Linux Could Use A New Maintainer For Its CD-ROM Code

[doomie]

You're correct. Flash drives do indeed perform maintenance if powered, even with no data being written.

oh wow... what i get for not reading more deeply about that tech. i'll have to though, good to know.

[arQon]

I was thinking more along the lines of the firmware scrubbing the data.

You're correct. Flash drives do indeed perform maintenance if powered, even with no data being written.

[nils_]

Perhaps a pertinent topic, does anyone know what is currently accepted as the most long-term durable way to store data? I've heard conflicting things about optical and flash, and I'm sure specific tech and products make a difference...

I keep one local backup on my NAS, one remote backup on a server and I burn a new M-Disc of my /home every quarter, mostly to have access to things like SSH Keys, Backup Keys, GPG keys and so on. I also keep a printed version of all my private keys (QR Code), encrypted of course. One copy I store in a safety deposit box. That should allow me to decrypt the backups.

[s_j_newbury]

Power cycling won't help at all. It isn't DRAM, it has to be written to to be refreshed. And that requires an erase cycle first.

I was thinking more along the lines of the firmware scrubbing the data.

[Sonadow]

CDs can go and die.

Even some OEMs are shipping servers without an optical drive nowadays. USB flash disks simply read much faster than optical media.

[MadeUpName]

Thanks to every one that posted about my issue. You have given me some great stuff to look at and it makes sense that the Opera guys would have the same problem. The only proper way to listen to Operation Mindcrime is end to end so I am not worried about the individual songs. Again thanks to every one that has posted.

[ssokolow]

Audio CDs are notoriously difficult to read reliably. You'll need a specialized tool; as far as I know cdparanoia is still the best tool for the job. It's on the no-frills side, but I use it to read audio from opera CDs and have never had difficulty. It could be, though, that your DVD drive is just particularly misbehaved. Some drives do a really poor job. If cdparanoia doesn't work, you may need to try a different brand of drive.

You want whipper. It's a wrapper for cdparanoia which helps to get the tunings set right and verifies correct reading, like a less advanced but more open-source equivalent to Exact Audio Copy.

[Adarion]

I hope somebody capable will step up. I also don't use it as often as in the past, but I usually still buy music and movies on CD (Vinyl or tape even), DVD or BluRay. In the latter case I tend to make an mkv *cough* *cough* so one can watch things nicely on Linux. I am wary about any streaming services. You don't own anything there, it's (also) DRM infested, but much more than some DVDCSS. I don't like that.

Once in a while I need a boot media for certain things, FW updates, trying out something, or an install media. CD RW and DVD+RW are my friends.
Also backups on optical media is still of interest. Yes, with todays amount of data one needs high capacity media, but for several things DVD is still fine. I don't buy cheapo stuff, had good experiences with TaiyoYuden/Mitsubishi Verbatim media. Might try BluRay-M-Disc in the future.
Gotta keep an eye on storage, though.
Other things are hard disks and good (MLC/SLC) flash media. (sheer archival might still be okay with TLC). Though I also think simply powering up... I don't know it that really is enough or if we need some re-write once in a while.
Rotating backups are good, and have a "media disruption" occasionally (HDD -> flash or optical).
But no matter which media, we have to keep in mind: hardly any media lives forever and we need drives and interfaces to read the data later*, and the very soft data formats. Seen too much in my 30+ years in computers.

* Punch cards might still have survived, but can you read them these days? A M-Disc will still be fine in 150 years. But can you find a drive? You still have a working drive? But do you have an IDE/SATA interface? You still have? But can you read the very data formats?


Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn't have studied informatics, but I was worried about the amount of maths. Maybe I could have stepped up now. But in any case: The world needs more paid Linux (kernel) developers.

[baka0815]

onlyLinuxLuvUBack Thanks Form the link, I didn't knew the site. Only that the original site went down.

[yump]

Archive quality optical media should be fine long term. Random recordable CD/DVD probably not so much.

Flash retention is normally given as ~10 years, YMMV. Power cycling it every few years should help though.

The only "archival media" that's actually worth a damn is a server that wakes up once a week on a timer, scrubs its filesystems, and sends an email with the results of those scrubs to a human being who is responsible for upkeep. For real long-term stability, it takes a (memetically or biologically) reproducing team of humans who view maintaining the integrity of the data as a sacred duty.