Ok techies, I've a data storage question?

[Guest120311-2]

Great stuff here! One more question,
Are pricier name brand disks and thumb drives necessarily better than XYZ brands as far as reliability and durability or are they basically the same?
Tess

[GneissGuy]

Originally Posted by Topshelf Tess

Great stuff here! One more question,
Are pricier name brand disks and thumb drives necessarily better than XYZ brands as far as reliability and durability or are they basically the same?
Tess

I would not depend on any thumb drive, pricey or not. They're OK as one of multiple copies you have as backup.

There's probably a little difference between cheap thumb drives and expensive ones, but neither one is really great.

If you want to put it on something like a thumb drive, I'd recommend SD memory, like you use in cameras. It's the same kind of memory internally, but the packaging is mechanically much simpler. I've had a number of thumb drives go bad on me from what I think is mechanical failures of the connectors or packaging.

[rrrabbit]

Pricier flash cards should offer faster write times, and not necessarily more reliable.

I would only spend the extra money, on say, flash memory for a SLR camera because I'm shooting sports and I need to be able to hold down the shutter button and go click, click, click click. We would not want the click, click to be slowed down because we can't write fast enuff to our cheapo flash card, now would we ?

[NipLover]

Tess, a final thought on the subject. Send your photos to me. I will look at them and store them in a special place in my brain for the rest of my life. At no charge, of course.

[austin_voy]

Okay guys, beat this one. I have a NAS at home and a second at my sister's place, with SFTP betwixt the two sites (I cover her data, she covers mine). I have my local NAS setup as, of course, network drives on a gig backbone. 2TB on each end. Linux firewalls and Snort. It's a reasonably secure setup.

Thumbdrives as probably good for about 10 years. BUT, writeable CDs and DVDs are only good for about the same amount of time. If you keep them spinning constantly, a hard drive will be good for about 20. Assuming that you don't have a touchdown.

If you are keeping stuff that you wouldn't like others who might use them to hurt you to see, there are a couple of devices of interest. One is a totally encrypted device that will permanently lock down after four or five consecutive failed attempts. The other is a neat little hub that you can plug up to four USB devices (thumbdrives, usually). There's a button with a cover (like those movies with the self-destruct button). Lift the cover, press the button and 120 volts jumps through the drives. I've used one. The drive makes a little "bumf" sound and starts smoking our of the small hole.

[Guest120311-2]

Originally Posted by NipLover

Tess, a final thought on the subject. Send your photos to me. I will look at them and store them in a special place in my brain for the rest of my life. At no charge, of course.

LOL, I'm sure the photos I'm wanting to preserve would bore you to death. Just family pic's of bygone years.

Originally Posted by austin_voy

Thumbdrives as probably good for about 10 years. BUT, writeable CDs and DVDs are only good for about the same amount of time. If you keep them spinning constantly, a hard drive will be good for about 20. Assuming that you don't have a touchdown.

If you are keeping stuff that you wouldn't like others who might use them to hurt you to see, there are a couple of devices of interest. One is a totally encrypted device that will permanently lock down after four or five consecutive failed attempts. The other is a neat little hub that you can plug up to four USB devices (thumbdrives, usually). There's a button with a cover (like those movies with the self-destruct button). Lift the cover, press the button and 120 volts jumps through the drives. I've used one. The drive makes a little "bumf" sound and starts smoking our of the small hole.

I use an Ironkey for sensitive items. The self destruct feature is priceless and well worth the extra cost of these baby's!
Thanks for all the suggestions!
Tess

[austin_voy]

I use an Ironkey for sensitive items. The self destruct feature is priceless and well worth the extra cost of these baby's!
Thanks for all the suggestions!
Tess[/QUOTE]

Ironkey is one of the best. For those who understand, the hardware is potted, so "they" can't even pull the chip.