Best data storage solution for scanned films?

[Taz]

Like most things it depends on how you treat them, and the type of tape used. DAT tapes are particularly unreliable, DLT and SLR are much better.

[Wombat]

Originally posted by Drizzt
NO, NO, NO, NO!!!!
I've worked with many of them, and they last nothing.
Or, better, they last a lot. But they have this bad attitude to auto-erase totally random.

Drizzt is very wrong here. DAT generally sucks, but I'd trust an LTO or SDLT tape to survive far more than an HD would. They're much more tolerant to environmental changes, and physical shock.

[Kurt]

The problem with tapes is also that the technology moves forward sometimes too fast.

I've seen piles of incompatible junk left with perfectly good tapes (or at least supposed to be).

Don't bet on one technology or another.

Right now, we design our systems with a mix of RAID and tape, so we have multiple copies and we decrease our backup time.

There's a trend to go all hard drive for big storage, as it is cheaper and as reliable if not more than tape. You just have to account for the 1% or so defect drives per annum.

Opticals are totally unreliable, except if you go MO. The technology is good for long term storage but pricey. You do have compatibility from different generations though.

For a "cheap" system, it's probably best to use IDE drives in RAID 1 (strict minimum) (Seagate will give you 5years warranty now) complemented by a cheap DLT drive. If you make compressed files, use a format that can strenghten file integrity, and as VJ said, one archive per file.



edit: MO, not WORM.

[Wombat]

Originally posted by Kurt
The problem with tapes is also that the technology moves forward sometimes too fast.

I've seen piles of incompatible junk left with perfectly good tapes (or at least supposed to be).

Whatever. AIT technology has been around since 1996, and Sony just released the AIT-4 drive (read compatible with all previous AIT families). LTO came out in 2000, and LTO-3 is due out any day now (read/write compatible with previous families).

[chaoliang]

Another question: What is actually "anti shock design/protection" with external hard drives and some external enclosures? How does it work?

[Kurt]

Originally posted by Wombat
Whatever. AIT technology has been around since 1996, and Sony just released the AIT-4 drive (read compatible with all previous AIT families). LTO came out in 2000, and LTO-3 is due out any day now (read/write compatible with previous families).

Duh. Of course there ARE technologies that are backward compatible, but unless you're from 1996, there were OTHERS too.

DAT is still selling, TRAVAN too. You know what, our Gov clients only buy that...

Re-read the post, I never said tape wasn't good or always incompatible. I said "sometimes" the tech moves forward too fast. You can't know what tech has got a future or not.