Drop, charge, and lose the cords
Storage: Do burned CDs and DVDs have a shelf life?
- 2/13/09 2:55 PM
Yes , there is a shelf life
by Baer - 1/30/09 6:56 PM In reply to: Do burned CDs and DVDs have a shelf life? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
There is a shelf life. Unlike comercial CD or DVD disks which get their ones and zeors from pits in an aluminum disk, home burned ones use dye. The better blank disks use a stable phototropic dye (gets darker when exposed to light at a specific frequency) Some of the cheaper disks use cheapoer materials and therefore sometimes a less stable dye. Keep your disks out of direct light and they will last longer. They should last for a very long time but if you want long term storage back them up every few yerars and don't be cheap and buy off name brands if you are using them to store valuable data for a long time.
Shelf life? Life Span?
by cdadave - 2/13/09 7:24 PM In reply to: Yes , there is a shelf life by BaerI'm converting my record collection to CD's. I've read a lot of the postings here about what does and doesn't work; it seems as if the consensus here is, the better you treat your CD's, the longer they'll last. I'm keeping my CD's in either plastic-lined paper envelopes, or in jewel cases and as such, get no exposure to sunlight. Perhaps no media is capable of lasting forever, and it may be the case that the technology that was used to press records is the best of all, since the grooves are stamped into the vinyl forever and ever. I'm 54 now; all I'm asking is that my CD's last 20 or 30 years...since that's probably the time in which my own personal shelf-life will run out...
Shelf Life
by one_unfettered_mind - 2/14/09 12:22 PM In reply to: Shelf life? Life Span? by cdadaveI'm 61 and have 5 1/4, 3.5, CDs, VHS. and audio tapes that I can no longer find players for. Our products and programs get dumped by the makers. Try and find a machine to run your old games and such. They don't work! I makes me mad to think the companys don't care about their oldest users. Case in point. $500. GPS, 2 Years old and no longer supported. No updates, no new maps and the marine charts no longer work. To the CO's! If you drop us, then you lose us as customers. To bad as some things were great but now are trash. Just try and get a needle for your record player. I have 78's that are worth a lot but can't be played. The Music is no longer availably unless you know the right people. Well thats my point of view. Rob Cosby
Comment on GPS support
by slemenda - 2/14/09 3:58 PM In reply to: Shelf Life by one_unfettered_mindI was surprised to see your comment about your GPS's lack of support. I've got a Garmin, and I'm used to pretty decent support. I have a Street Pilot III that I purchased in 2002, and I've updated the mapping software several times, for a fee of course. They haven't had a firmware update for several years, but I was able to find a new speaker/power cable on Amazon in 2008 when my old one broke.
Amazon
by antiquefart - 2/14/09 4:50 PM In reply to: Comment on GPS support by slemendaSpeaking of Amazon and things breaking, you always need to be wary of buying anything directly *from* them that might ever break. Regardless of the manufacturer's warranty, Amazon ruthlessly enforces its own one-month warranty rule; beyond that you're entirely on your own in dealing with the manufacturer. I don't know how that would work if your purchase is really coming from a "partner" business where Amazon is just providing the listing and handling the payment, but I assume you'd be dealing with the actual seller.
What is the shelf life of CDs and DVDs?
by ltoribio - 1/30/09 7:04 PM In reply to: Do burned CDs and DVDs have a shelf life? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
CD's and DVD's are extremely durable but not totally indestructible. And with reasonable care, and protected from dirt, extreme heat, chemical exposure, or extreme laser light, they may reasonably be expected to outlast your lifetime.
Leo Toribio
NO ONE ever said "indestructible"
by Watzman - 2/13/09 6:52 PM In reply to: What is the shelf life of CDs and DVDs? by ltoribioNo one ever said that the media was indestructable, quite the contrary, we all agree that improper handling or storage can destroy ANY media in short order.
The question, rather, is how long quality and properly recorded media that is handled and stored perfectly (or, ok, just extremely well) will last. Our question, in other words, is really how stable is the dye layers on which the data is recorded. There is no argument that whatever that answer, improper handling and/or storage can destroy the best of recordings.
By the way, one other point: People keep using the term "Shelf Life", and that is simply not what this discussion is about. "Shelf life" is the time BETWEEN MANUFACTURING AND RECORDING, and that IS limited to about 5 years. But what everyone is discussing is how long the data will last after recording, which is "ARCHIVAL LIFE", not "SHELF LIFE"
CD / DVD lifespan
by hackinsat - 2/15/09 11:50 AM In reply to: What is the shelf life of CDs and DVDs? by ltoribioFrom my personal experience, they do fail.
I have literally dozens of CDs that no longer play.
I also have dozens of DVDR disks that are also unreadable.
The brand DOES make a difference, and unfortunately I can not recomend any name brands, this is due to name brands changing manufactures from batch to batch. I have had some brands that were great, and then the very next batch I buy are from a totally different factory, different dye formulation, stability unknown.
I have run several non scientific tests to determine if a disk is going to be reliable or not for my use. I make a test recording, and then expose the disk to direct sunlight, UV and infrared light sources and see how long it takes to fail. The record here for my non-scientific test is 72 hours exposure to a full spectrum sun lamp used on a coral reef aquarium. This was using very cheap non-branded media. What I have found is media rated for higher speed recording, tends to have a higher failure rate under my test setup.
This is probably due to the dye baing more sensitive in order to burn at a faster speed.
The almost silver CDR disks also have been more unreliable unde rmy tests, and the nice dark dye have held up better.
One thing I just found recently. I had been storing some older CD-R disks for a number of years, unrecorded. I finially needed a CDR to make an audio CD, and I burned one of these older disks, and it would not play back directly after burning. The media was very old 8x media, and my newer drive has 12x as it's slowest selectable speed, so this could have caused the failure.
Bottom line is I make 2 copies of everything, one copy goes into a dark closet, and the other to my library. I make backup copies every 5 years, as I have never had a failure within 5 years, but I have had many failures of 10 year old disks.
In the other hand I have video tapes going back to 1979 that still play pretty good. Signal to noise is down a little, but they play.
I warn my friends that are out buying camcorders to get a tape based model (DV or HDV) and transfer their tape to DVD or AVCHD disk. That way they still have the original tape that they can fall back on to make another copy when the DVD is either scratched or fails.
I know too many people that have HD based cameras that get dropped, or damaged, and they have lost total vacations, or other important material. At least with tape, even if the camera is totally trashed, you can buy another, and your tapes will play just fine.
Be aware also of burning software compatibility
by motorbobb - 2/15/09 12:40 PM In reply to: What is the shelf life of CDs and DVDs? by ltoribioTwo years ago, I bought a large external drive and decided to back-up / restore about 60 back-up CD's burned from 1999-2003. The CD's were burned using a couple operating systems - Millenium and first release XP Pro, a number of burners, and a several different burner software programs.
About half the CD's I tried to back up could not be read. I received a message saying something to the effect of "disk unreadable. CD damaged". I found it hard to believe that I had that many bad disks so I began experimenting.
I first tried a couple other computers and found some of the disks could were readable. This raised my suspicion that the problem was a combination of backwards hardware / software compatibility. After trying many suggested fixes with no success, as a last step I dug through my old installation disks and found the installation CD for the original internal CD burner.
I installed the very old burner software (circa 1998) and voila, all CD's were readable once again.
Just thought I would share my experience with members as another potential avenue of hope for those having trouble recovering data from seemingly destroyed disks.
readable cds
by JOHN A. JOHNSON - 2/15/09 12:49 PM In reply to: Be aware also of burning software compatibility by motorbobbWhat speed are you burning at. When I bought my Dell 8200, music cds burned at 16x would not play in my cd player. A Magnavox (mde ny Phillips. When I switched to 8x they played in my cd player but not in my car. When I dumped the included cd burner and installed a Plextor burner the sitiuation improved. I could now play an 8x inmy car. Just to be safe, I burn all music cds at 4x. When I create a master, I make it on Fuji and amke a backup on TDK.
CD/DVD Shelf Life
by Zouch - 1/30/09 7:12 PM In reply to: Do burned CDs and DVDs have a shelf life? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Hi Michael,
yes, your friend is correct, home burned CDs and DVDs do have a limited shelf life, though this can easily be tens of years, given a few precautions.
Why are they different to commercial CDs and DVDs? Commercially "stamped" CDs and DVDs have the data recorded by actually burning tiny pits in the substrate and, in general, these will last for a very long time - some manufacturers claim 100 years plus! You are more likely to lose these by breaking or scratching them than by losing the data on them.
Home burned optical disks don't do this, they record the data in the dye layer on the writable disk and the biggest danger to this is exposure to strong sunlight. A word about CD/RWs and DVD/RWs, these are MUCH LESS reliable than CD/Rs and DVD/Rs. They use a magneto/optical technique for recording and erasing the data and this has a much shorter shelf life. Think of it as the difference between writing on a sheet of paper in ink and storing it away (R) and writing in pencil, erasing, writing over, erasing again, etc., (RW) the write-erase-write cycle will wear the paper out very quickly.
So, assuming you are backing up to CD/R or DVD/R, what can you do to ensure maximum shelf life? First, buy a good quality media, it really does make a difference, the "bargain basket" type disks will fail much quicker. There have been many debates on which is the best dye colour for longer life. Personally, I can;t really say I've seen a difference, though I don't get as good results with the silver disks that are almost translucent. I tend to buy purple or gold colour disks but I'd have a hard time justifying that! I also have better results with the slightly thicker disks - they seem a bit more mechanically durable.
OK, so you've recorded the disk, what do you do now? DON'T write on the disk, even with one of the pens supposedly safe for the job and DON'T stick a label on the disk. Either buy the full face printable disks and put them in a suitable inkjet printer or use one of the special pens to write a code number in the transparent piece near the hub and print the actual data on the case label. I've not used the Lightscribe disks, where the burner can use its laser to burn on the label side of the disk, perhaps other members can comment.
For long term storage, put the disks in individual cases, preferably the ones with a black backing on the recoding surface side. Don't store them in the "jukebox" carriers. Keep the disks and cases in the dark, strong sunlight can affect the lifespan of the recording.
Of course, I'm assuming you are already careful with handling the disks, hold by the edge only, don't get finger marks on the recording surface and don't step on them and keep them disk free.
If what you are storing is really important, then you might want to make two copies and then check one of them and even burn a new one every few years or so.
litescribe
by maggiedev - 2/13/09 6:05 PM In reply to: CD/DVD Shelf Life by Zouchthis is exactly the same advice i would have given. i have lost media from using cheap disks and putting paper labels on it. i have now used litescribe for several years and would never own a computer without it. it is an awesome invention. i burn on cd/dvd-r litescribe media and then store my disks in a room with little light. i now have hundreds of disks full of photographs and so far they seem very safe on litescribe, in the cool, dark room in which i keep them. the litescribe disk were very pricey to start, but they have come down in price. they are worth the investment. i take hundreds of photos per month and have not lost one litescribe disk yet.
Never Ever use stick on disc lables
by hugo1230 - 2/14/09 5:12 PM In reply to: litescribe by maggiedevLite scrib best way if your going to bother to do a pretty dic. cover .
Speed on DVD players with an incorrectly aligned paper applique will eventually break down your DVD driver .
I myself use a good Sharpie specially made for writing on DVD's & CD's _ who see them anyway .
You hide them to prect them from the elements anyway so why bother .
Joe V
Sharpie pen
by pilotswest - 2/16/09 9:05 AM In reply to: Never Ever use stick on disc lables by hugo1230Hi, where did you find the special Sharpie pen? The ones I see in drug stores or Wal-mart stores do not say anything special on the package.
Thanks
Don
Sanford Sharpie CD \ DVD Markers
by Winchester257 - 2/16/09 7:36 PM In reply to: Sharpie pen by pilotswesthttp://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B0017TKW74/ref=dp_olp_new?ie=UTF8&condition=new
You can find them at one of those places or @ Office Depot.
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