[OT] Hardware question: storage of portable drive

As we all know, offsite storage of backups is an important component
of a secure backup strategy.

I have two portable drives, non-SSD type, with their own sealed
enclosures. Every week I do a full backup on one, take it to work,
and bring the other home, where I do the same full backup. But I'm
retiring now, so that's no longer an option. Uploading about 40 MB to
cloud storage, at the roughly 1 MB/s speed I get, would take almost
12 hours.

There's always safety deposit boxes, though they're not close by and
there's a cost. But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
not in the same day. :-)

Any likelihood that would cause problems? I know of course to let the
drive come to indoor temperature before using it.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...

"Stan Brown" wrote

| There's always safety deposit boxes, though they're not close by and
| there's a cost. But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
| just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
| climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
| subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
| not in the same day. :-)
|
| Any likelihood that would cause problems? I know of course to let the
| drive come to indoor temperature before using it.
|

Yes. It doesn't hurt to have yet another backup,
but if you really care then why are you skimping?

I pay about $70/year for a safe deposit box. I
keep disk images and data there, on DVDs, as well
as legal papers. It's not an expensive option. I also
keep recent data backups in my truck, which is
similar to your garage option. But those are DVDs
and they get swapped out regularly, so I don't have
to worry about damage from cold/heat/damp.

But it also depends on how important the data
is to you. Most people I know don't really care if their
computer goes down. The only "data" they have is
stored on gmail. Most people still don't use computers
to do their taxes, edit photos, write documents, etc.
The last time I had to fix someone's computer, she
was only worried about the pictures of her grandkids.
"Where are they?", I asked. "In my email." I knew
by that that she was talking about her gmail account.
She'd never even saved out copies of the photos to her
computer!

"Mayayana" on Sat, 9 Mar 2019 09:44:22 -0500
typed in alt.windows7.general the following:

But it also depends on how important the data
is to you. Most people I know don't really care if their
computer goes down. The only "data" they have is
stored on gmail. Most people still don't use computers
to do their taxes, edit photos, write documents, etc.
The last time I had to fix someone's computer, she
was only worried about the pictures of her grandkids.
"Where are they?", I asked. "In my email." I knew
by that that she was talking about her gmail account.
She'd never even saved out copies of the photos to her
computer!

And probably never thought to maybe, print the favorite ones.

"That CD looks great over the sofa." said nobody.

One of my concerns is that while I have ~15,000 books, the vast
majority of them are e-books of some sort.
So, nothing to sort through, nothing to look at, just all the
pictures, books and music on a computer drive, and the heirs can just
junk it all in one fell swoop, because the computer is obsolete and
running an antique version of Windows. Never mind if they might have
grabbed some of the books, photos and albums if they had been held
physically in their hands.



--
pyotr filipivich
Next month's Panel: Graft - Boon or blessing?

"pyotr filipivich" wrote

| One of my concerns is that while I have ~15,000 books, the vast
| majority of them are e-books of some sort.

I've been dealing with that lately. I don't like
to read things on a computer. But I have some
PDFs that I can't get otherwise. I just recently
bought a private publication that comes only as
PDF. It's a pain in the neck. There's no sitting back,
no spatial memory of page content, no flipping
backward and forward, no casually picking it up
off the shelf for a quick refresher read.
Printing, though, is way behind in terms of
technology. A printed page looks better than it
used to, but it's prohibitively expensive and time
consuming. I print almost nothing other than business
contracts and receipts. Even receipts I now usually
just send as PDFs. Then I print out a single copy for
my own records.

| So, nothing to sort through, nothing to look at, just all the
| pictures, books and music on a computer drive, and the heirs can just
| junk it all in one fell swoop, because the computer is obsolete and
| running an antique version of Windows. Never mind if they might have
| grabbed some of the books, photos and albums if they had been held
| physically in their hands.
|

And you'll want to at least convert them to
formats that are not commercial.

In article ,
says...

As we all know, offsite storage of backups is an important component
of a secure backup strategy.

I have two portable drives, non-SSD type, with their own sealed
enclosures. Every week I do a full backup on one, take it to work,
and bring the other home, where I do the same full backup. But I'm
retiring now, so that's no longer an option. Uploading about 40 MB to
cloud storage, at the roughly 1 MB/s speed I get, would take almost
12 hours.

There's always safety deposit boxes, though they're not close by and
there's a cost. But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
not in the same day. :-)

Any likelihood that would cause problems? I know of course to let the
drive come to indoor temperature before using it.

It should be fine provided you "pack" it properly. Maybe put it in some
sealed plastic bag along with a little rice to capture any misc.
moisture is about all I'd do. What I can tell you is I keep a stack of
hard disks in my basement which fluctuates from close to zero to livng
temp depenind on if rec rooms fire (in basment but diff. section also)
is going. I never have any problem taking a drive out, putting it on my
special drive cable, plug in the USB and the drive appears and seems
fine.

"Mayayana" on Sat, 9 Mar 2019 12:55:23 -0500
typed in alt.windows7.general the following:

| So, nothing to sort through, nothing to look at, just all the
| pictures, books and music on a computer drive, and the heirs can just
| junk it all in one fell swoop, because the computer is obsolete and
| running an antique version of Windows. Never mind if they might have
| grabbed some of the books, photos and albums if they had been held
| physically in their hands.
|

And you'll want to at least convert them to
formats that are not commercial.

One thing about hardcopy: The technology to access it hasn't
changed in a bazillion years.
--
pyotr filipivich
Next month's Panel: Graft - Boon or blessing?

"Mayayana" on Sat, 9 Mar 2019 12:55:23 -0500
typed in alt.windows7.general the following:
Printing, though, is way behind in terms of
technology. A printed page looks better than it
used to, but it's prohibitively expensive and time
consuming. I print almost nothing other than business
contracts and receipts. Even receipts I now usually
just send as PDFs. Then I print out a single copy for
my own records.

One of the "joys" of Modern Technology, is that I can download
text A (Say the King James Psalter), then "mark it up" using notes
from Text B ( the Kathisma/Stasis sections of the Orthodox church, or
the Monthly Reading of the Anglicans, or both,) and then printing the
whole megillah. OTOH, I've been binding my own books (using needle &
thread to stitch the signatures together) for a long time.
But I rarely make more than one copy. I fully understand why
books are expensive, and were formerly even more so.
--
pyotr filipivich
Next month's Panel: Graft - Boon or blessing?

"pyotr filipivich" wrote

| One of the "joys" of Modern Technology, is that I can download
| text A (Say the King James Psalter), then "mark it up" using notes
| from Text B ( the Kathisma/Stasis sections of the Orthodox church, or
| the Monthly Reading of the Anglicans, or both,) and then printing the
| whole megillah. OTOH, I've been binding my own books (using needle &
| thread to stitch the signatures together) for a long time.
| But I rarely make more than one copy. I fully understand why
| books are expensive, and were formerly even more so.

Sounds like a very satisfying hobby.

Stan Brown wrote:
As we all know, offsite storage of backups is an important component
of a secure backup strategy.

I have two portable drives, non-SSD type, with their own sealed
enclosures. Every week I do a full backup on one, take it to work,
and bring the other home, where I do the same full backup. But I'm
retiring now, so that's no longer an option. Uploading about 40 MB to
cloud storage, at the roughly 1 MB/s speed I get, would take almost
12 hours.

There's always safety deposit boxes, though they're not close by and
there's a cost. But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
not in the same day. :-)

Any likelihood that would cause problems? I know of course to let the
drive come to indoor temperature before using it.


The enclosure is not sealed.

Each drive has a breather hole.

As the temperature changes, the drive "breathes in and out".
A high humidity environment will eventually ruin the platters.

If you're going to do that, use an air tight enclosure,
and include desiccant packs inside the housing.

*******

The new Helium drives are available in 3.5" size. They
start at perhaps 4TB or so, and go up to 14TB. Those
are sealed, and the Helium is guaranteed to stay in
for 5 years. That's an example of a drive I would put
in the garage. Although, I would not know what to
expect at the 5 year mark. It's not a given that
all the Helium would leave at 4 years 364 days. The
drive might last longer than that, but until we have
statistics, we won't know.

The seals on the Helium drives are metal to metal,
with a deep adhesive seam between the metals. It is
the attempts to pass through the deep adhesive seal,
which gives the five year life. The device may have a
"welded lid" on top, but that could be the "second cover".
And I think *if* the lid is welded, it's welded as
mechanical protection.

I don't own any of these, but they are heading down to
the lower capacity end, so some day, a large percentage
of 3.5" drive offerings will be He based.

Some other interesting data points, are that the He
drive does not have extended specs. I was hoping to
see that the "air-breather" drive 10,000 foot limit
had been lifted to say, 40,000 feet. Yet, the companies
have not extended the specs like that. The specs for
Helium drives remain the same as for air breathing
drives. Which includes the low temp spec. You would
think a Helium drive, with absolutely dry gas inside,
would work well at below 0C temps (no condensation
inside). Only the controller board might have condensation.

*******

Find a storage space with better climate controls.

Paul

On Sun, 10 Mar 2019 01:12:45 -0500, Paul wrote:

Stan Brown wrote:
But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
not in the same day. :-)

The enclosure is not sealed.

Each drive has a breather hole.

As the temperature changes, the drive "breathes in and out".
A high humidity environment will eventually ruin the platters.

If you're going to do that, use an air tight enclosure,
and include desiccant packs inside the housing.

....

Find a storage space with better climate controls.

Thanks for the information, Paul. I'm glad I asked, because my house
isn't air conditioned either. The temperature variations are less,
about 68 - 90 °F, but it does get humid in the summer. So I guess
even the drive that's in the house needs to be packed better.

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...

pjp wrote:
In article ,
says...

As we all know, offsite storage of backups is an important component
of a secure backup strategy.

I have two portable drives, non-SSD type, with their own sealed
enclosures. Every week I do a full backup on one, take it to work,
and bring the other home, where I do the same full backup. But I'm
retiring now, so that's no longer an option. Uploading about 40 MB to
cloud storage, at the roughly 1 MB/s speed I get, would take almost
12 hours.

There's always safety deposit boxes, though they're not close by and
there's a cost. But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
not in the same day. :-)

Any likelihood that would cause problems? I know of course to let the
drive come to indoor temperature before using it.

It should be fine provided you "pack" it properly. Maybe put it in some
sealed plastic bag along with a little rice to capture any misc.
moisture is about all I'd do. What I can tell you is I keep a stack of
hard disks in my basement which fluctuates from close to zero to livng
temp depenind on if rec rooms fire (in basment but diff. section also)
is going. I never have any problem taking a drive out, putting it on my
special drive cable, plug in the USB and the drive appears and seems
fine.

Mine lives in a closed metal box in my shop. Just in case of a house
fire or stray electronic emissions. The shop is heated in winter
(about 65 degrees) and cooled in the summer (about 75 deg).

--
G Ross

Stan Brown wrote:
On Sun, 10 Mar 2019 01:12:45 -0500, Paul wrote:
Stan Brown wrote:
But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
not in the same day. :-)

The enclosure is not sealed.

Each drive has a breather hole.

As the temperature changes, the drive "breathes in and out".
A high humidity environment will eventually ruin the platters.

If you're going to do that, use an air tight enclosure,
and include desiccant packs inside the housing.

...

Find a storage space with better climate controls.

Thanks for the information, Paul. I'm glad I asked, because my house
isn't air conditioned either. The temperature variations are less,
about 68 - 90 °F, but it does get humid in the summer. So I guess
even the drive that's in the house needs to be packed better.


The breather hole uses a "labyrinth" design, to make the effective
filter path length longer, so it's harder for moisture to get in.

But I've had two disk failures during high humidity times in the
house, and zero disk failures when the HVAC is fully functional
(25% RH in winter, as I have no humidifier on the side of the
furnace, and about 40% RH when on AC in summer). Generally, the
disks are in danger, when the carpeting begins to stink (mildew) :-/

I've never been able to find first hand info on the humidity
question. Some IBM disk specs have a graph for humidity and
temperature, showing the "acceptance polygon" on the graph. A
set of conditions considered safe. But there's no accompanying
text, and no way to ensure I'm interpreting the graph properly.

There have been disk drives, that when the cover is removed,
the (air) filter packs inside the drive are absolutely filthy,
and it looks like the plating on the platter has failed. But I
haven't seen a picture like that for any newer drives. Just
the old ones used to do that. The filter packs were black, from
a coating of particulate. And the hard part to understand, is
how the disk could run so long, building up that dirty filter,
without head crashes happening. If the plating was coming off,
the disk should die before the filter pack gets dirty.

I don't have any really good references for this topic,
and I'm still looking for evidence from a reliable source.

Paul

"Mayayana" on Sat, 9 Mar 2019 18:22:50 -0500
typed in alt.windows7.general the following:
"pyotr filipivich" wrote

| One of the "joys" of Modern Technology, is that I can download
| text A (Say the King James Psalter), then "mark it up" using notes
| from Text B ( the Kathisma/Stasis sections of the Orthodox church, or
| the Monthly Reading of the Anglicans, or both,) and then printing the
| whole megillah. OTOH, I've been binding my own books (using needle &
| thread to stitch the signatures together) for a long time.
| But I rarely make more than one copy. I fully understand why
| books are expensive, and were formerly even more so.

Sounds like a very satisfying hobby.

Yep.

Back in tech school, I was working on a Project: make a rolex to
hold a set of parallels. Loads of fun. But as I told my instructor,
watching the machine cut a slot, again, if I was going to produce
these, I would be doing it very differently.
--
pyotr filipivich
Next month's Panel: Graft - Boon or blessing?

On 3/9/2019 3:12 PM, pjp wrote:
In article ,
says...

As we all know, offsite storage of backups is an important component
of a secure backup strategy.

I have two portable drives, non-SSD type, with their own sealed
enclosures. Every week I do a full backup on one, take it to work,
and bring the other home, where I do the same full backup. But I'm
retiring now, so that's no longer an option. Uploading about 40 MB to
cloud storage, at the roughly 1 MB/s speed I get, would take almost
12 hours.

If you're only backing up 40MB, put 10 copies on a thumb drive and
have a friend keep one for you. Maybe do it for three friends.
It's not likely that they all fail at the same time.
Reorganize your life into archival storage that never changes and
new or changing stuff. You only need to backup the archive once.
That should significantly reduce upload times.

12 hours is nothing. Take a nap.
I'd be far more worried about the place you put it still being
available far into the future.



There's always safety deposit boxes, though they're not close by and
there's a cost. But since I have a detached garage, I wondered about
just storing the "off site" drive in the garage. The garage isn't
climate controlled, so the drive would be out of the weather but
subject to temperature fluctuations from 0°F to the 90s -- probably
not in the same day. :-)

Any likelihood that would cause problems? I know of course to let the
drive come to indoor temperature before using it.

It should be fine provided you "pack" it properly. Maybe put it in some
sealed plastic bag along with a little rice to capture any misc.
moisture is about all I'd do. What I can tell you is I keep a stack of
hard disks in my basement which fluctuates from close to zero to livng
temp depenind on if rec rooms fire (in basment but diff. section also)
is going. I never have any problem taking a drive out, putting it on my
special drive cable, plug in the USB and the drive appears and seems
fine.

If you put all that in an insulated container, you limit the temperature
excursions to somewhere close to the average daily temperature.
The temperature in my crawl space is very close to 55F all year.

On Sun, 10 Mar 2019 13:48:45 -0700, Mike wrote:
If you're only backing up 40MB, put 10 copies on a thumb drive and
have a friend keep one for you.

Hmm -- rather than 10 copies on one drive, it might be better to do
one copy on each of 10 drives. :-)

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://BrownMath.com/
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
Shikata ga nai...