From: Dennis Moser (aldus@angrek.com)
Date: 10/20/03-04:54:27 AM Z
Greg has brought up an excellent resource (CoOL, the original online
conservation resource!) and I thank him for correcting his stance on
the cold storage. Remember that all of the degradation we have
mentioned is chemical in nature and all chemical reactions are slowed
down by lower temperatures, so yes, both dye degradation and
substrate oxidation will be slowed down by a lower temperature.
Jean-Paul Gandolofo (you're the first person I've heard about that
attended that SEPIA conference!) mentioned one of the other bugaboos:
recording speed. Yes, by all means, when you are burning for keeps,
use the SLOWEST possible speed that your software and hardware will
allow.
But a special thank-you goes to Grace Taylor for having Diversified
Systems Group's phone number for ordering those Mitsui gold disks!
Zip disks, SyQuest cartridges, floppy disks...a trend here? Actually
I have a drive for my (running!) pre-PowerPC Mac (a IIci) that will
read 5 1/4" disks...8-)...and you can guess why...
Dennis Moser
>First a correction to my previous message on this subject. I was
>probably wrong in my previous post to discount dark cold storage of
>CD-R media. Since CD-R technology uses dyes in addition to the
>metallic substrate, lower temperatures would probably reduce the rate
>of dye fade. That said, there is still the issue of the mirror
>material which would benefit from an atmosphere (or lack of one)
>capable of protecting it from damage.
>
>Yes Judy, hard drive prices have dropped substantially and have
>replaced optical media for some common uses. Unfortunately, magnetic
>storage is not all that stable either. Short of creating some sort of
>physical record such as a glass master (for optical disks) or printing
>out digital records in an optical form, say with a monochrome laser
>printer (which is very permanent - like a carbon print), I am not
>aware of any good long term digital storage medium.
>
>BTW, since you mentioned Zip disks - I threw away (can you believe it)
>3 Zip drives and an Iomega Jaz drive this weekend. Personally, based
>on experience I wouldn't trust my data to any of Iomega's "disk like"
>products.
>
>-greg
>
>
-- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "That so few now dare to be eccentric, marks the chief danger of the time" --John Stuart Mill (1806-73) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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