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I'd like to see some solid data on this. I used to think that DVD+/-R and DVD+/-RW had a shelf life of <10 years (this was ~10 years ago) and I can't recall an
by codezero 10y ago
I'd like to see some solid data on this.
I used to think that DVD+/-R and DVD+/-RW had a shelf life of <10 years (this was ~10 years ago) and I can't recall anyone asserting they lasted longer.
After running a long term program where backups were written to DVD+RW discs, and seeing them last > 10 years, I was impressed.
Now I'm finding sources that say that the post-write self-life of optical media is on the order of 10s to 100s of years.
Anyhow, it just makes me wonder what the practical shelf-life is, and what the underlying media "does" over time :)
- tw04 10y agoIt breaks down like any material. The easiest way to sample this would be the REALLY cheap cd-r discs you could get in the late 90s. If you left one of those sitting on your dash, they would borderline melt in the sun... and for sure start peeling off the plastic if they sat on your dash for a couple hours. Same thing with newer media - if you keep it in a climate controlled environment the sky is the limit. If you abuse it, it's not going to see anywhere near the quoted life.
- digi_owl 10y agoIirc, RWs las longer than plain Rs. Something to do with there being a second layers between the stprage surface and the environment.
- Amezarak 10y agoOn the other hand, I've never gotten writable optical media to last longer than three years, despite storing them in a cool dark closet. Did you compare checksums on the data you wrote?
- codezero 10y agoOn the earliest data, nope! Very likely I had some or many flipped bits. I did have the backups on multiple discs and comparing the two they had the same data so I guess that's almost as good.