Write Once Read Never

A couple of weeks ago I needed to reinstall a laptop. I had burned the system recovery discs to DVD+R so I thought this would be a quick job. Something strange had happened to the discs though.



It looks like they were stored in a toaster. It was impossible to boot and restore from these discs, so I had a tedious adventure in loading XP, then Vista and then hunting down drivers.

The Optical Storage Technology Association claims that a DVD+R should last 30-100 years. I'm sure I did something bad to the discs, like brief exposure to sunlight or garlic. I'm also very happy that the data was inconvenient to replace and not impossible.

Before Cucku my remote backup plan was to burn a disc and keep it at the office. If your disaster recovery plan is similar then maybe it's time to think again.

posted by Rob on Friday, September 05, 2008

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