Cost of DVD as data storage versus HDD (UK)

[guv]

I can play from mp3 on my pc, I won't buy a cd player (.wav) ever again
only mp3 playing devices, so I will never need to convert.

Sorry, you've lost me! Where are these mp3s coming from? If you are
downloading them, then this all takes time. If you are buying pirate
discs - then they are on CD not hard drive? Im not sure on the point
you are making. My reference was to the fact if you are converting for
HD use or to burn on a disc, the time taken to do so will be the same.

Whatever I have tried alll that, its too much hassel and it
doesn't get done when you are in rush and it is a job in it self.
How many hours (days more like) will it take to catalogue 300 DVD?

Since the DVDs in question are films, they took less than 30 minutes -
and that includes links to imdb. Hardly a lot of time. Like someone
else has said, it doesnt take long to index. There is lots of software
out there that will take the sting out of it. For instance, if you are
talking about mp3s, do you use the CDDA database so it pulls in the
track titles and can be directly input when you convert to those .mp3
tracks? Then using simple database catalogueing software, it will do
the work for you in seconds. It does work and work well.

And then you cannot reorganise your files as you can on a HDD


Ah so I heed to add the cost of a new PC into the equation now?
Well thats another £500 minimum, mind you as it will have a HDD
inside I won't need to burn!!

Your choice, but suggesting disc media is useless because your own PC
isnt man enough for the job is hardly a good argument. What spec is it
anyway?

Well I find HHD's infinitely more reliable so I will invest my money
in that direction, incidently that is not the original CD drive, the
original failed within the first year and I got a free replacent. So in
My experience they are not very reliable (also have a failed
portable CD radio thing).
And whilst it *may* be my fault they failed, none of my
HDD's have ever had a single problem!!!

But it is a fact your hard drives *WILL* fail. It is as certaining as
you in life paying taxes and dying.

Seconds? you have to read 300 lists, you must be a quick and flawless
reader, like my PC find files function.

Who said anything about 300 lists?

It is a major hassle manintaining allyou lists and puting the corect
CD in the correct box.

I fail to see how it is a lot of hassle to put a disc back in the
correct place once you have finished with it. Perhaps this is where
you are going wrong? No sarcasm intended.

Yes but you don't need a set top DVD player as you can play
direct from your PC.

You've mentioned that your PC is pretty ancient and only has a CD
drive that is intermitently faulty. Can this PC play DVD films?

Dont think I would trust a CD or a DVD, wont take up
much space on a HDD though.

Hey, each to their own. If it works best for you, then thats fine. I
have only entered into this as you have slated the media is next to
useless. I disagree.

What I would suggest though, is getting over to Tucows and get
yourself some indexing software, such as this one:

http://tucows.enta.net/preview/193523.html

It will save you a lot of time in the long run.

 

[half_pint]

There are some legitimate reasons to keep stuff on a hard drive rather
than put it on DVD or CD, but these reasons don't cut it. Any kind of
simple database makes it far easier to find stuff then doing directory
searches on a hard drive. If you are putting things in reasonable folders,
a few simple scripts of one kind or another can read the directory structure
of a CD/DVD and spit out something you can import into a database
with very little effort.

Well quite a bit of effort really, I have tried myself and largely given up.
It requires buying software or making do with inadaquare freeware.
Then will the CD always be in the correct box? Not in my experience
it won't unless I make considerable extra effort to ensure this.

Creating a playlist may require several CD changes.

Most likely I would still use the database even if I was keeping everything
on hard drives.

You don't generally have to do 300 DVDs at a time. I catalog each disk
right after I make it.


When your cd drives failed did you lose any data? I'll bet you consider
your data to be more valuable than the 20 dollars or so it costs to
replace a cd drive.

My hard drives have never failed and probably never will, not even one
bad sector. I would probably get some kind of warning anyway and the
data would still be 'there'

I find CD have a lifetime shorter than a prawn sandwich anyway.
to be absolutely sure I had a workinig backup would require
2 or 3 backups (at least!!).

Maybe DVD's are more practical now the prices have dropped
but I imagine they have the same scratch and dirt problems
that cds do, probably much worse given the higher data density,
am I correct?

You keep your lists on a computer and you use the computer to seach through
them. You can query a database in much more creative ways than you can
search through directories on a hard drive.

It takes seconds for me to find which disk contains what I want. Putting a
CD back in a box is no big deal.

Delicate operation requiring he care of a surgeon!!!

I don't expect you to change how you are doing things, but your explanations
are not very convincing.

Well I have no problems with HDD's, CDs are a differerent matter,
to many to list, £10 for a cleaning disc (didn' work)
£7 for a scratch removal kit (didn't work either and bacically was
just a couple of small cloths and a dab of polish, worth about 50p)
Thats not to mention the *hours* I spent trying to get the disk to
work (scratch removal), I think some of the 'backing had come off anyway).

Basically it is a time consuming nightmare when all is said and done.
Time and money spent on a HDD would have been a far more cost effective
option.

The big difference is HHDs are sealed units, free from the elements
and optical disks are not, one tiny scratch and its ready for the dustbin.

 

[half_pint]

Sorry, you've lost me! Where are these mp3s coming from? If you are
downloading them, then this all takes time.

Not on broadband it doesn't!! a minute or 2.

Then *you* have to burn to CD!

If you are buying pirate
discs - then they are on CD not hard drive? Im not sure on the point
you are making. My reference was to the fact if you are converting for
HD use or to burn on a disc, the time taken to do so will be the same.


Since the DVDs in question are films, they took less than 30 minutes -
and that includes links to imdb. Hardly a lot of time. Like someone
else has said, it doesnt take long to index. There is lots of software
out there that will take the sting out of it. For instance, if you are
talking about mp3s, do you use the CDDA database

Sounds like spyware to me!!

so it pulls in the
track titles and can be directly input when you convert to those .mp3
tracks? Then using simple database catalogueing software, it will do
the work for you in seconds. It does work and work well.


Your choice, but suggesting disc media is useless because your own PC
isnt man enough for the job is hardly a good argument. What spec is it
anyway?

200 or 300mhz i think 128meg ram. it is idle 95% of the time.

But it is a fact your hard drives *WILL* fail. It is as certaining as
you in life paying taxes and dying.

Well I have lost more in CD data that the capacity of both my
HDDs (5gig) I would imagine, or pretty close to it anyway.
Say there is 500 meg on a CD I an sure I have lost about 10
of them already, and thats data CD's the audio coasters is another
story altogeather!

Who said anything about 300 lists?


I fail to see how it is a lot of hassle to put a disc back in the
correct place once you have finished with it. Perhaps this is where
you are going wrong? No sarcasm intended.

Well maybe for an organised person, but hat is not everybody
by any means!

You've mentioned that your PC is pretty ancient and only has a CD
drive that is intermitently faulty. Can this PC play DVD films?

But I will be replacing it soon, my PC can play mpegs fine anyway
the newer formats are unnecessary anyway, they use excessive CPU
time for similar quality results.

Hey, each to their own. If it works best for you, then thats fine. I
have only entered into this as you have slated the media is next to
useless. I disagree.

It is the most problematic storage format I have ever encountered
ok not useless, but too troublesome a road to go down, I prefer
the freeway (moterway) of HDDs than the clogged up country
lanes of CDs where there is a tractor or a huge pile of manure
around every corner!

What I would suggest though, is getting over to Tucows and get
yourself some indexing software, such as this one:

http://tucows.enta.net/preview/193523.html

Thnks but I will give it a miss and put the money saved to a HDD
I am basically too lazy to be looking through 100 cds
for the right one,and I have better things to do with my time.
I prefer point and click to dragging out my box of cds, searching thouugh
for the right disc (having previously located the filein my database),
getting the delicate media out of its case and putting it into
my drive (which now requires finding the case for the existing CD,
assuming I can actually get the drive door to open.
Then I have to wait whilst the drive spins up to speed
and if I am lucky reads the cd correctly.

TOO MUCH HASSLE!!!!

 

[guv]

Not on broadband it doesn't!! a minute or 2.

But its quicker to convert! (Granted - not if you dont own the disc -
but you WERE talking about converting!)

Then *you* have to burn to CD!

Until you started on CDs this was a DVD question. In less than 10
minutes, you could have 2000 tracks on one disc!

Sounds like spyware to me!!

But it isnt.

200 or 300mhz i think 128meg ram. it is idle 95% of the time.

So pretty ancient as you say! I thought 300Mhz was the bare minimum
for MP3?

Well I have lost more in CD data that the capacity of both my
HDDs (5gig) I would imagine, or pretty close to it anyway.

Ye gods! 5 Gig! Ive thrown out bigger drives as being pointless! If
all your data fits on 10 gig inc OS and overheads, then great, but
thats just 2 dvds worth!

Say there is 500 meg on a CD I an sure I have lost about 10
of them already, and thats data CD's the audio coasters is another
story altogeather!

Well maybe for an organised person, but hat is not everybody
by any means!

Not to do with being organised, just taking good care.

But I will be replacing it soon, my PC can play mpegs fine anyway
the newer formats are unnecessary anyway, they use excessive CPU
time for similar quality results.

Similar quality? You cannot be serious?

It is the most problematic storage format I have ever encountered
ok not useless, but too troublesome a road to go down, I prefer
the freeway (moterway) of HDDs than the clogged up country
lanes of CDs where there is a tractor or a huge pile of manure
around every corner!

Your choice! ;-) But your HD will eventually fail. That is
guarranteed.

Thnks but I will give it a miss and put the money saved to a HDD
I am basically too lazy to be looking through 100 cds
for the right one,and I have better things to do with my time.

Fair enough. Just pointing out its not difficult to do.

I prefer point and click to dragging out my box of cds, searching thouugh
for the right disc (having previously located the filein my database),
getting the delicate media out of its case and putting it into
my drive (which now requires finding the case for the existing CD,
assuming I can actually get the drive door to open.
Then I have to wait whilst the drive spins up to speed
and if I am lucky reads the cd correctly.

TOO MUCH HASSLE!!!!

I dont use CDR any more. Too small in size - but then I have been
talking about DVDR - which stores as much as your hard drive on a
single disc! With that in mind, you wouldnt even need to take it out
of the drive!

 

[half_pint]

But its quicker to convert! (Granted - not if you dont own the disc -
but you WERE talking about converting!)1

Sorry I think I have lost the what you are talking about here!

Until you started on CDs this was a DVD question. In less than 10
minutes, you could have 2000 tracks on one disc!

They are basically the same medium, a DVD is just bigger.
I was refering to audio CDs which use .wav files which can
be 64meg+ in size.

But it isnt.

Oh OK thats a relief coming from a reliable source, do you have
a legal document to back that up? I am sure you do and you will
post the link immediately to take the wind out of my sails!

So pretty ancient as you say! I thought 300Mhz was the bare minimum
for MP3?

Well maybe it is, I think mine is 300MHz and it does use a lot of CPU time
which is a problem, so sometimes I burn .wav files and play them as I
believe
this requires less CPU time as it does not have to decompress them, but I
could
be a a bit wrong.

Yes it a bit old but it is more than adaquate for most applications
(currently using 10% CPU). It is perfectly OK most of the time unless
I am using another CPU intensive application at the same time (java
application
for instance).

I will upgrade my PC soon, but maybe I will wait untill after Xmas as I
expect
to get more for my money then, DVD writers have dropped considerable
in price recently and will soon make CDRW drives redundant I would rather
pay £30-£40 than £200 for one, which seems sensible to me anyway!

I expect my PC to last 6-7 years as opposed to 2-3.
Having said that I expect to get several more years usage out of this one as
it is still a very powerful machine! which will still be fine 10 years down
the line.


As you may have guessed I am not a 'technology victim' who spends thousands
on the latest gadgets

Ye gods! 5 Gig! Ive thrown out bigger drives as being pointless! If
all your data fits on 10 gig inc OS and overheads, then great, but
thats just 2 dvds worth!

Well send you drives to me!!!
Actually one drives main purpose is as a bootable and surfable
back-up should the main drive fail. One is 2 gig, the othe 3 gig
and I have over 1 gig free after a ruthless purge of data since I
got broadband because it will not take much time to reload
what previously took hours to download on dial-up.
I only use a fraction of my daily generous bandwith allocation :O)
and I could probably fill both drives in a few overnight downloads.

Not to do with being organised, just taking good care.

Maybe but but I am not usaually very methodical.

Similar quality? You cannot be serious?

I find mpeg a good enough format, never had any complaints about it.

Your choice! ;-) But your HD will eventually fail. That is
guarranteed.

I will probably be dead before it dies, it is purring like a happy cat.

Fair enough. Just pointing out its not difficult to do.


I dont use CDR any more. Too small in size - but then I have been
talking about DVDR - which stores as much as your hard drive on a
single disc! With that in mind, you wouldnt even need to take it out
of the drive!

I agree DVDs are more managable and a DVD writer for about £40
seems pretty reasonable as I could back up an entire drive on one, which
I cannot do on a CD.
However I doubt my current PC would handle.wav files on DVD
(if that is possible) as it struggles doing that on CD.

 

[guv]

Sorry I think I have lost the what you are talking about here!

You mentioned it takes ages to convet wav to mp3. I am saying it is
quicker to convert than download. (And since you wer saying you also
had to add time to burn to disc, I would think it takes you longer to
find the track you want anyway!)

Oh OK thats a relief coming from a reliable source, do you have
a legal document to back that up? I am sure you do and you will
post the link immediately to take the wind out of my sails!

The database that mediaplayer accesses is at cddb.com. When you put
your disc in, there is a data exchange to their servers to identify
your disc and that informationis sent back and stored on your PC.
Apart from that, nothing else is added to your PC. Does your version
of mediaplayer not do that?

Well maybe it is, I think mine is 300MHz and it does use a lot of CPU time
which is a problem, so sometimes I burn .wav files and play them as I
believe
this requires less CPU time as it does not have to decompress them, but I
could
be a a bit wrong.

That is correct. The CPU is used to decode the mp3 format and is
relatively (by older CPU speeds) intensive.

Yes it a bit old but it is more than adaquate for most applications
(currently using 10% CPU). It is perfectly OK most of the time unless
I am using another CPU intensive application at the same time (java
application
for instance).

Your definition of CPU intensive is a little different to mine! Try
running CCE to decode avi files to mpeg! If it takes an hour on my
machine, it'd probably be a week on yours! But as you say, if you dont
use apps that kill for raw power, there is no point in paying out for
it.

I will upgrade my PC soon, but maybe I will wait untill after Xmas as I
expect
to get more for my money then, DVD writers have dropped considerable
in price recently and will soon make CDRW drives redundant I would rather
pay £30-£40 than £200 for one, which seems sensible to me anyway!

Sounded ok, but you lost me on the £200 bit. What is going to cost you
£200? CDRW drives can be bought for about £16 and DVDR for just over
£30 if you look in the right places!

I expect my PC to last 6-7 years as opposed to 2-3.

It should last 6 or 7 years - but the current apps or OS wont run on
it!

Having said that I expect to get several more years usage out of this one as
it is still a very powerful machine! which will still be fine 10 years down
the line.

I'd hardly call it a powerful machine! But fine I guess if you are not
going to change any software. Even so, it wouldnt cost much to buy a
new bare bones PC that'll knock yours for 6 in performance. (I just
bought one, which has ended up costing me £140 from Dell. Its crap by
todays standards - but it has got a 2.6Ghz processor and 40 gig drive.
Ive had it about 2 weeks now and Ive not even started using it yet.
Not much space for it on the desk that houses 6 other PCs. But it has
been bought to replace the one I am using now, which is a 750Mhz. I'll
probably get a tenner for it if i sold it! And it *does* need a new HD
as the 60Gig drve in it is on its way out.)

As you may have guessed I am not a 'technology victim' who spends thousands
on the latest gadgets

Yes, I think I worked that out! ;-)

Well send you drives to me!!!
Actually one drives main purpose is as a bootable and surfable
back-up should the main drive fail. One is 2 gig, the othe 3 gig
and I have over 1 gig free after a ruthless purge of data since I
got broadband because it will not take much time to reload
what previously took hours to download on dial-up.
I only use a fraction of my daily generous bandwith allocation :O)
and I could probably fill both drives in a few overnight downloads.

I download sometimes as much as 20 gig a day! Not often mind -
normally just between 5 and 10! ;-) My 2MB connection comes in handy
at times;-)

Maybe but but I am not usaually very methodical.


I find mpeg a good enough format, never had any complaints about it.

Have you ever watched a DVD? I might have been a little forgiving if
you were talking about DivX (which wouldnt play on your PC), but VCD
quality is pretty dire!

I will probably be dead before it dies, it is purring like a happy cat.

I very much doubt that!

I agree DVDs are more managable and a DVD writer for about £40
seems pretty reasonable as I could back up an entire drive on one, which
I cannot do on a CD.
However I doubt my current PC would handle.wav files on DVD
(if that is possible) as it struggles doing that on CD.

But only because your CD drive is faulty? Yes it is possible to plonk
wavs onto DVD - but then so is it possible to do the same with MP3s.

Mind you, hard drives do come in handy for MP3s. My 40GB iRiver is a
nice peice of kit!

 

[Simon Finnigan]

[...]
Oh ok guys. Wait for 3 years and all will be well.

Well I ws mainly talking about CD's but DVD have the same problems.

I cannot use my computer whilst burning and thats a problem.

My older cd drive dont work anymore either (occasionally works).
Its just too much hassle.
LIfe is too shor to burn media!!!

How long will it take you to find a file on 300 DVD's?
A month?

I think that is the key issue here. Of course you can do copies
of all data to 2 or more media. of course you can verify all
your media once a month and re-burn those with problems.
(Incidentially I do complete surface scans of most of mu HDDs
once a month, but that is completely automatised...).
But how much time will that cost? How mind-numbing will the
process be? Better get a job flipping burgers in that time
and buy external HDDs for the money earned!

Yes I wonder how much I could have earned in the
time it takes to burn cd's.

I am 100% certain that for what I could earn in
the time spend trying to back up a music CD I could have
ernt out and bought serveal backup copies!!
My experience is 4-5 hours and 5-6 coasters per
successful recording!!!!!

In which case you`re even thicker than I thought! A backup of a plain CD
takes ~5 minutes tops with no coasters.

 

[Andy Ball]

So pretty ancient as you say! I thought 300Mhz was the

bare minimum for MP3?

My 170 MHz SPARCstation happily plays (and encodes) MP3
files. I daresay a 200 MHz Pentium could also work.

I back up my files to tape, although I've been known to put
additional copies of certain things on CD-R or CD-R/W.
Winchesters and RAID are handy for availability, but they're
not a backup medium. DVD?R has its uses, but doesn't allow
for unattended backups of larger data sets.

- Andy Ball

 

[J. Clarke]

My 170 MHz SPARCstation happily plays (and encodes) MP3
files. I daresay a 200 MHz Pentium could also work.

I back up my files to tape, although I've been known to put
additional copies of certain things on CD-R or CD-R/W.
Winchesters and RAID are handy for availability, but they're
not a backup medium. DVD?R has its uses, but doesn't allow
for unattended backups of larger data sets.

My 200 MHz Thinkpad has no problem with MP3s and also can play DVDs just
fine. Actually does a better job of it than a friend's new Athlon-64
machine.

 

[Mike Redrobe]

My 170 MHz SPARCstation happily plays (and encodes) MP3
files. I daresay a 200 MHz Pentium could also work.

Any pentium will do, even a 486/66 (just about) manages to play
MP3s....

 

[guv]

My 170 MHz SPARCstation happily plays (and encodes) MP3
files. I daresay a 200 MHz Pentium could also work.

I'm pretty suprised it works - but not doubting what you say.

I back up my files to tape, although I've been known to put
additional copies of certain things on CD-R or CD-R/W.
Winchesters and RAID are handy for availability, but they're
not a backup medium. DVD?R has its uses, but doesn't allow
for unattended backups of larger data sets.

Now you are getting into a different scenario. You are talking about
"true" backing up of data files? Whilst I agree tape is a decent
medium for that purpose, it has many flaws as well. It will enable you
to restore files, granted (or even a full HD backup if thats what you
did), but not in realtime. Its just too slow and linear for my liking.

 

[half_pint]

Any pentium will do, even a 486/66 (just about) manages to play
MP3s....

Mine is Cyrix MII 300 also called a Cyrix 6x86MX(tm)
Cyrix MII 300 runs at 233MHz (the 66 x 3.5 version)
I need to write this down here cos I keep forgetting!!
That 300 bit makes it sound faster han itis (marketing (lying) I guess).
I just tested it playing an MP3 128 kbs 44kHz and the CPU is at about 75%
I guess the results depend on the sampling rate of the original MP3.
I think the 300 bit is it's pentium equilivant rating (it all gets a bit
complicated).
What is a 486's 'P' rating?

I also tried a 160kbs MP3 (curiously also 44kHz) and thats still 75% CPU?

I guess ( I am no expert though) that the software may be clever enough to
enable it to play the MP3 at a lower quality if your processor cannot do
'the full monty' [well that is how I would have written the code anyway
:OP ]
Iif I had a couple of hours to spare :OP

 

[Toshi1873]

I think you are correct HDD's are cheaper, also you excluded the cost of
of a CD burner so you can add another £20 or more, much more
to the CD option.

Then you have to consider the huge ammount of grief you will get from
CD's (burning problems, scratched disks, disks which won't work,
CD writers which wont work .....well read this group and you will
get the general idea).

It's been quite a while (at least a few months if not a
year) since I've had any problems burning DVD/CDs
(usually at least a disc per day if not more).

Scratches I take care of by adding parity data to the
disk with QuickPar.

Then there is the time cnsumed bburning your CDs, how would you
cost that? Several hundred pounds?

Yep, which is why I don't think that doing a daily
backup to optical media is the best solution. It's a
valid solution, but not great because of the manual
effort involved. (And since there's a decent amount of
manual attention that is required, the backup job will
often get postponed for days/months.)

Then there is huge problem of storing, locateing, indexing of the
CDs.......

There are a few solutions here, but I agree that once
you have ~100 pieces of a particular media, it becomes
difficult to manage unless you're *really* organized.
One thing that helps is some sort of disk indexing
program combined with having dedicated locations for
each type of archive. Daily backups in this drawer,
long-term archives over yonder.

Printing the directory listing on the surface of the
disc also works well if you're just flipping through the
archives looking to see what's there.

Oh I see I am talking about CD's not DVD's but the argurements are the
same except DVD burners are very expensive.

All you get from burnable media is grief and coasters.

You 300DVDs are 3 meters high and hardly portable!!

I think burning media is a dying art, in 3 years time
a 200GB drive will be what? £20?

Hopefully, Blu-Ray discs will be prevalent by then and
only cost a pound or two for the media. HD prices are
down around US$0.55/GB here, DVD-R prices are down to
around $0.15/GB. Assuming that DVD prices fall as fast
as CD-R prices do, they'll probably bottom out around
$0.05/GB. I think it will be a while before HD prices
hit the $0.05/GB mark.

Optical media has one big advantage over HDs, no power
required and extremely simple design. While you might
be able to put a HD on the shelf for 5 years, then plug
it back in and have it work... what happens if the motor
burned out? With optical media, you just move the media
into another drive, HDs are not that simple (while you
can move the platters, it requires a clean room).

One advantage of 300 DVDs is that if you drop and break
one, it's probably not a real big deal (assuming the
information is recoverable). Drop and break that HD
holding 300 DVDs worth of information, and you'll be on
the phone to a data recovery service.

Both solutions have advantages/disadvantages.

 

[Toshi1873]

There are some legitimate reasons to keep stuff on a hard drive rather
than put it on DVD or CD, but these reasons don't cut it. Any kind of
simple database makes it far easier to find stuff then doing directory
searches on a hard drive. If you are putting things in reasonable folders,
a few simple scripts of one kind or another can read the directory structure
of a CD/DVD and spit out something you can import into a database
with very little effort.

Most likely I would still use the database even if I was keeping everything
on hard drives.

You don't generally have to do 300 DVDs at a time. I catalog each disk
right after I make it.

I use SuperCat to do the same task ('s okay, not the
best software). The other thing I've started doing
since I got the Epson R200 is printing either the
directory listing or some list of contents on the
surface of the disc. Much easier to flip through the
binder and look at the discs for some tasks.

The big key is that I don't keep my (quick count... 500
+) DVDs in a single binder. Instead, I have themed
binders. One is all of my NBC DVDs for the current
year, another is for DVDs that I've converted from old
VHS tapes that I own, another holds backup copies of my
CDs that I've ripped to FLAC. So when I want to find
disc X, I'm only (worst case) flipping through 100 DVDs
instead of 500 DVDs. And that's only if I can't
remember the filename in the search software.

(Within the binder, I just file things in chronological
order.)

 

[Toshi1873]

Well quite a bit of effort really, I have tried myself and largely given up.
It requires buying software or making do with inadaquare freeware.
Then will the CD always be in the correct box? Not in my experience
it won't unless I make considerable extra effort to ensure this.

Creating a playlist may require several CD changes.

Which is one advantage of collapsing your collection
from CD-R to DVD-R... you'll need 6x fewer discs.

My hard drives have never failed and probably never will, not even one
bad sector. I would probably get some kind of warning anyway and the
data would still be 'there'

Not guaranteed. In fact, I'd say you're overdue for a
disc failure now that you've invoked Murphy's Law.

I find CD have a lifetime shorter than a prawn sandwich anyway.
to be absolutely sure I had a workinig backup would require
2 or 3 backups (at least!!).

Maybe DVD's are more practical now the prices have dropped
but I imagine they have the same scratch and dirt problems
that cds do, probably much worse given the higher data density,
am I correct?

DVDs have one big advantage in their physical
construction. CDs are made of roughly 1mm worth of
plastic, and the data layer / reflective layer is about
0.1mm away from the label side. (Scratches on the label
side very often damage data as a result.)

For DVD media, the reflective / dye layers are in the
middle of the disc with roughly 0.5mm of plastic on both
sides.

They also bumped up the amount of error-correction on
DVDs (not enough, but better then CDs). Audio CDs still
have one big advantage over data CDs/DVDs. If there's a
glitch on an audio CD, the player can just interpolate
over the missing samples. The listener may not even
notice the blip. Digital data, of course, is not as
forgiving.

Even with those improvements I still add parity data to
my discs with QuickPar and sometimes burn duplicates of
key discs.

Optical media is great for seldom-used snapshot data,
HDs are great for more frequently used backup data. I
have both in my safe deposit box on the far side of
town. HDs are too expensive to dedicate to a "Jan 15
2001" snapshot, much cheaper to just burn that snapshot
onto optical media along with some parity data. (Even
if a particular snapshot goes bad beyond the ability to
be repaired, I can pull the previous/next month's disc
set.)

 

[Toshi1873]

Any pentium will do, even a 486/66 (just about) manages to play
MP3s....

IIRC (it's been a while), the 486/66 had trouble playing
MP3 bitrates over 128kbps (or thereabouts). Combined
with the disc sizes of the day (4GB HD was big), most
folks decided that 128kbps was "good enough" (most
everyone agreed that it wasn't CD quality, it was the
marketing folks that sold 128kbps as "CD quality").

Now I rip to FLAC and then convert to whatever codec is
required by the portable device which is usually 160-
256kbps MP3.

 

[J. Clarke]

It's been quite a while (at least a few months if not a
year) since I've had any problems burning DVD/CDs
(usually at least a disc per day if not more).

Scratches I take care of by adding parity data to the
disk with QuickPar.


Yep, which is why I don't think that doing a daily
backup to optical media is the best solution. It's a
valid solution, but not great because of the manual
effort involved. (And since there's a decent amount of
manual attention that is required, the backup job will
often get postponed for days/months.)


There are a few solutions here, but I agree that once
you have ~100 pieces of a particular media, it becomes
difficult to manage unless you're *really* organized.
One thing that helps is some sort of disk indexing
program combined with having dedicated locations for
each type of archive. Daily backups in this drawer,
long-term archives over yonder.

Printing the directory listing on the surface of the
disc also works well if you're just flipping through the
archives looking to see what's there.


Hopefully, Blu-Ray discs will be prevalent by then and
only cost a pound or two for the media. HD prices are
down around US$0.55/GB here, DVD-R prices are down to
around $0.15/GB. Assuming that DVD prices fall as fast
as CD-R prices do, they'll probably bottom out around
$0.05/GB. I think it will be a while before HD prices
hit the $0.05/GB mark.

Optical media has one big advantage over HDs, no power
required and extremely simple design.

Uh, hard disks don't need power if they're not being read or written.

While you might
be able to put a HD on the shelf for 5 years, then plug
it back in and have it work... what happens if the motor
burned out?

Why would it burn out if the disk is sitting on the shelf?

With optical media, you just move the media
into another drive, HDs are not that simple (while you
can move the platters, it requires a clean room).

Regardless of any of this, archival storage and backup are different.
Backups don't have to sit on the shelf for 5 years, but rewriteability of
the media is necessary if the costs are not to become unreasonable.

And you don't put all your eggs in one basket with archival storage, no
matter what the media. In other words you don't use one hard disk, you use
two, you don't use one DVD, you use two, etc.

One advantage of 300 DVDs is that if you drop and break
one, it's probably not a real big deal (assuming the
information is recoverable). Drop and break that HD
holding 300 DVDs worth of information, and you'll be on
the phone to a data recovery service.

No, you'll get out your _other_ hard disk with that same 300 DVDs worth of
information. If you run them in mirrored pairs when you store data to
them, that doesn't even involve much additional effort. In any case,
modern hard disks are not as fragile as you seem to believe. Put one in a
removable tray and it will generally survive a pretty good fall without
problems.

 

[half_pint]

Which is one advantage of collapsing your collection
from CD-R to DVD-R... you'll need 6x fewer discs.

True I am considering that option as you can get a dvd
writer for about £40 now, little more than a cd writer and
a dvdrw will write cds anyway.
I think I will get a brand new PC with a writer on it as my current PC
is ancient, however having said that I dont think new harddrives will be any
faster
than mine ( speeds are basically the same 5400 or 7200 ) so I cant see them
writing any faster. Prehaps someone can explain how the magis works?

Not guaranteed. In fact, I'd say you're overdue for a
disc failure now that you've invoked Murphy's Law.

Maybe, maybe not, I recently looked at the mean time between
failures of a drive on ebay (fairly common drive) and it worked out
at about 50 years, (probably better than a human body).
Also most failures are very early, once you get past this the life
expectance is very
long so my drive may well last 100 years.
Bit better than a CD DVD or their respectrive drives, of which the MTBF
appears in my experience to be 2 weeks!!!

DVDs have one big advantage in their physical
construction. CDs are made of roughly 1mm worth of
plastic, and the data layer / reflective layer is about
0.1mm away from the label side. (Scratches on the label
side very often damage data as a result.)

Yes I believe some of my probs have came from scratches on
the 'safe' side of a CD ( think i can see a hole!!!!).(which
is not repairable , as opposed to a scratch which theoretically
is, but I have never repaired a scratched disk (just made it worse!))

For DVD media, the reflective / dye layers are in the
middle of the disc with roughly 0.5mm of plastic on both
sides.

Yes maybe, but I still anticipate many problems with DVDs too.

They also bumped up the amount of error-correction on
DVDs (not enough, but better then CDs). Audio CDs still
have one big advantage over data CDs/DVDs. If there's a
glitch on an audio CD, the player can just interpolate
over the missing samples. The listener may not even
notice the blip. Digital data, of course, is not as
forgiving.

Even with those improvements I still add parity data to
my discs with QuickPar and sometimes burn duplicates of
key discs.

Optical media is great for seldom-used snapshot data,
HDs are great for more frequently used backup data. I
have both in my safe deposit box on the far side of
town. HDs are too expensive to dedicate to a "Jan 15
2001" snapshot, much cheaper to just burn that snapshot
onto optical media along with some parity data. (Even
if a particular snapshot goes bad beyond the ability to
be repaired, I can pull the previous/next month's disc
set.)

I backed up some mp3 on cd recently (two backups as they
were my favourites) anyway I tried to put some more mp3s
on one of the backup and it refused to write to the cd anymore.
(talk about a short life span, I had used the disk twice).

PRetty worrying but I have all the mp3,s on my hdd anyway.

 

[guv]

True I am considering that option as you can get a dvd
writer for about £40 now, little more than a cd writer and
a dvdrw will write cds anyway.
I think I will get a brand new PC with a writer on it as my current PC
is ancient, however having said that I dont think new harddrives will be any
faster
than mine ( speeds are basically the same 5400 or 7200 ) so I cant see them
writing any faster. Prehaps someone can explain how the magis works?

It definately would write and read faster than your current 3 gig
drive. The motherboard in a new system, would also ensure faster
access times and faster throughput.

Maybe, maybe not, I recently looked at the mean time between
failures of a drive on ebay (fairly common drive) and it worked out
at about 50 years, (probably better than a human body).

How did you come to that conclusion? Has ebay been going 50 years?

Also most failures are very early, once you get past this the life
expectance is very
long so my drive may well last 100 years.

Nonsense. You should be grateful it has last you the 7 years it has.
Expecting 100 years is virtually inconceivable.

Bit better than a CD DVD or their respectrive drives, of which the MTBF
appears in my experience to be 2 weeks!!!

You seem to have a great deal of bad luck with CD drives. That in
itself is not normal.

Yes I believe some of my probs have came from scratches on
the 'safe' side of a CD ( think i can see a hole!!!!).(which
is not repairable , as opposed to a scratch which theoretically
is, but I have never repaired a scratched disk (just made it worse!))

There is a hole on the disc? (apart from the obvious one?) Is it any
wonder it doesnt work?

Yes maybe, but I still anticipate many problems with DVDs too.

Perhaps DVD Ram is a better option for yourself?

I backed up some mp3 on cd recently (two backups as they
were my favourites) anyway I tried to put some more mp3s
on one of the backup and it refused to write to the cd anymore.
(talk about a short life span, I had used the disk twice).

Are you sure its the discs fault? Are you sure you didnt close the
disc and make further recordings impossible?

PRetty worrying but I have all the mp3,s on my hdd anyway.

You seem convinced you have nothing to fear with your 100 year life
expentantcy for your HD. Why bother?

 

[half_pint]

It definately would write and read faster than your current 3 gig
drive. The motherboard in a new system, would also ensure faster
access times and faster throughput.

However such factors are not relevant as the drive speeds are basically the
same
and I would imagine electronic factors, bus speeds, are much faster than
mechanical ones such as data transfer rates to a hard drive.

How did you come to that conclusion? Has ebay been going 50 years?

Fair point as the drives are not yet 50 years old, you can make estimates
of course which may be wrong, but the manufacture would be in deep
shit 50 years down the line when all the company directors are dead, and
liable to prosecution :OP

Nonsense. You should be grateful it has last you the 7 years it has.
Expecting 100 years is virtually inconceivable.

Reply in 100 years time.
It worked well for 6-7 years so what mechanism would cause it to fail now?
It is a sealed tin can, and food sealed in tin cans has been edible 50-100
years
down the line.
Thats my reasoning.

You seem to have a great deal of bad luck with CD drives. That in
itself is not normal.

That may well be true, maybe then I should stick to hard drives, which
have been considerably more 'lucky' for me?
A fair assumption?

There is a hole on the disc? (apart from the obvious one?) Is it any
wonder it doesnt work?

Not really but there are no holes in my HDD apart from the obvious one.

Perhaps DVD Ram is a better option for yourself?

What is that?

Are you sure its the discs fault? Are you sure you didnt close the
disc and make further recordings impossible?

I dont think so I can only eject the disk via using the software which
burns the disk, which asks me if I want to close the disk, I have not
done this.
However I can also eject by rebooting, but this would not 'close' the
disk (an active process) and I may have done this but i dont think
I did and i am sure I have probably rebooted other disks and written
to them again.


This "cannot write to disk" has become a fairly common problem lately.

You seem convinced you have nothing to fear with your 100 year life
expentantcy for your HD. Why bother?

Well if I live 100 years I think I will need a touch more than
5 gig drive space to store all my downloads :O)