The best-laid plans... :-(

[pnstenquist at comcast.net]

Hi Luiz,
Have you had DVD discs fail? I have a lot of backups on DVD, and thus far none have failed. Some are six or seven years old. I don't do mirrored drives, but I backup all important photos on a second drive. So far, I haven't lost anything, but Charles' message is motivating me to get caught up on my DVD backups.
Paul
 -------------- Original message ----------------------
From: "Luiz Felipe" <luiz.felipe at techmit.com.br>
> ... ouch...
> 
> Charles, I understand your feelings. I'm up to re-scan a lot of stuff lost due 
> to media failure, and right now I don't trust dvdr media enough to depend just 
> on them. Guess I'll be using mirrored HDs eventually, but right now I can't 
> afford. Unfortunately some of the older stuff is not where it should be... and 
> many of the subjects aren't around anymore.
> 
> Luiz Felipe
> luiz.felipe at techmit.com.br
> http://www.techmit.com.br/luizfelipe/
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Thu, 1 Jan 2009 11:08:30 -0600, Charles Robinson <charlesr at visi.com> escreveu:
> 
> > I fumbled my backup routine.... and now it's too late.
> > 
> > Normally, each month of images is in a separate folder on my  
> > harddrive.   As space gets tight, I backup the folder to three  
> > different locations: A "disk image" out on an external harddrive, and  
> > two different DVD backups (one folder of discs at home, the other at  
> > work).
> > 
> > Earlier this year, I did some of this shuffling while at work (my  
> > first mistake) and I lost focus.  I created a blank disk image to put  
> > all of the images into... and then got distracted.  Seeing that I had  
> > the disk image out on the external harddrive, I burned DVD copies of  
> > that image and filed them.
> > 
> > I had, however, neglected a key step - putting any files into that  
> > disk image.
> > 
> > (Those of you with Macs know there are two ways to go about making a  
> > disk image - either an empty "CD/DVD Master" into which you can drop  
> > things, or "create disk image from folder".  For the life of me I  
> > don't know why I didn't do it the last way - disk image from folder -  
> > as that would have copied everything in there as part of the creation).
> > 
> > Well, fast-forward to yesterday when I'm poking through my Lightroom  
> > library.  Lightroom thought that my 2008_May images were still on the  
> > harddrive (they were not) so I went to tell LR that the images were  
> > now on this disk over here.... but that disk image was empty.   In a  
> > stunning triple oversight, the two DVD images were perfect duplicates  
> > of the empty disc image.
> > 
> > My Time Machine backups only go back to early November - which is long  
> > after I nuked the directory from my harddrive.  SO!  The only images I  
> > have from my daughter's wedding (and countless other events) are the  
> > ones I have put online.  I'm disappointed and angry and mad and have  
> > nowhere to direct that energy.
> > 
> > This is just a tale of caution.  Be consistent.  Check your backups.   
> > Make sure you really know what you have where.  (sigh).  I just had to  
> > tell someone who might understand just how disappointing this all is  
> > to me.
> > 
> >   -Charles
> > 
> > --
> > Charles Robinson - charlesr at visi.com
> > Minneapolis, MN
> > http://charles.robinsontwins.org
> > 
> > 
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