[clug] Keeping Data Alive [SEC=UNOFFICIAL]

Davis, Ron Ron.Davis at dva.gov.au
Sun Feb 21 23:58:57 MST 2010


Jacinta Richardson wrote:

> (snip) I suspect LPs would be much easier to translate than CDs and
they again easier than BlueRay.

Indeed, for LPs hardware is not even required, see:
http://www.snopes.com/music/info/reader1.htm

Another angle on the same discussion... 
In 1998 an associate in the US was working on Y2K issues.
A client of his had kept some IBM (mainframe) 3330-11 disk packs in
their archives but not their associated drives.
(The 3330-11 packs are just a stack of (huge by modern standards)
aluminium platters coated in Ferrous Oxide, no electronics or anything.)
Apparently they had believed that there would always be "somebody" who
could read them if they ever needed to.
Well, there wasn't.  Not even IBM could help, it seems there was not a
working 3330-11 disk drive left in the world.

Does anybody remember NASA's missing moon tapes?  Wired mag wrote it up
a few years ago.
It's a good example of what can go wrong in data storage and retention.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.01/nasa.html

Cheers
Ron


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