Well digital should be but isn't perfect, bad copies can be made due to
equipment error and failing media, among other things. I've seen enough
restores because backups were corrupted and not checked until needed
when it was too late.
On 2/14/2015 7:21 PM, Jostein Øksne wrote:
I think I disagree with your blanket statement that obsolence of either makes
them unrecoverable. If anything, it takes obsolence of both in my opinion, but
in either case it's more a matter of how much you are willing to pay for
recovery.
What really sucked about analog was that the original could not be copied at
all without quality loss. Digital can be migrated losslessly between media for
as long as you bother to migrate to new hardware regularly. Like with your tape
reader. Since migrating to floppies, that's your historic 'event horizon'. If
then migrated to CDs, why would you look back to floppies.
And yeah, ImageMagick is a godsend, but only for us computer geeks. ;-)
Jostein
Den 14. februar 2015 16:44:58 CET, skrev Bruce Walker <[email protected]>:
The obsolescence of either is enough to render your data unrecoverable.
Physical media seems to die out sooner than file formats do simply
because
it's generally not too hard to keep a file format reader around in
software. As you found with ImageMagick. Thank goodness for that at
least.
I actually own an 8-bit paper tape reader, 110 baud, chunky mechanical
thing with a big motor. The last time I used it to read tapes I cobbled
together a 20mA current loop to RS-232 converter and transferred a
bunch of
data to floppies.
If I wanted to use it today I'd like to have a 20mA current loop to
Bluetooth interface but I don't imagine they are too plentiful.
BTW, the last time I used that reader, I also had to write a DEC PDP-8e
emulator to run the code on them. Some of the tapes are in RIM format
and
some in BIN, all with code from the late 1960s and early 1970s. 'Twas a
gas
to see the old FOCAL prompt again.
On Fri, Feb 13, 2015 at 5:06 PM, Jostein Øksne <[email protected]>
wrote:
I think you should differentiate between media obsolence and file
format obsolence.
Jostein
Den 13. februar 2015 20:34:02 CET, skrev "P.J. Alling"
<[email protected]>:
Recent motherboards don't even have floppy controllers built onto
them
and no one makes a PCI anything floppy controller add in board, so 5
1/4
floppys are dead unless you happen to have an older machine, (I have
one
for running my film scanner), you can still buy 3 1/2 inch USB floppy
drives, but they're not 100 percent compatible with anything. In
fact
I
think it would be easier to find something to read the paper tape
than
an 8" floppy.
On 2/13/2015 2:25 PM, Bruce Walker wrote:
I saw a bit of a convo between two Facebook connections with this
with
one disbelieving that this could be a problem. "Someone, somewhere
can
read your old file formats", he stated confidently.
I'm tempted to show him some 1" paper tape and ask him if he knows
anyone who can still read that.
But even relatively modern formats are effectively dead these days.
How many of us could read an 8 inch MDS-80 floppy? A 5.25" CP/M or
MS-DOS floppy? Even finding a PC or Mac with a 3.5" 1.44M floppy on
it
is non-trivial lately. In a pinch I can read 3.5" floppies, but I'd
have to spend a couple of hours jury-rigging something together: an
old PC from the basement, running FreeBSD and networked.
My late 2014 iMac came with no CD/DVD reader/burner in it. I had to
buy a USB one.
The digital vellum idea is kinda like VMware, so I get it and it
makes
sense. But printing photos works for me too since I like to see
them
on my walls anyway.
On Fri, Feb 13, 2015 at 12:32 PM, Christine Aguila
<[email protected]> wrote:
Hi Team:
Just thought this might be of interest given a recent thread about
compatibility of DNG files on old software versions.
To my mind, more importantly, it makes the case for paper
:-)))—print your photos—and an even better idea is to make photo
books—which with Lightroom are really fun and relatively easy to
make.
I’ve recently purchased some archival clam shell photo boxes for
loose photos, and they’ve been working out well.
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-31450389
The solution suggested by internet guru, Vint Cerf, seems
interesting enough, but printing either a single photo or photo
books,
should still remain a viable option for showcasing and preserving all
your lovely photos—IMHO :-)!!!
Cheers, Christine
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