Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!ucsd!hub!lime!dz
From: dz@lime.ucsb.edu (Daniel James Zerkle)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: Floptical upside-down cake
Keywords: data fade
Message-ID: <2152@hub.UUCP>
Date: 1 Aug 89 15:18:23 GMT
References: <246300027@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu> <348@wet.UUCP> <2161@sjuvax.UUCP>
Sender: news@hub.UUCP
Reply-To: dz@lime.UUCP (Daniel James Zerkle)
Organization: University of California, Santa Barbara
Lines: 19

In article <2161@sjuvax.UUCP> dcarpent@sjuvax.UUCP (D. Carpenter) writes:
>Someone mentioned this alleged problem of "data fade" some while
>ago and no one ever responded.  Is there any reliable information
>as to whether or not this is a genuine problem.

Optical disks are considered one of the most reliable forms of
data storage.  They tend to hold data unless they are being
struck with a laser, so they are not affected by the electrical
fields that can degrade data on normal floppies or on normal
magnetic tape.  You can expect your flopticals to be good for
at least a decade, or maybe two.  Normal magnetic tape, on the
other hand, is only good for two or three years, then you may
or may not get data loss.  The new metal particle tape is really
amazing, though.  It doesn't lose data over time, and a $9 cartridge
the size of a cassette tape can hold 2 GBytes!
| Dan Zerkle home:(805) 968-4683 morning:961-2434 afternoon:687-0110  |
| dz@cornu.ucsb.edu dz%cornu@ucsbuxa.bitnet ...ucbvax!hub!cornu!dz    |
| Snailmail: 6681 Berkshire Terrace #5, Isla Vista, CA  93117         |
| Disclaimer: If it's wrong or stupid, pretend I didn't do it.        |