Archiveing

[playinhockey]

Does anyone have a suggestion to archive digital files? I would like a program that would allow me to archive on to DVD or CD.

[sdommin]

Not quite sure what you mean, but photo files are like any other kind of computer data file. Just burn them to a CD or DVD with regular burning software. I'm fairly paranoid, so I have every digital photo of mine in 3 different places: a DVD, a regular CD, and on a second hard drive that I bought just for archiving photos (the second HD also makes it easy to quickly grab an old photo for editing, viewing, etc.).

[newdamage1]

I personally love this http://www.maxtor.com/en/products/external/personal_storage_3000/personal_storage_3000le/index.htm I have the 120Gig model and if your machine supports USB2 than the data really moves onto this drive. But Maxtor also has this http://www.maxtor.com/en/products/external/onetouch/index.htm?b=3 which may be more suitable for what your thinking of doing.

Also keep in mind, if your machine is only USB1-1.1 then you are limited to 12MBPS but 2.0 is 480MBPS.

Sorry got off track on ya there, I think Arcsoft has a CD/DVD Archiving tool.
I'm not totally sure if this is what your looking for, but ACDsee has a pretty neat cataloging utility that makes the database searchable (and I think it will catalog across hundreds of disks, so you know what disk has what on it) but the down side is you have to write captions for every thing.

[TonyKInTexas]

Look at Archive Creator from Yarc+.

http://www.yarcplus.com/ArchiveCreator/Pages/AC-Main.html

I've used it for a year now (or so) and really like it.

playinhockey wrote:
Does anyone have a suggestion to archive digital files? I would like a program that would allow me to archive on to DVD or CD.

[jboyd]

I use Photoshop Album - for photo management and then at the end of every monthy I archive to CD. It leaves a thumbnail on my hard drive, and archives the full image to the CD. When I want to work with a photo that is archived, it tells me which CD it is on, pop that one in the drive, and work with it.

Jackie

[samdring]

Jackie
Snap! and to DVD also

[Canuck]

newdamage1 wrote:
I personally love this http://www.maxtor.com/en/products/external/personal_storage_3000/personal_storage_3000le/index.htm I have the 120Gig model and if your machine supports USB2 than the data really moves onto this drive. But Maxtor also has this http://www.maxtor.com/en/products/external/onetouch/index.htm?b=3 which may be more suitable for what your thinking of doing.

Also keep in mind, if your machine is only USB1-1.1 then you are limited to 12MBPS but 2.0 is 480MBPS.

Sorry got off track on ya there, I think Arcsoft has a CD/DVD Archiving tool.
I'm not totally sure if this is what your looking for, but ACDsee has a pretty neat cataloging utility that makes the database searchable (and I think it will catalog across hundreds of disks, so you know what disk has what on it) but the down side is you have to write captions for every thing.

Oh, ouch...Maxtor...kinda like Compaq...I've had numerous Maxtor drives go south. I use WD, IBM, and Seagate. I'm using 2x WD 120GB HDs in RAID in the one I do all pic manipulation, and a 60GB Seagate one in the one I'm on the 'net with. IMHO, Maxtor is poop!

[newdamage1]

Canuck wrote:
Oh, ouch...Maxtor...kinda like Compaq...I've had numerous Maxtor drives go south. I use WD, IBM, and Seagate. I'm using 2x WD 120GB HDs in RAID in the one I do all pic manipulation, and a 60GB Seagate one in the one I'm on the 'net with. IMHO, Maxtor is poop!



I'd have to agree with you on the Compaq, crapola for sure. I run a small network (36,000 users and 16,000 desktops and servers) of all the drives I have seen, maxtor is definitely one of the better drives. But if it was to rate them Id have to go: IBM, Maxtor,Seagate, then WD. Keep in mind this is for ATA drives, SCSI is a totally different story. anywho, YMMV of course =)

[J.A.F. Doorhof]

I don't use DVD or CD anymore.
After a few years CD's can become corrupted, I have one only 4 years old and it's now barely readable, some photo's take 2 minutes to read...... TDK.

At the moment I only use the one touch backup drives from Maxtor, the advantage is that there is NO compression but it only copies the newer files, so no need to wait until the at the moment 20GB's are copied :D.

I leave all the photo's on my primairy harddrive and everyweek a mirror is made on the external which is after that disconnected from the PC and power.

Greetings,
Frank

[John_T]

I do exactly the same thing Frank, and though my oldest CD is from 1987, I don't consider them a valid backup medium beyond temporary, and/or just a useful medium to transport larger data.

The Maxtor one button backup makes it easy to backup. On one hand I'm lazy, and on the other I hate it when an automatic backup kicks in right in the middle of when I'm doing something, which might be in the middle of the night. Just as a double security, I have a directory on a second drive I call Direct Backup, and from time to time I just copy my whole photo library there. This gives me three copies of everything, two complete and up to date, and one worst case safety net.

If I was really serious about security, I would buy a second Maxtor (USB2/Firewire) and alternate the two in a remote location, but that would be an overkill in my situation. It is good, however, to pull the USB connector after a backup to keep the Maxtor from sharing the fate of anything else that happens on the computer. Three or four years ago I got a virus that wiped out all the jpegs on my computer. Luckily I had an extra hard drive that still had all but the more recent pix on it. That was a lesson I won't forget. Doesn't pay to get too complacent...

[playinhockey]

Thanks everyone, Potoshop Album sonds like what I'm looking for.

[thomascanty]

J.A.F. Doorhof wrote:
I don't use DVD or CD anymore.
After a few years CD's can become corrupted, I have one only 4 years old and it's now barely readable, some photo's take 2 minutes to read...... TDK.

At the moment I only use the one touch backup drives from Maxtor

That's a hard drive isn't it? Those can fail too. My desktop PC's hard drive just died after only a year and a half. My previous PC had a tape drive backup. I've seen a few tapes go bad also. Nothing is bullet proof.

Personally, I use Archive Creator to copy my pictures to CD, then I make a second, backup copy of each CD. I'll copy them to another CD after a couple years.

I have had a few CD-RW discs go bad, but I've had pretty good luck so far with CD-R's. I have several that were recorded something like 6 or 7 years ago that are still readable with no problems. (Knock on wood)

[John_T]

You hit the right phrase Thomas, "nothing is bulletproof." Redundancy is the only reasonably safe method and upgrading to the next reliable medium when it's proved itself every few years.

When you shoot RAW and convert to 8 or 16 bit tiffs, you are pumping up the gigabytes very quickly, so CDs and DVDs become a PITA very quickly too, which only leaves HDs as a reasonable and cost effective medium. If you are careful which HD you buy and where it was made, you rarely get a bad one.

[samdring]

As I mentioned earlier I use DVD for archive but for originals (unphotoshopped) I use a different method.

My Apacer portable CD recorder sits on desk when I am not using it portably and takes CF card to upload through Apacer to hard drive. Whilst checking the beauty of my snaps and gazing in boundless wonder, I press record and have CD of all originals separate to archive.

My favourite trousers are held around my comely waist with a stout piece of string, a 34+ inch leather belt and my trusty bracers. I can verify that through this approach I have never unexpectedly mooned in public.