On Jan 7, 2008 7:22 AM, knitti  wrote:

quoted text
> On 1/4/08, Nick Guenther  wrote:

> > How would you verify the whole disk is readable? And if it's all

> > readable, how do you ensure the data is still the same pattern you put

> > on before?

>

> the posting von hannah shows what to do. Ths big picture is this:

> Backup (and/or archiving) is not fire-and-forget. You have to know how

> long you want to store this data to choose the right technology and

> media. And you have to have a process to verify that your data is good

> after this time. If you want backups for five years, and your life/business

> won't come to an end should you lose some data in spite having backed

> up, use DVDs or HDDs, verify after backup and just store the media.

> For more than five years and more-or-less critical data, use tape and

> verify every x time. If you approach ten years and up, you have to

> know how you get hardware to read the tapes...

>

> At least the LTO spec states that drives of the *current* generation

> _have to_ read and write also tapes one generation older and

> read tapes which are two generations older. So if you have LTO-2

> tapes around, you will be able to read them with LTO-4 drives (which

> should be checked, but does actually work in this case).

>

> Some companies and universities with huge archives spend

> large sums just to copy their archived data to the newest technology

> every couple of years.

Ah... it's the (http://www.)longnow(.org/). An unsettling concept, that.
-Nick