Which is the best

[expats]

Being out of touch I wonder what everyone uses as a backup format? I have been

extremely lax in backing up my hard drive. How reliable are DVD backups?

Should I be exploring a second method as a backup to the backup?

 

Any thoughts appreciated.

 

Thanks,

Steve

[michaelging]

I use a external harddrive. You can get them very cheap now and although I do have my files on CD and DVD, who knows how long you will be able to read the info on them. I used to have photos on a floppy disk and now none of my computers can read them.

[des adams]

My computer man was around and he definitely recommended backing up external hard drivers with DVD. I use two external HD's, one as back-up and one as back-up back-up. Plus DVD. I have other fetishes but they don't involve back-up yet.

[expats]

Thanks for the replies, I guess an external HD and DVD are the way to go. My luck is not good, perhaps I should add a third BU too.

[fanta]

If you have all your pictures backed up on your external HD, a complete failure of the disk will waste all of them at once. At that time you will pull your DVDs, may be to find out that one of them is not readable anymore, and those pictures are gone for good. If you are truly paranoid, you make two copies of each picture on DVD, on separate DVDs of course.

[rsteckis]

I use backups to tape. It is still the only truly reliable backup method for long term storage. If you use DVDs then ensure they are archival quality, not the ones you get from the local supermarket.

[wayne_crider4]

Wasn't film (maybe Kodachrome) the recommended backup medium?

 

Actually from what I just read, external HD's replaced about every three years is the way to go. Optical backups are alot slower.

[mendel_leisk]

I keep as many files as possible of my current project on an internal drive *and* copied to a second internal drive. I use software that copies changed/new files only, and will delete destination files that have been deleted at source. It's fairly bullet-proof I think. The main downsides are issues that involve your whole pc, things like theft, fire, short in the power supply, power surge.

 

When I get down to 17% freespace (the Windows defrag limit), I do *double* DVD burns, slow speed and verified. One is working, one is archive. At completion of project, I burn the remaining on disc files. I've been meaning to get the archive copy off-site, and better get to it.