Posted by GregS on 01/11/42 11:45

In article <B%h1g.3066$UK5.34@trndny01>, "David McCall" <david.mccall@comcast.net> wrote:
>
>"Charles Tomaras" <tomaras@tomaras.com> wrote in message
>news:jrGdnRysEo1RCtjZ4p2dnA@comcast.com...
>>
>> "Richard Crowley" <rcrowley@xpr7t.net> wrote in message
>> news:124b35qj1a14h19@corp.supernews.com...
>>> "Steve Guidry" wrote ...
>>>> You guys are missing the point of any serious effort to
>>>> do archiving.
>>>>
>>>> The _REAL_ issue is not "how long does the media last ? "
>>>> Tather, it's "How long can I keep an obsolete format player running ?"
>>>
>>> I still claim there are people who keep players running
>>> for >90% of the tape formats ever made. Many services
>>> can be found online who dub "obsolete formats".
>>>
>>>> P. S. Anyone have an 8-track player I can transfer my old McGinnis
>>>> Flint and Badfinger tapes with ?
>>>
>>> Yes. And frequently available on eBay, also.
>>
>> I don't know but it seems to me that 0's and 1's are gonna stand the test
>> of time better than oxide. They can be copied without degradation and
>> oxide cannot.
>I believe oxide, or something like it is used to record data just as it is
>when recording analog. The oxide will get old and brittle, and flake off
>on digital media just as it will with analog media.

I have tried a bunch of old DD floppies and many of them no longer
are any good. Reformatting only shows up with many errors.
Many of these are old programs I no longer use but have kept
the disks.

greg



>One big difference, is that most analog media will still play even if
>the media is in poor shape. It will just get noisy. With digital media
>there is more tolerance to noise. That is to say your information stays
>in tact even if the media has started to fail, UP TO A POINT. Some
>things like DV video and CD audio have error correction which will
>attempt to reconstruct an approximation of your data, If it can't find
>enough information you get massive dropout. In some cases
>(computers for instance) you get total failure once the data is corrupted.
>
>David
>
>

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