Burned Discs Don’t Last Forever? Oh, Cmon!

2 Apr

I feel it is very important to talk about data archiving.  The process of archiving data is a hot topic because digital files are being created at staggering rates like no other time in history.  The trend will continue upward as barriers are broken down to various technologies.  

Remember when shooting three roles of film would cost you a pretty penny in film and development? Now anyone with a $100 digital camera can shoot gigabytes of photos in a single night.  How will these precious pieces of data be easily stored in formats that will not go obsolete overnight?  

Many have turned to burning data to blank compact discs.  Burners are now common options on personal computers and discs can be had very cheap.  However, that is where many people make their mistake.  Just because you burn your data to a disc doesn’t mean it will last forever for your grand kids to watch in the future.  There are two reasons behind this:

  • Technology progresses extremely fast and CD’s will become old technology and progress downward and ‘fade’.
  • Blank CD’s can break down over time and become unreadable
The blank CD’s you purchase have dye on the blank side of the disc, this is what your laser (burner) writes pits into.  This dye formula can break down over time. This is usually due to oxidation of the metallic layer or a debonding of the the adhesive holding the the disc together. This break down can be throttled by improper handling and storage of your discs. It is commonly known as ‘disc rot’. You pop that DVD into your computer to grab birthday photos from three years ago only to find an ‘unreadable’ error.  Your only copy of little Timmy’s full resolution photos are now gone forever.
I am not knocking this technology as I use it for short term storage of data (6 months – 1.5 years). Many feel those discs laying around their office will last forever and it just isn’t true.  There are some good practices you can do to ensure your files will be safely backed up for a long time:
  •  One back-up is not enough, I can’t stress it hard enough. If I had a very important document, I would back it up on a compact disc, on an external hard drive and also sync that hard drive with an off-site Internet server that is secure.  With that I would feel much more comfortable about not loosing that document
  • Do not purchase the cheapest bargain brand compact discs if you have important data.  You can judge what you define as ‘important’.  If you need to give a friend something real quick to transfer or show a video at a conference, a $1 DVD might be just fine.  If you have important information, buy quality compact discs.  The dye formulas to differ among the manufacturers.  The gold standard ‘caddillac’ of CDR technology is a company called ‘Taiyo Yuden’.  If you can find these, they are your best choice by far!  Here is a chart courtesy of CDMediaWorld.com
Brand Factory Quality Misc
Imation Taiyo Yuden Good  
Kodak Kodak Good  
Philips Gold Kodak Good  
TraxData Gold Kodak Good  
Philips Silver Taiyo Yuden Good  
Ricoh Premium Ricoh Good  
Sony Taiyo Yuden Good  
TDK TDK Good  
NoName Mitsubishi Mitsubishi Medium  
Ricoh Standard Ricoh Medium  
That’s Taiyo Yuden Medium  
Arita Ritek Bad  
Philips IQ Silver Ritek Bad Problems writing the “aged” CD-R’s
TraxData Silver Ritek Bad  
NoName Ritek Ritek Bad  
FujiFilm Ritek Bad Problems writing the “aged” CD-R’s
NoName Fornet Fornet Bad  
  • If you have data archived on compact disc’s, store them away from moisture, direct sunlight and keep them at normal room temperatures.  Prolonged exposure to any of these can lead to unreadable discs.
Anyone who is serious about archiving their digital data I urge to invest in an online back-up service.  I highly recommend Carbonite.  

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