I have been buying many pdfs and vids from various magic stores around the country. How do you guys store all your media safely and in an organized fashion? The devices today store so much information that the loss of one such device could be catastrophic. I have many wonderful books that are no longer in print I want to make sure I do not lose this information due to a glitch,theft,corrupt memory and other such things. Suggestions?
Also when you buy books on Google play is there a way to download them so the online portion is no longer needed to read them?

A lot of folks are now subscribing to third party cloud services which offer both remote backup capability and on-line access of electronic media from practically any device. You can also set up your own cloud for backup capabilities. More and more magic vendors are giving you unlimited access to electronic purchases so you do not have to download them. Others are selling stuff with digital rights which means you can only access them on line and not be able to download them.

Key thing to remember is that the storage means you utilize could become technically obsolete or some cloud services and magic vendors could go out of business.

All my important data is backed up in several places. I have a 64 gig memory stick on my keychain. When I finish doing something important, it goes onto the memory stick, which then goes to my other computer AND the university server, which I suppose is basically a cloud--but I have a couple of hundred gigs available there for free.

Of course, one might think twice about using work servers as a back up, depending on what kind of data you consider "important".

My magic stuff is also on my iPad.

1 Terabyte external hard drive, old school way, folders for music folders for books
Music organized by generes
Books organized by authors

I bought a few Penguin Magic Lectures with their 5 for $99 deal. I have them (along with other magic videos, PDFs, and misc) on my laptop (which auto backs up to an external 1TB drive), backed up on thumb drives, and also backed up on Google Drive.

After having a few laptops crash, I've learned importance of backing up...

Sorry no clue on how Google Books work....

[quote]On Aug 21, 2015, stoneunhinged wrote:


Of course, one might think twice about using work servers as a back up, depending on what kind of data you consider "important".

Your Ashley Madison account, for example.

I forgot to say that I also have everything backed up on external hard drives. Really *important* stuff I have backed up in five or six places.

Magnus: I had never heard of Ashley Madison, but having been educated by Google, I fear that your point was not made to be humorous. There's a lot of ugly stuff out there. Ashley Madison seems to be one of them.

Funny, but grim.

When working on my dissertation, I was in constant fear of loosing my work. I had my files backed up on laptop, external hard drive, google drive, two separate flash drives (one stored at home, another at office, as well as burning a few CD's. It got a bit out of hand when I started spending too much time backing stuff up, and then ran into revision issues..."Where the hell is that last chapter I typed?! I thought it was here....ARGHHH!"

Regarding CDs...

Back in 2008, I worked at a radio station. It had several CD libraries from TM Century. They had to be destroyed (by contract), as the stations (there were 4) went completely digital. These were Oldies, Groovin' Oldies (R&B), Classic Rock, Smooth Jazz and Country.

I could not let those go to waste, copyright be d**ned! I copied all 500+ CDs. They were for my personal use, anyway. Today, (2015), the CDs have corrupted! Songs from cut 12 or so to the end (23 to 25 cuts) WILL NOT PLAY! That darn things OXIDIZED! Do not count on CDs as permanent storage! Flash drives? They weren't around then.

Doug

My guess is that all digital storage is subject to de-magnetization of the storage media. But the larger immediate problem is the obsolescence of the hardware required to retrieve the bytes. That goes out of fashion more quickly than we tend to imagine at the time. There's a reason for those incessant L&L DVD sales of the month. They want to dump their inventory before DVD players go the way of 8-track tape players.

A month ago I got a 1990 computer, which was beautiful to type on. I was half way through a novel and switched to the new computer. Last week it crashed and reset to factory settings, and I lost more than a third of the novel (three weeks before it was due to the publisher). I consulted an expert who told me that even if it had not crashed there would have been no way of getting the novel off the computer because the hardware is obsolete.

Lesson learned. Storage and back-up are important.

Sorry to hear that, Tony!

One more thing I want to mention, related to what Tony said, and something that probably all of us who have been writing on computers for a few years have realized: even if you have backed up your files, there's a good chance that there's no way to open it with the current version of the de rigor software program of the year. That is, you may be stuck with files in incompatible formats.

For example, if you had word processing files done in the old ClarisWorks format years ago on an Apple machine, even if you now have access to those files, without the application to open that particular file format, you're screwed.

Ah, you say, but I saved that application and I can get it running. Perhaps--but if you need to send it to someone else, how does that person access the file? Now there are programs which can convert from one format to another, but it's hit or miss as to whether you can find one that converts from your source to your target format.

Which probably means we'll all eventually be forced to use a cloud-based system, where all our data is physically owned by MicroCrap or whatever company, and soon they'll start charging us for accessing our own data. Adobe is leading the way with this kind of business model--you now have to rent the use of their online version of Photoshop. How much backward compatibility they build into any current version is up to their whim.

I use a couple 2 TB USB portable hard drives. I convert everything to a digital backup and load them on each. One is kept in a fireproof safe under my bed and the other is in storage at another location. (I update them both regularly but keep one out of my house just in case).

NOTHING is perfect, but I find this works best for me.

This method is pretty permanent, well until disaster or something happens.

I agree with everyone that says nothing is perfect or fool-proof, but to store it in as many places as possible, is the best bet. Some places will let you re-download something in case of loss.

Must take an awful lot of paper if you're backing up a video file.

Back in late '90's I worked with a VP of a company that printed ever email and then filed it. Email use was restively new but growing like crazy. He had 8 file cabinets behind his desk filled with printed emails

Ha!

On Aug 23, 2015, ed rhodes wrote:
Must take an awful lot of paper if you're backing up a video file.


It might make one heck of a good flip book, though.

I wouldn't be so sure.... have you tried contacting a professional data recovery service like OnTrack?
You'd be surprised how much "old technology" those companies keep around for situations just like this.
The down side is it could cost big $$$.

Link: http://www.krollontrack.com/data-recovery/