that.

[Overgaard]

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My experience with DVDs has been that there can be trouble writing them. And even when they seem to be ok, there can be trouble reading them. So I don't use them anymore (for several years in fact).

 

Harddrives are great and get more and more inexpensive. So as the harddrives grow in size and the prices fall, you can collect old smaller harddrives on new ones.

 

I have a chain of FireWire disks (LaCie) that keep growing in size as the harddrives grow in size and fall in price. The first ones was 120 GB and the newest ones are the 1 TB which cost less than the 120 GB did then. And for each new harddrive I buy, I buy a less expensive LaCie black brick disk (USB only) which I use as backup for that specific harddrive.

 

This way I can have the backup in another location, and if anything happens, I can take the backuop disk, name it the name of the failed one, and continue working in a matter of minutes.

 

And if one calculates, harddrive space is much cheaper than DVD space.

 

I also use the small 250GB and 500GB LaCiie black plastic drives for portable work. Those will get their power from the USB port and has built in USB cable as well. So one doesn't need to bring power or cables.