REMINDER: CDs degrade over time and eventually become unreadable.
Burned CD-R’s can last as little as 5-10 years(!)
CD-RW discs generally last 20–50 years
Factory-pressed CDs generally last 50 years
Rip your disks to your permanent HDD storage, which ofc should be on a RAID mirror and backed up regularly. Always store a copy in a separate location in case of fire/flood/etc.
I love that physical media is getting new life, but CDs are not archival in nature. It’s a drastically different problem from not owning anything, but I don’t want unreadable CDs to push people back to streaming.
I’ll also mention that a major benefit of vinyl records – despite cracks and pops and quality turntables being generally expensive – is that they are so dirt simple as to be effectively immune from similar issues. Not trying to sway opinions at all, but as physical media goes, it still exists for a reason.
… and ofc gold is not tractable for consumer-priced devices, but there’s a very good reason the very best minds at NASA listened to Carl Sagan and added this to Voyager
I’ll recommend one more tool I use for off site backup: iBroadcast
I already have a NAS, my original discs / records, and Plex running Plexamp for music streaming, but iBroadcast has been my music locker for streaming / storing in case my home system goes down. You can re-download Your original music and keep the quality (FLAC) so nothing is lost.
Free accounts (which I use) have unlimited upload space but You are limited to 128kbs for streaming. If you pay their monthly (or annual) subscription, you can stream full quality. So it depends on what you want to use them for.
REMINDER: CDs degrade over time and eventually become unreadable.
Rip your disks to your permanent HDD storage, which ofc should be on a RAID mirror and backed up regularly. Always store a copy in a separate location in case of fire/flood/etc.
I LOVE YOU AND WANT YOU TO OWN YOUR DATA FOREVER!
Depending how you handle them, it doesn’t take much to scratch a cd
A surprisingly small quirt of cat urine left undiscovered on a pile of exposed disks for a few days can render them unusable. Ask me how I know…
Thank you for doing the lord’s work.
I love that physical media is getting new life, but CDs are not archival in nature. It’s a drastically different problem from not owning anything, but I don’t want unreadable CDs to push people back to streaming.
I’ll also mention that a major benefit of vinyl records – despite cracks and pops and quality turntables being generally expensive – is that they are so dirt simple as to be effectively immune from similar issues. Not trying to sway opinions at all, but as physical media goes, it still exists for a reason.
Personally, I have both CDs and vinyl. And tapes!
… and ofc gold is not tractable for consumer-priced devices, but there’s a very good reason the very best minds at NASA listened to Carl Sagan and added this to Voyager
I love you for providing this information that helps us own our data forever! 💖💖💖
I have my original CD-RW.
I’ve saved a copy (HDD) of all my library onto an external hard drive that I’ve lost in the move.
I have a second copy on my PC (SSD) that I have operational.
Then my old laptop (HDD) has my original library and thats lost somewhere at my parents home (remote location)
Am I doing this right!??
Oh big edit immediately: I LOVE YOU TOO AND ALL MY OTHER LOVELY LEMMY FRIENDS
I’ll recommend one more tool I use for off site backup: iBroadcast
I already have a NAS, my original discs / records, and Plex running Plexamp for music streaming, but iBroadcast has been my music locker for streaming / storing in case my home system goes down. You can re-download Your original music and keep the quality (FLAC) so nothing is lost.
Free accounts (which I use) have unlimited upload space but You are limited to 128kbs for streaming. If you pay their monthly (or annual) subscription, you can stream full quality. So it depends on what you want to use them for.
Hope this helps someone!! :)
Oh if we’re going for tool recommendations I swear by my data and my love of it that everyone should have a copy of SpinRite
And you should buy it because it supports Steve Gibson whose research and podcast make us all safer
deleted by creator