Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+

01 Jan 17 - 07:07 PM (#3829896)
Subject: Obit: +RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Thompson

For those who, like me, ditched most of their CDs years ago and saved the tracks to a hard drive, a warning: two, count 'em, two hard drives of mine have suddenly and inexplicably died, with all they contained. I've tried Disc Utility without success: the part with the good stuff on it is greyed out and they seem to be deceased parrots.

---

01 Jan 17 - 08:16 PM (#3829906)
Subject: RE: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: GUEST,.gargoyle

Thank you for the Codswallop classification in the decade-and-half old thread ..."German phrase, translation, please?"
thread.cfm?threadid=10008&messages=24

That thread is a classic example of the Spew/Laf misinformation consortium of the Mud 90's.

You do not mention your device, nor OS.

Consider, a boot from a Linux to view and recover.

For old HD's (like stuff found in trash-bins) you can remove, apply external power, and access via a USB port on a lap-top...and Linux. Lots of information is available if you look for "forensic recovery". THINK Hilary.

TRY This for a start...

www.pcworld.com/article/2147063/linux-to-the-rescue-how-ubuntu-can-help-a-computer-in-distress.html

Sincerly,
Gargoyle

---

01 Jan 17 - 10:47 PM (#3829921)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Big Al Whittle

in a way, we are all on god's floppy disc and one day he will go on soundcloud and that will be the end of the universe.

---

02 Jan 17 - 06:55 AM (#3829954)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Stanron

For all things of value stored on computers we must remember backup. Music tracks can be backed up on CDs, DVDs, flash drives and USB Hard drives. All at pretty low cost. Not much use now perhaps but worth remembering for the future.

---

02 Jan 17 - 09:21 AM (#3829976)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Bonzo3legs

I have kept all my CDs, cassettes, 45s, LPs and 78s. I only copy pre- CD stuff to digital for car playing purposes. Mind you I must have 3-4000 live shows on hard discs!!!

---

02 Jan 17 - 09:31 AM (#3829979)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Thompson

Thanks, gargoyle guest. I'm plugging them into a MacBook by USB.

I think I still have all the stuff on other hdd, but it gave me a right turn, so it did. One was my main backup of seven years' research.

---

02 Jan 17 - 09:56 AM (#3829987)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Jim Carroll

Have Just lost a 3TB (and maybe a desktop PC) - lost a 2TB last year
Luckily, our collection is archived in several places so if anything is missing it can be retrieves (but it has to be reorganised)
The most effective way to protect your stuff is to share it (always our policy anyway).
Jim Carroll

---

02 Jan 17 - 10:04 AM (#3829990)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Bonzo3legs

Yes music sharing is one of the wonders of the digital age. I downloaded a wonderful Dutch FM recording of The Carpenters this morning - superb hiss free quality as well!

---

02 Jan 17 - 10:21 AM (#3829995)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: GUEST

I know it is old fashioned, but I still buy cds and , like Bonzo, I still have all of my tapes and albums. It seems to me to be the best way of keeping my music safe...am I wrong ?

---

02 Jan 17 - 10:27 AM (#3830001)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Bonzo3legs

You are absolutely right. One of our twitter friends who compulsively brags about having converted all her music to mp3 and must be seen to move with the digital times!!!

---

02 Jan 17 - 01:01 PM (#3830036)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Thompson

All media degenerate, from wax cylinder recordings and celluloid film on forward.

---

02 Jan 17 - 01:38 PM (#3830040)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Jim Carroll

I was once told by somebody who ran Britain's leading Folk Label who should know, that the most reliable medium to preserve recordings is reel-to-reel tape - the better the quality, the longer the life.
Print-through is the main problem, but even this in a minor one.
I have digitised several thousand tapes down the years - the oldest dating to the mid sixties - the onlr real problem has been with the oldest and cheapest, some of which have magnetised, but even this can be got round with a bit of effort.
I have to admit, despite modern technology, I still prefer to take a reel-to-reel - it's a Nagra - the Rolls Royce of recorders - and it's very comforting to actually see the wheels go round and be confident that you haven't wasted a day recording nothing
Nor are you likely to press the wrong button and wipe the lot in a second
Jim Carroll

---

02 Jan 17 - 01:45 PM (#3830043)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: GUEST

Yes, I have reel to reel tapes that are well over 60 yrs old and they still sound very fine.

---

02 Jan 17 - 03:37 PM (#3830060)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Bonzo3legs

I have a B & O 2000 and a Teac 3340!

---

02 Jan 17 - 03:52 PM (#3830064)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: robomatic

Number one: Ain't nothin' perfekt! Storage is a matter of what is to be stored, how long it is to be stored, and how it is to be stored. And don't forget: How ya gonna decode it, play it back, at the end of time?

While I believe that magnetic media have gotten a bad rap against digital storage, I have had some non-perfect experiences with reel to reel, specifically musical recordings purchased on the market in the 60s.
I believe that reel to reel tapes are not as bad as some folks have implied, but are NOT the permanent answer. Check out references to "Sticky Shed" phenomenon.
My family had a repository of reel-to-reels. Analog music.
I found some recordings of Gilbert & Sullivan were a bit degraded and were exhibiting sticky shed. I was able to play them for digital conversion by 'baking' the tapes first according to instructions I found on the web.
I found the DECCA label popular music to be in excellent shape.
Likewise with cassettes. Some pretty cheap makes of cassettes have both mechanical and tape quality issues. Others, like Maxell, and TDK brands, have held up well.
And CDs can degrade on the shelf because that's an awful thin layer of metal with millions of holes in it, and the metal can oxidize. I don't know for sure about DVDs but I suspect they have the same issues.
Sound has only been preservable for about a hundred years, Hi-fi sound only since the mid 50s. Digital hi-fi since the mid 80s.

Remember it's not only the reel to reel tapes you've gotta preserve, it's the reel to reel tape player!

---

03 Jan 17 - 11:50 AM (#3830169)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: EBarnacle

Back to the original post--Yesterday two of my Windows 7 machines suddenly went funky. One of them went blue screen. Immediately rebooted and ran chkdsk, then MalwareBytes and Glary. Found several pieces of malware that apparently came in via Google. Both machines fine now.

---

03 Jan 17 - 06:13 PM (#3830258)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: treewind

Reel to reel tape has a pretty good media lifetime if looked after well and you were lucky with your type of tape (and not everybody was!) but it won't last forever and the danger is that one day you won't be able to find a tape machine to play them on, and if you do the quality will degrade because it's analogue recording. Ralph Jordan had a huge collection of music on DAT and calculated that copying them all to another medium would wear out all the remaining working DAT machines in the world (they haven't been made for years now, and have limited playing hours lifetime) so we'd never hear all of it.

For ultimate long term storage, it has to be accepted that you'll be copying your data as media and machinery change. As it's digital it should be preserved accurately, but you can't bury it in a time capsule and expect it to work 1000 years later, or even 100 years.

As for routine music and other data on hard disks - backup up has never been easier. USB hard drives are fast, high capacity and ridiculously cheap and there's no excuse!

Offsite backups over the internet are easy too, though the storage is more expensive if you want a lot of it.

---

03 Jan 17 - 06:37 PM (#3830267)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: Big Al Whittle

that's true.
if Jesus's hard drive goes down.
perhaps the Buddha will have will have a variant of us from another collector.

---

03 Jan 17 - 06:56 PM (#3830272)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: robomatic

Remember:

Jesus saves!

---

05 Jan 17 - 07:04 PM (#3830651)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch

A couple of stories about how the "big shops" deal with it (or not)

http://www.laweekly.com/music/master-recordings-from-abbey-road-to-born-to-run-could-be-lost-forever-without-archivists-help-7575450

http://mentalfloss.com/uk/entertainment/27204/how-one-line-of-text-nearly-killed-toy-story-2

Remember to store at least one back up copy at another secure location to protect yourself from fire/flood/theft &c.

One can buy a +500gb micro-sd card for under U$60. One card holds a lifetime of scanned documents. My entire music collection, tax records, photos &c fits in a standard business envelope in the safety deposit box.

---

06 Jan 17 - 08:37 PM (#3830842)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: robomatic

Great articles, Phil d'C.

Don't know where you're finding a micro-sd card of 500Gb. Amazon has 'em up to 128 and Costco sells a 256 GB Thumb Drive for under $40. Just sayin'.

---

07 Jan 17 - 01:59 AM (#3830862)
Subject: RE: Tech: Obit+RIP+ my hard drives +RIP+
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch

Robo:

Hmmm, well I may be I victim of haste, Moore's Law and SanDisk marketing. They announced some months ago and I passed on the price back then. Googled again just before I wrote the above but going back and checking the top three links in detail now... looks a bit dodgey. Can't recommend.

The last 'big' ones I bought were SanDisk 200gb Ultra microSDXC UHS-I at the American Walmart chain, in-store, holiday sale around U$50 plus taxes. They're 'too big' for the camera, scanner &c but great for backups.

---