If anyone finds any comparative data on the durability of CDs vs DVDs (for the home recordable ones) I suppose it might be of interest. Due to the much more sensitive "recording" layers required for the DVDs I'm a bit dubious that they'll be comparable to CDs for long term stability - as currently available; but real data would be helpful.

I've found some format problems with using DVDs for data backup - esp. because data recovery is extremely slow and clumsy, so I haven't used them much, even where "long-term data security" wouldn't be much of an issue. Suppliers seem to hope that users will assume they're the same, but the absence of actual "competent affirmative statements" on the issue keeps my suspicions nagging at me.

For now I've only got about 600(?) backup data CDs on the shelf, so it's not a big problem, but higher data-density might be helpful when I start re-archiving as I come up on the 10-year storage cyle that's recommended. I'll probably worry about it when the index files get too big for one CD.

John