Might Flash Memory be a Viable Backup Medium?

General Books asks: "Rather than fuss over mechanical failures and damaged media, why not use flash memory for backups? We maintain about 100 servers distributed to customers' sites. Each night we copy a backup of critical data (generally less than 128MB) to removable media in case the hard drive fails. We have experienced high failure rates with CDRWs and so now I am considering some sort of flash memory like a USB key drive. They are solid-state and you can get a 128MB device for $20. They seem ideal to me, but I can't find solid evidence. One question is how would they endure a lightning strike (perhaps not as good as an optical medium)? Admittedly, there is a wide variety of CDRW drives and media but don't they all seem risky compared to a solid-state device? More info about my circumstances: We have no network for backups. A second hard disk is not viable because it could not be rotated offsite. Tape drives are relatively expensive and overkill for our volume of data."

Comments

I don't do offsite backups

[the_other_one]

When that place burns I want to be sure all the evidence goes up in smoke.