I think that a bigger problem might be the quickly changing disk technology and having to maintain possibly obsolete hardware that could read the disks in the future if need be.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Michael D. Parker -----Original Message----- From: tech-boun...@lists.lopsa.org [mailto:tech-boun...@lists.lopsa.org] On Behalf Of Bill Bogstad Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2014 5:19 AM To: Edward Ned Harvey (lopser) Cc: tech@lists.lopsa.org Subject: Re: [lopsa-tech] Data on longevity of powered off disk drives? On Thu, Dec 4, 2014 at 1:06 PM, Edward Ned Harvey (lopser) <lop...@nedharvey.com> wrote: >> From: tech-boun...@lists.lopsa.org >> [mailto:tech-boun...@lists.lopsa.org] >> On Behalf Of Bill Bogstad >> >> Not sure if my previous (subject only) note made to the list or not, >> but the subject line pretty much says it all anyway. Although, it >> should not matter for answering my question, my motivation is to get >> some idea of the feasibility of treating disk drives the same >> way as tape cartridges. i.e. Leaving them on a shelf for extended >> periods of time and then expecting to retrieve data from them. >> While there have been public studies in recent years on the lifespan >> of powered disk drives, I can not find anything other then anecdotal >> comments about unpowered drives. > >[lots of good thoughts on redundant copies, everything decays, etc.] > > Unfortunately I don't have performance statistics for hard drive media... Which is what I think you're actually seeking... Yeah, that really is what I want. Without performance statistics, it is impossible to know if I would need to keep copies on one or ten unpowered disks. Should I copy the data to new "media" every year or every decade? I'm guessing that no one has tried to use disks this way so there isn't going to be any real world data out there. I suppose even idle speculation by someone who worked in the drive manufacturing or data recovery industry would be of interest. For example, I don't have the physic background to even intelligently guess if individual magnetic regions/domains on a drive platter will degrade their neighbors over time, but someone else might. Admittedly, this is only one part of whether an entire drive will remain readable; but it might put a useful ceiling on the maximum longevity of an unpowered drive. Bill Bogstad _______________________________________________ Tech mailing list Tech@lists.lopsa.org https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tech This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators http://lopsa.org/ _______________________________________________ Tech mailing list Tech@lists.lopsa.org https://lists.lopsa.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tech This list provided by the League of Professional System Administrators http://lopsa.org/
