Media for Long Term Data Storage

Manuel Mejia Jr - 2002.02.18

On the last day of 1999, LEM published an article that described various storage media for computer data. In the two years since that article's publication, there have been some dramatic changes in computer technology. These changes mandate an update to that article.

800k floppy disks

The 800k (double-density) 3.5" floppy was the media of choice for the original Mac Plus, the early SE, and the Mac II computer system. Unfortunately, the last supplier of these disks in North America, Radio Shack, discontinued them as a regular store item in 2000. It is doubtful that they are being manufactured anywhere. Fortunately for early generation Mac users, these disk were made for a long time. Many suppliers of old Macs, like those on the Used Mac Dealer's List, still carry a supply of 800K floppies in inventory to go with their 800K floppy Macs. A first- or second-generation Mac user should keep at least a dozen 800K in storage for use for storing software backups and operating system software. If you can find more disk, that is even better. One can often find 800k floppies that were used to hold DOS/Windows software. These disks can be reformatted for use in Macs. It would also be advisable to get some sort of hard drive, be it external or internal, to store the Mac OS and key programs.

1.4 Meg Floppy Disks

High density disks are still in production and in regular use by computer users. They should remain available for another 7-10 years. As limited as they are in terms capacity, they are still the method of choice when it comes to being rugged and portable. They are inexpensive and over 90% of the planet's existing active computer population still uses them. Other means of data storage like Syquest, Zip, SuperDisk, and Jazz drives have appeared and disappeared while the lowly 3.5" HD floppy remains in use.

Zip, Jazz, SuperDisk, and Syquest

These drives store much more data than a HD floppy. Zip and SuperDisk cartridges could hold 96 megs of data, while Syquest developed drives and cartridges that could hold anywhere from 44 MB to 1.5 GB of data. For more information on Syquest, refer to SyQuest Drives: Fast, Cheap Removable Storage by Korin Hasegawa-John.

The reliability of these "removable hard drives" is their main weakness. LEM reader Clarisse Liete Motter of AIMUG noted how fragile the Syquest cartridges were. "I know, from personal experience that it is a waste of hard-to-come cash to pay for a few dozen for a [Syquest] drive, and a few dozen more bucks for cartridges, both of which are so easily knocked off their alignment. Worse yet, you do not EVEN FIND OUT about the problem prior to the malfunctioning cartridge making your drive unusable because the cartridge knocked off the drives Reading Laser alignment just by the act of being put in and not mounting. Even with the best of care, I have rendered 4 cartridges and 2 Syquest drives useless." In order to protect the cartridges from damage, Hasegawa-John noted that special Syquest-supplied cases had to be used. Given these problems, it is not a surprise that Syquest went under while the rugged 1.4 MB floppy survived.

If a Mac user chooses to use a removable, high capacity drive for storage, use an Iomega Zip drive. The drives and the cartridges seem to be more rugged than the Syquest counterpart. With the proper software driver, one can even use the Iomega drive with a Mac Plus.

CD-R and CD-RW

Although the CD burner has been around since the early 1990s, it has been only in recent years that burners became inexpensive enough for computer companies to make them standard equipment. Unlike the magnetic floppy disks, CDs are long lasting in terms of storing data without it degrading over time. They can practically be classified as archival. A pack of CDs are almost the same price as a box of HD floppies. In time, CD-RW will likely retire the HD floppy to history in the manner the 3.5" floppy retired the 5.25" floppy.

In terms of archiving files for very long periods of time (decades), the personal computer age has yet to produce a medium that can last that long. The methods of data storage keep changing. The magnetic media type of storage (5.25" floppies, 3.5" floppies, VCR tapes, etc.) degrade over time and data loss is inevitable. This may have been one consideration that went into the infamous 1998 Byte magazine article on archiving data. The author recommended printing out important documents and data on paper and binding them into books. Paper was considered the most cost effective medium for long term storage.

Companies with gigabytes and even terabytes worth of data go one step further and photograph their paper printouts and put the data onto microfiche film. Many libraries with newspaper and journal collections have their documents on microfiche. The closest the personal computer industry has come to developing such a durable medium is the CD.

The Future

Although this is speculation on my part, there is one other future medium that may even overtake the durable CD. This medium is a form of Solid State Recorder (SSR). SSRs store information directly to a silicon chip. NASA already uses SSRs on spacecraft, such as the Cassini/Saturn probe. You can also find crude versions of SSRs in use on telephone answering machines that do not use magnetic tape. A consumer computer version would be probably be the size of an 18mm by 70 mm "data rod." To get an idea of what such a rod looks like, review a rerun of "Star trek: Deep Space 9." The red/orange cylinders that are held by the crew are referred to as "Cardassian Data Rods." There look very handy in terms of storing data. It would be plausible to mimic one of these rods in real life. They are hypothetically durable and archival.

Those of you who are taking family photos using digital cameras or writing important documents should be prepared to store an archive version of these record in paper form, on CD, or perhaps even in data rods some day.