Large IDE Drives as Long-Term Archival Media?

PlatterMan asks: "The question of how to cope with backing up disk drives which are rapidly increasing in size, onto tape and other backup devices which aren't scaling in size as quickly isn't new to Slashdot. Neither is the use of single, raided, and removal disks as backup devices, this has been covered numerous times on Slashdot in e.g. here and here. One thing I haven't really seen discussed however is the feasibility of disk drives as medium to long-term archival media, say 5 to 10 years. Like many people I'm in the position of now having multiple machines with a combined data pool of about 220 Gig, and backing up these onto DDS or DLT tapes is slow and manual to do, and expensive in tape costs. So I'm looking to add a removal drive bay to my primary backup machine and pick up a bunch of large IDE drives, so that I can do regular disk to disk backups over 100 Meg Ethernet (and for my machines which are in cages, over the Net) pulling out and alternating the backup drives on a 3-way backup cycle."

"Backups are of no use without offsite archival copies so I plan to take one set of disks out of the pool, and archive them offsite on a quarterly basis.

However, I've heard horror stories about the data retention and usability off older disks which have been shelved for archival, for example disk stiction - where people try to restore data off of a 4 to 5 year old drive only to find that the disk won't spin up due to solidification of lubricants, or that they've experienced data degradation.

I'd be interested in the Slashdot crowd's opinion on using large IDE drives as an archival media. Clearly one possible problem is being able to get hold of a machine in the future with a suitable IDE interface to plug them into for restoration, but I can't see IDE disappearing within 5 years (maybe 10 though). I'm more interested in experiences and opinions on the suitability of the disks themselves for long-term archival.

• Is stiction still likely occur on newer makes of IDE drives or have manufacturers beaten the problems which caused this in the past?
• Likewise how likely is bit drop-out and general data degradation over say a 5 year and 10 year period, and what do people think would be the likely maximum feasible time that a shelved drive would be usable for?
• Any suggestions as to how would I need to store drives in order to minimize these types of problem and maximise their feasible life as archival media.

Thanks!"

Comments

Print!

[grub]

Print out all your data in hexadecimal and store it in a large vault. If and when a data loss occurs you just need to re-type all the data back in.


yes I'm being facetious

Re:Print!

[alexburke]

Have you ever tried to grep three boxes of greenstripe?

Not a pretty sight, let me tell you...

t's the next AYB^H^H^H Soviet Russia

[Dental Plan]

Backing up to IDE hard drives.... That's a paddling

Not using SCSI like you should... That's a paddling

The right tool for the job is a tape drive, if you don't use it.... That's definitly a paddling.

rock and chisel

[Lxy]

with all the stories I've seen about being unable to retrieve data from just 15 yrs ago (because the format is unreadable, not because the media deteriorated) I'm convinced that archiving data using a chisel and a rock is the best way to go.

Re:rock and chisel

[Anonvmous Coward]

"with all the stories I've seen about being unable to retrieve data from just 15 yrs ago (because the format is unreadable, not because the media deteriorated) I'm convinced that archiving data using a chisel and a rock is the best way to go."

He's right, you know. Look at the info we're gathering from fossilized remains of dinosaurs! Once they found the petrified remains of a velociraptor next to a picket sign protesting the use of fossil fuels.

Slashdot - the "Jackass" of tech support

[HotNeedleOfInquiry]

Here's some more questions:

Can I use my laser printer to print on Gummy Bears?

Can I dry my cat in the microwave?

Can I put rice in my car radiator?

Can I unplug all the fans in my computer so it will run quieter?

Can I run 120 VAC on the spare CAT5 pairs?

Perfect Storage Medium

[techsoldaten]

For my clients, I always suggest the use of stone and / or clay tablets for all mission critical data archive projects, regardless of size or scope. Bablyonian and Greek models of data retention from as far back as 4,500 years ago are (in many cases) superior to the models we commonly use today, with much of the physical meadia having survived electrical storms, tornadoes, floods, fires, and wars on every scale imaginable with a data corruption rate of zero and without the benefit of a climate controlled room, dedicated security staff, or even a closet for media storage. Imagine the elegance of a 84'3/4 STROM (Stone Tablet Read Only Memory) machine hooked up to your Slackware Archive server for performing restorations, and the ST Binary Writer you have networked to your backup systems and kept physically over by the quarry... nice! The TCO for slab is far less than that of tape archives, considering you can store the media in a pile of mud and hose it down when you are ready for a restoration.

M

Re:the absolute surefire way to back something up.

[tomhudson]

Lets have some fun :-)

And just how many tons of paper are you going to need to reliably back up a terabyte in dots and dashes?

Assuming double the standard density (160 chars per line instead of 80, 132 lines per page instead of 66), which actually works out to quad density, you get 160x132=20120, say

1. 20k per page
2. 50 pages = 1 mb
3. 50k pages = 1 gb
4. 50m pages = 1tb

Now let's assume boxes of 5000 sheets. 10,000 boxes, at, say 20 pounds a box = 200,000 lbs, or 100 tons. Man, give me the toner franchise for this!

Re:Non-volatile: no such thing

[Alien Being]

"accidentally drop it and have it shatter"

Moses: I bring to you these fifteen [crash], ten, ten ommandments.

You could always ...

[Greedo]

Stegnographize your data and hide it in an amateur pr0n video.

To restore from backup, search with Kazaa.

The cheapest, and most long lasting backup.

[teamhasnoi]

The oral tradition! Have many children, give them each 10 pages to memorize. To make things easier, you can name them Sector 237, Cylinder 13004 and such.

As disk space grows, so does your family/backup.

To see examples of how this works see: Mad Max - Thunderdome, The Bible, American Indians, The Fellowship of the Ring, Aesops Fables, and the Legend of How the Great Nog Vomited the Earth and Heavens in Ancient Times, Before the Oceans Drank Atlantis.

I have heard rumors that this is how Google archives.