[clug] EXT4 Reliability

[Ian McLeod]

Ok so after all that, I believe this discussion is trending toward EXT3
being the preferred choice, only due to it being more mature and
supported than EXT4.  Other than that, because I have my wedding master
tapes sitting on a EXT4 USB HD now 1,200kms away, I have nothing to be
concerned about.  FAT would not be suitable due to the large sizes of
some files (say 15GB for a DV master file).  Sounds like I have nothing
to be concerned about either way.

I only chose EXT4 because I thought it had more reliability built in -
but it seems EXT4 is intended more for performance rather than
reliability improvements.

I should be happy either way, at least EXT4 is documented.  I mean we
can still read Commodore 64 tape files and Amiga 500 file systems so I
don't think I will have a problem as long as USB or IDE sticks around
for a while.

On another note, for personal information I intend to install TrueCrypt
on an Ubuntu and XP system - the only thing is that it seems if you lose
your password there is ZERO chance of recovering the days as it does its
job exceptionally well!  That could be more of an issue in the future -
how to read old encryption systems.

In some student stupor a decade ago I password protected a few backup
files, thankfully I found the passwords for many files somewhere but
damn that's a pain.