I debated doing this recently but ultimately spent a lot of money on an LTO-6 tape drive instead, just due to the cost efficiency over time for larger amounts of data. I justified it to myself as I needed to either expand my NAS or clear stuff off it, and the drive was the same price as buying two new HDDs to expand the NAS thanks to the obscene price inflation at the moment. As I’d likely need to further expand my NAS next year (I’m shooting a lot of photo and video) I think this works out a much more cost effective way of storing this data long term when I likely don’t need to access it much.
Blu-ray drives are becoming increasingly rare sadly, so it's not great to hand over to others in the years ahead. An external hard disk drive kept safe and secure might be your only option. I had the same issue 6 years ago winding down my company and archiving data. Only sensible options were M-DISC and external hard disks.
LTO tapes are the worst possible format for passing on family photos to family members. I dread to think of anyone in my family trying to setup an LTO drive when they barely understand how to use their smartphone.
I mean if you don't print them and want digital and we're talking having them for the next generation(s) then pretty much whatever current format you choose, it won't be the one that's widely used in the future so it will require some tech knowledge. And LTO tech stayed pretty settled and compatible for quite a few years now.
LTO drives/tape are not friendly, consumer grade technology. One look on a search engine, and it's all obscure refurbished server parts costing hundreds. The prices of them going forwards might increase sharply too and make it unviable...a bit like external hard drives right now. So yeah, printing everything out and hoping for the best is the only sensible option...
I'm surprised this is not more common. I have been doing this since 2016 (started with DVDs and quickly moved to Bluray since writable DVDs are more prone to failure).
Just use a magnetic hard disk and your data will be fine for many decades if not centuries. You don't need M-Blu Rays (which have very limited capacity anyway). A hard disk is cheap and stores several Terabytes.
You obviously need to store the data in a physically remote place like your shed, car or safe deposit box in case your house burns down.
Never, ever use a SSD if you want your data to be safe for any amount of time. What's worse, SSDs can fail unexpectedly with almost zero chance of data recovery.
> Just use a magnetic hard disk and your data will be fine for many decades if not centuries.
A few months ago I needed to pull from an offline backup. The disk, which used CMR and was purchased new from an actual computer supply company (i.e. not Amazon), was burnt in for about 72 hours before it was loaded up with data and shoved in a padded box. Ten years later, the drive was pulled, and there were so many media surface errors that most of the data was unrecoverable. (I haven’t bothered opening the drive to see if there is some obvious sign of what exactly failed.)
In my case the backups were created in multiples using two different brands for exactly this reason, and the second copy was fine. But I wouldn’t say it’s the case a single magnetic disk can take the place of BD.
Mechanical disks are also getting expensive. The disk purchased to replace the failed backup was being sold at three times its original release MSRP. Some of this is due to the AI hysteria but some of it is also that the market is shrinking and becoming K-shaped.
Are Verbatim's M-Disc Blu-Rays still really M-Disc? There was something about how they changed the recipe a few years ago, and the counter-argument was that Blu-Ray discs are non-organic anyway, which was the main feature of M-Disc DVD.
There's very few companies now making new Blu-Ray drives too. Pioneer has supposedly stopped producing them, and the ASUS drive I bought earlier this year was one of the only SKUs on the market. Sony stopped producing high-capacity recordable BDXL discs too which means they aren't much of an option now for large backups.
100% everything here. That level of tamper evidence should be good enough for the reasonable individual, IMHO.
On the enterprise scale, the question I think everyone should be asking is: Do they have LTO tapes on a shelf? Fundamentally the same issue (but larger), in terms of needing to ensure it's physically separate, and secure, and tamper evident. =)
Anything in the cloud or connected to your network can be hacked. The backup of last resort must be on a shelf.
I debated doing this recently but ultimately spent a lot of money on an LTO-6 tape drive instead, just due to the cost efficiency over time for larger amounts of data. I justified it to myself as I needed to either expand my NAS or clear stuff off it, and the drive was the same price as buying two new HDDs to expand the NAS thanks to the obscene price inflation at the moment. As I’d likely need to further expand my NAS next year (I’m shooting a lot of photo and video) I think this works out a much more cost effective way of storing this data long term when I likely don’t need to access it much.
Does anyone use it for family photo backup for generation to pass on? I am struggling to come up with a good back up solution that last ages.
Blu-ray drives are becoming increasingly rare sadly, so it's not great to hand over to others in the years ahead. An external hard disk drive kept safe and secure might be your only option. I had the same issue 6 years ago winding down my company and archiving data. Only sensible options were M-DISC and external hard disks.
Buy a new hard drive every year, make it your primary drive. The previous one becomes your backup.
Or just keep it attached to your system, so spyware, adware, and the NSA will make free backups for you!
get some used LTO-5 / LTO-6 drive if you have some desktop/server to plug it in
LTO tapes are the worst possible format for passing on family photos to family members. I dread to think of anyone in my family trying to setup an LTO drive when they barely understand how to use their smartphone.
I mean if you don't print them and want digital and we're talking having them for the next generation(s) then pretty much whatever current format you choose, it won't be the one that's widely used in the future so it will require some tech knowledge. And LTO tech stayed pretty settled and compatible for quite a few years now.
LTO drives/tape are not friendly, consumer grade technology. One look on a search engine, and it's all obscure refurbished server parts costing hundreds. The prices of them going forwards might increase sharply too and make it unviable...a bit like external hard drives right now. So yeah, printing everything out and hoping for the best is the only sensible option...
I'm surprised this is not more common. I have been doing this since 2016 (started with DVDs and quickly moved to Bluray since writable DVDs are more prone to failure).
This seems a little over the top to me.
Just use a magnetic hard disk and your data will be fine for many decades if not centuries. You don't need M-Blu Rays (which have very limited capacity anyway). A hard disk is cheap and stores several Terabytes.
You obviously need to store the data in a physically remote place like your shed, car or safe deposit box in case your house burns down.
Never, ever use a SSD if you want your data to be safe for any amount of time. What's worse, SSDs can fail unexpectedly with almost zero chance of data recovery.
> Just use a magnetic hard disk and your data will be fine for many decades if not centuries.
A few months ago I needed to pull from an offline backup. The disk, which used CMR and was purchased new from an actual computer supply company (i.e. not Amazon), was burnt in for about 72 hours before it was loaded up with data and shoved in a padded box. Ten years later, the drive was pulled, and there were so many media surface errors that most of the data was unrecoverable. (I haven’t bothered opening the drive to see if there is some obvious sign of what exactly failed.)
In my case the backups were created in multiples using two different brands for exactly this reason, and the second copy was fine. But I wouldn’t say it’s the case a single magnetic disk can take the place of BD.
Mechanical disks are also getting expensive. The disk purchased to replace the failed backup was being sold at three times its original release MSRP. Some of this is due to the AI hysteria but some of it is also that the market is shrinking and becoming K-shaped.
Offline HDDs are not a reliable long term data storage. Not even for a few years.
Hard disks aren't even rated for one decade.
Hard drives are way bigger, but M-Disk is more reliable for very long term storage.
I use a 2.5" drive. I find them ideal. But then again my backup footprint isn't double-digit terabytes.
With the decline in quality I am no longer confident my HDDs are actually a save backup strategy.
I have so many photos of vacations and people who I've buried over the years, that I don't want to lose.
So I was thinking about using Blu-ray M-Disks as well, these last couple of months.
Are Verbatim's M-Disc Blu-Rays still really M-Disc? There was something about how they changed the recipe a few years ago, and the counter-argument was that Blu-Ray discs are non-organic anyway, which was the main feature of M-Disc DVD.
There's very few companies now making new Blu-Ray drives too. Pioneer has supposedly stopped producing them, and the ASUS drive I bought earlier this year was one of the only SKUs on the market. Sony stopped producing high-capacity recordable BDXL discs too which means they aren't much of an option now for large backups.
100% everything here. That level of tamper evidence should be good enough for the reasonable individual, IMHO.
On the enterprise scale, the question I think everyone should be asking is: Do they have LTO tapes on a shelf? Fundamentally the same issue (but larger), in terms of needing to ensure it's physically separate, and secure, and tamper evident. =)
Anything in the cloud or connected to your network can be hacked. The backup of last resort must be on a shelf.
Now that I'm at ~$350 a year on Backblaze I need to look at this again. Or the LTO-6 tapes.