Digital Archiving and Preservation

[alexjames01]

Like many of you I'm sure, I have amassed quite a large collection of gaming related files from ROMs, ISOs, Patches, Soundtracks, Manuals, Covers, Strategy Guides, Video game books, Magazines, Tools, SDKs, Spec Sheets, Press Releases, Videos, Walkthroughs, and so on and so on.

I have been plagued with the fear of hard-drive failure at this point. I do have many of these files mirrored on an external drive and some on DVD's here and there... but no one searchable, stable, reliable, organized method of storage for all of this.

Does anyone here have the same issues, concerns or have any suggested methods?? How do racketboy members organize and preserve their file collection(s)????

I have thought of organizing each file with some specific method and storing them onto burned DVD's. Yet I also fear that these burned DVD's will easily degrade over time. Even with a good burner and good media, how do you know how long the data will be retrievable down the road?

I once ran across a Media Storage leather case somewhere which held multiple physical media devices into one nice case. Each page had a slot for CD/DVD, Flash Memory Cards, SD cards, and some other slot i couldn't identify. I kick myself now for not buying this but i believe it wasn't expandable and only had a small limited number of pages. Now I can't even find anything close to this!

I've thought about storing these files online somehow in the cloud but i cringe at the through of my account being deleted down the road for any number of reasons. Has anyone run across a reliable online storage option? I know Dreamhost has/had something called "Files Forever" but it was geared towards selling these files and came with a hefty price when storing tens of gigabytes of data. I'd hit my ISP cap just trying to upload my collection there!

What do you do????

[Anayo]

Paper disk.

http://www.paperdisk.com/

[alexjames01]

Paper disk.

http://www.paperdisk.com/

2.4mb fills up 1 side of paper?? I'd hate to see what 68gb would look like!

but in all honestly, that was actually pretty interesting.

[Anayo]

Yes, that would make an interesting logistical venture. You'd need dozen file cabinets or so dedicated to waterproofed stacks of paper sequenced in the right order.

[Hobie-wan]

That's why you make multiple backups. Either new disc ones every once in a a while or combinations of disc/external HD/offsite backup.

[BigTinz]

Paper disk.

http://www.paperdisk.com/

It's so silly that I like it.

[alexjames01]

That's why you make multiple backups. Either new disc ones every once in a a while or combinations of disc/external HD/offsite backup.

Aye, maybe I am stuck having to set it up that way. I just move around so often and hard-drives die on me regularly. I wish their was an easier more reliable way. I am close to etching bits into large stones and burying them in a tomb of some sort.

[CRTGAMER]

Everything backed up not DVD-R (Unless videos) but reliable CD-Rs. Because so critical, I spend a little extra for good known name brand, such as Maxwells and TDKs. I think CD-Rs just seem more robust with the larger data pits for long term use and data read years later Seems the smaller tighter pits would be harder to read as the Disc deteriorates or gets scratched. CD-Rs hold less data so if CD-R is somehow damaged 700mb loss not as bad as 4.7gb worth of data.

More precious stuff like family photos get annual backup as "Photo Album" CD-R Christmas gifts to relatives. A straight dump of the original JPGs to those albums and not some silly compressed media presentation. Also have a backup hard drive for HDTV viewing with external drive enclosure.

[alexjames01]

I think CD-Rs just seem more robust with the larger data pits for long term use and data read years later Seems the smaller tighter pits would be harder to read as the Disc deteriorates or gets scratched.

That's a really good point. I never thought about that. I'll switch to good brand CDr's instead of DVDs for this project after thinking about it.

I think what I am going to do is organize all of my files into compressed archives that are tagged (some program meta-tags files out there) so i can then burn them accordingly onto CDr's and mirror them on other formats such as some spare sdhc cards and also onto an external hard drive i have. If they're tagged I can sort them by year, system, type, etc. I just need to find a portable, non-ugly storage case for them.

[CRTGAMER]

I think CD-Rs just seem more robust with the larger data pits for long term use and data read years later Seems the smaller tighter pits would be harder to read as the Disc deteriorates or gets scratched.

That's a really good point. I never thought about that. I'll switch to good brand CDr's instead of DVDs for this project after thinking about it.

I think what I am going to do is organize all of my files into compressed archives that are tagged (some program meta-tags files out there) so i can then burn them accordingly onto CDr's and mirror them on other formats such as some spare sdhc cards and also onto an external hard drive i have. If they're tagged I can sort them by year, system, type, etc. I just need to find a portable, non-ugly storage case for them.

Another problem is compressing them. After dumping to CD-R, only way to verify a good copy is uncompressing each one temporarily back to the hard drive, a pain. A disc full of say non-zipped JPGs can easily be verified right on the CD-R. A game install setup file too, easily verified by temporarily installed direct from the CD-R. A Zipped file not only has to opened, but also fully extracted to verify that a good compression was done.

Definitely don't have a proprietary Archive file, years later obscure on a given newer operating system.

Because of size available on inexpensive CD-Rs maybe best to backup files direct from hard drive uncompressed? Game files that have a Install/Setup.exe program, back that one up over an installed game with files scattered in various directories and Windows Registry.