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I have a lot of data I care about at home (i.e. TV series, applications, games, movies), and up to a few years ago, was storing on 40 GB HDDs, up to 500 GBs. I have about 20 hard drives that range in with these sizes. With a lot of the data I have, they are literally irreplaceable because a lot of it is no longer downloadable.

My issue is data corruption due to long-term storage. I already have a number of 250 GB hard drives in which the drives are failing. So its been a mad exodus the last couple of months getting my crap off before the drives die.

I managed to “acquire” a number of LTO 2 tapes (and a couple of cleaning tapes )with an LTO tape drive (destined for trash from old job). So I’ve been migrating data to that for the time being.

Was wondering if there is a reliable hard drive (or method) of storing data long-term besides what I’m doing right now without the risk of data corruption. And I want nothing to do with any cloud-based solutions. Until I see an improvement in security/trust when it comes to things “cloud”, I don’t see myself utilizing that technology anytime soon.

I am pondering using SSD or SSD-Hybrid drives for the time being- but because they are rather new, I am a bit nervous (and unsure) of their reliability.

7 Spice ups
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LTO is probably the best option short of setting up your own NAS with a RAID system where you can replace drives as they fail.

(Jared7469) 3

Tapes, although LTO-2 is kind of useless now due to the 200GB limit, I’d try and find a LTO-4 or 5 tape drive

edit* apparently LTO-6 is out now with a 2.5 TB capacity, probably pay a crap ton for it though, LTO-5 is 1.5 TB, might be able to find someone dumping theirs for LTO-6.

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http://www.mdisc.com/what-is-mdisc/

Maybe something to consider. Cost is fairly okay. And utilizes BluRay which has already planned to stay. With LTO keep in mind they are backwards compatible by 2 if I recall correctly so an LTO 5 tape drive, does not read LTO 2 tapes, but LTO 3 and 4 are fine. So keep that in mind as far as hardware compatibility goes down the road.

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The only reliable solution is redundancy. The most reliable media in the world isn’t as reliable as two copies of data even on less reliable media. The idea being that the same bits on two different media failing at the same time is highly unlikely.

So two NAS with RAID is better than two drives. Two drives are better than one of anything.

Those tapes… they’re ok but what will you do 5 years from now when the tape drive fails? What if one tape fails? Unless you are striping the data across multiple tapes that data is lost.

As for SSD - they ain’t cheap and I have yet to read anything conclusive about them being more reliable.

Regardless, all media fails eventually. Thus the 321 rule. 3 copies (including the live or working copy) on 2 media with 1 offsite. It’s the most reliable solution.

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Hmmm…3-2-1 rule. Never heard of it, but it seems to be an awesome principle to abide by. Plus its short and sweet. If you don’t mind, I’m going to adopt it. :slight_smile:

In the short term, is there any brand/type of hard drive that is most reliable on the market?

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Tell me about it. Only reason why I’m using it now is because the tapes a cheap.

Other than that, its a bit of a pain in the @$$.

If I could get my hands on an LTO-5 or LTO-6, that would answer all my prayers. Its the moolah to buy 'em that I’m missing ;p

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My permanent storage is triple (125GB) and quad (100GB) layer archival BlueRay discs. The cheaper archival BDR’s are for hundred-year storage, while the ultimate discs approach a thousand year life.
The Pioneer BDR burner, USB 3.0 is around $75 and discs are 15 for $25.00.
Best long-term storage for my investment and these fit nicely in my fire/waterproof safe.

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Thanks for the post. You may have just swayed me into going Blu Ray. The cost of going Blu Ray vs the LTO tapes I’m using actually seems better in terms of price and benefits

Question #1: What brand due you use for the Blu Ray discs, or does it matter?

Question #2: How long does it typically take to burn a disc to full capacity?

Question #3: External or Internal blu ray burner? Does it matter in terms of performance?

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LTO’s are tape drives and all the care, cleaning, and upkeep that goes with it usually isn’t in a home budget.

Make sure you verify your data after a burn. I have had CD drives stop in the middle of the disc and try and burn the rest of the data in a single track while saying successful.

Some stuff is rare and un-obtainable at any price. The rest of the stuff you may have in archive may be cheaper to just buy it on fleabay on CD, Blu Ray, etc. Vs. the redundant tape/blank disk/hard drive cost.

“In the short term, is there any brand/type of hard drive that is most reliable on the market?”

For what exactly? Hard drives are best selected for their “art” value as displayed as a paperweight. I wouldn’t trust a mechanical hard drive any further than I could throw it. Their Value Engineering in the dirty cutthroat HDD business is why we have RAID (Where “I” stands for Inexpensive aka CHEAP!) arrays and we spend lots of money on backup devices.

Pick a brand modern or obsolete in: SATA, ATA, IDE, EIDE, SCSI, SAS, SCSIN, ESDI plus a few interfaces I forget and I likely have seen a dead paperweight example of it somewhere.

DSM55’s advice is priceless because: “S#it! Even in the future nothing works!”

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Although I have both internal and external BDR burners, the best one is the external Pioneer BDR-XD04 (6X BDXL quad layer) with a USB interface. I got mine at Best Buy on sale around $50. Typically they are $80 or so. The internal one is an LG Super-multi that identifies itself as a BH12LS38, but I would have preferred a Pioneer.
The best discs are JVC. The JVC standard discs are archival quality. Please Google JVC BDR and archival to read up on the technology.
The newest technology is probably better than 6x now, but you can’t beat Pioneer. I would say that internal is better, too since it would be SATA @ 3GB or 6GBps. The USB 3.0 is 5GBps.
How fast? LTO is probably faster, but since these last over100 years, I can wait … lol

EDIT: I don’t use JVC exclusively. I use even cheapie thirty cent 25GB BD-r discs. Of the hundred or so that I have burned, I don’t recall making any “coasters”. Some I “wasted” with a mere 10GB, but I’m ok with that, too! Best place for 25GB BD-r is Frys.com.

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Thanks for the info…will definitely check it out.

Also read that Sony and Panasonic coming out with Archival 1 TB Blu Ray discs- being released sometime next year. There was a 300GB and 500 GB Blu Ray discs being rumored in development from around March 2014- but haven’t seen any for sale anywhere… Wouldn’t mind getting my hand on those.

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Yep! Those have been in development for several years, now. I would use those discs like candy!
OK, I don’t do much candy…

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We use Blu-Rays…