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My trusty old computer finally told me it's filled to the brim and that I need to delete... "stuff". But, I am at a standstill, not knowing which route to take.

Some of my photos and videos are up in the GB's and I don't have a DVD burner. Should I get an external hard drive? Should I add two more sticks of 256's to my motherboard (Did I even say that right?) since I have two slots open? Does that really matter? Do they have to be in pairs?

Do these CD's actually have a shelf life of 100 years like they really say? Or are they as good as the regular ones? How are they "better"?

What is the safest, long term way to back up your files? In my case, I have a five year old Gateway with almost all of the 75GB used up.

I feel like I'm stuck in the mid 90's with all this new technology.

Jules wrote:Some of my photos and videos are up in the GB's and I don't have a DVD burner. Should I get an external hard drive? Should I add two more sticks of 256's to my motherboard (Did I even say that right?) since I have two slots open? Does that really matter? Do they have to be in pairs?

An external hard drive would probably be the easiest and most cost efficient method of backing up your machine. You could also purchase some 32GB USB keys (which are more easily moved around than an external hd) to store data on, but those are relatively expensive at this time. You'd need roughly three of them to do the job.

Adding RAM (random access memory) to your computer won't help at all. What you're looking for is more hard drive space or at least something equivalent to it. An HD (or any media that allows permanent writing capability) is ROM (read-only memory). RAM allows data to be stored temporarily and then is forgotten about once the program has finished or the computer shuts down.

Do these CD's actually have a shelf life of 100 years like they really say? Or are they as good as the regular ones? How are they "better"?

Theoretically speaking, CDs and DVDs should be able to store information for about a century. However, no one really knows if that's true. Neither form of media have been around for 100 years and even if they had, it'd be somewhat difficult to find someone who could either prove or disprove that claim.

What is the safest, long term way to back up your files? In my case, I have a five year old Gateway with almost all of the 75GB used up.

I feel like I'm stuck in the mid 90's with all this new technology.

A five year-old PC might be an issue in the sense that it could only have USB 1.1 and not 2.0, which is currently the standard. USB 1.1 transferred files at a far slower rate than 2.0 does right now. USB 2.0 is backwards compatible with USB 1.1, but the speed cycles down to that of 1.1, so your problem remains the same -- you'll wait forever to move to files.

I'm bringing this up since nearly all peripherals connect to a PC through USB. Some camcorders may use Firewire, but that's hardly the norm.

There has already been some sign of degradation of optical discs, especially "burned discs, so they cannot be considered a final solution to archiving. "Pressed" discs probably have a longer life span. DVD burners can be had very cheaply. I recently got a LightScribe burner for just $25. An external harddrive, as DPX said is probably the easiest solution, but if your USB ports are 1.1, it will be painfully slow to move much data. You might be able to add a USB 2 PCI card, but a machine that old is not really something that makes much sense to be upgrading. Especially when you can get new PCs so cheaply these days.

A DVD burner, external harddrive or even a large USB thumb drive would also be useful for transferring data to a new machine, when you are ready to get one.

Then there's the option of buying a new computer since it runs veerrry slow.

I've had mixed luck with flash drives. One became worthless after finding out that wiggling it out of the computer made the insides loose which made all of my files on the drive magically disappear. So, I don't trust them very much because of that.

It will depend on whether I want a bunch of CD's with all my files or everything stored on an external HD. Tawm, didn't you have an external HD crash on you?

I want to make sure everything is secure and CD's seem like the best way.

Do not buy WESTERN DIGITAL for your external hard drive. I'd go with Maxtor. Just look at the thread on tawmis.com about my WD 500GB drive crashing. Even if you get an external - back stuff up to CDs or DVDs (I'd recommend a DVD burner, it will be worth it in the end). Make MULTIPLE copies, all the time. Back up to DVDs/CDs and Externals Frequently - keep all copies.

Trust me.

I speak from experience.

Tawm is absolutely correct. Redundancy is the only guaranty. Anything really important should have copies stored in different locations. If, heaven forbid, your house should burn down you would still have the copies stored elsewhere.

Jules wrote:I've had mixed luck with flash drives. One became worthless after finding out that wiggling it out of the computer made the insides loose which made all of my files on the drive magically disappear. So, I don't trust them very much because of that.

Did you click on "safely remove hardware" on the taskbar? If not, that may be a reason why this occurred.

Using the "safely remove hardware" function, you allow the USB key (or flash drive, whichever you prefer) to disconnect properly. If you merely yank it out, you could possibly lose or corrupt the data inside it.

DeadPoolX wrote:Did you click on "safely remove hardware" on the taskbar? If not, that may be a reason why this occurred.

Using the "safely remove hardware" function, you allow the USB key (or flash drive, whichever you prefer) to disconnect properly. If you merely yank it out, you could possibly lose or corrupt the data inside it.

Yes, I've done exactly that every time. It was an older 256MB Kingston for $25 that I had from college. Eventually, it would only work if I nudged it a certain way. But my 2GB Lexar works perfectly after two years now.

Tawmis wrote:Do not buy WESTERN DIGITAL for your external hard drive. I'd go with Maxtor. Just look at the thread on tawmis.com about my WD 500GB drive crashing. Even if you get an external - back stuff up to CDs or DVDs (I'd recommend a DVD burner, it will be worth it in the end). Make MULTIPLE copies, all the time. Back up to DVDs/CDs and Externals Frequently - keep all copies.

Trust me.

I speak from experience.

That's funny because I asked a few of my coworkers and the majority of the answers were Western Digital and Seagate. I will look in to Maxtor though.

Thanks for all of your advice, everyone. Much appreciated.

Now here's a silly question. How is it that a CD holds less information where a DVD holds a lot more even though they are the same physical "thing"...?

Jules wrote: That's funny because I asked a few of my coworkers and the majority of the answers were Western Digital and Seagate. I will look in to Maxtor though.

Thanks for all of your advice, everyone. Much appreciated.

Now here's a silly question. How is it that a CD holds less information where a DVD holds a lot more even though they are the same physical "thing"...?

That's a good question and I didn't know the answer. So I looked it up and here's what How Stuff Works had to say about DVDs (and compares them to CDs, as well).

Interesting... about the single/double layer part. I wonder if the double layer affects archival ability...

That may be too technical. *g*

Thanks for the link, DPX. It was very helpful.

I'm buying an external DVD burner. Since I've almost no clue what I'm looking at, which one is better? What's the difference?

Pioneer External USB 2.0 DVD / CD Writer (DVR-X122S)

Pioneer DVR-X122 18x DVD±RW DL USB 2.0 External Drive (Black)

You can save some money if you go with an internal drive. If you don't have room, you can swap out the existing drive. This one is a LightScribe drive and only costs $23.99. I prefer LG over Pioneer, anyway.

Jules, I'd say the first external optical drive you linked to sounds better overall.

As Collector stated, an internal optical drive would be less expensive and Lightscribe is a nice feature. The downside to Lightscribe is that in order to do it, you'll need specific discs. To put this into perspective, Maia has a Lightscribe-capable optical drive and she's never used it. It's not essential judging by how most people write and rewrite to discs. If you can get it for a good deal, then you might as well. Don't bother paying more for it, however.

DeadPoolX wrote:Jules, I'd say the first external optical drive you linked to sounds better overall.

What features does it have over the other one? The letters, numbers, plusses and minuses are over my head. X speed + or - for X thingie.

Llightscribe sounds nice but I don't need it. I'm choosing external only because I'd rather not mess around with the insides of my computer. Brain surgery isn't my forte. *g*