Help me create a backup on CD rom.

Nathan S

Nathan S

Joined
May 31, 2001
Messages
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I don't know whether the gadgets and gear forum would be more appropriate for this thread, but if it is, I'm sure Ken will move it at lightspeed. ;)

Anyway, this is my problem: I've been trying to create a document backup on CD rom. I've used Nero and I've also trying mastering the CD and then copying the files directly to it. In each case, I can successfully save the documents, but then the computer won't let me save anything else to the CD. This is frustrating. I need to back up new documents several times a day, and can't break out a fresh CD everytime I do this: aside from the cost, I'd be swimming in CDs within a week.

Isn't there anyway to use a CD rom as ongoing backup?

Thanks for your help. :)
 
Nathan S said:
I don't know whether the gadgets and gear forum would be more appropriate for this thread, but if it is, I'm sure Ken will move it at lightspeed. ;)

Anyway, this is my problem: I've been trying to create a document backup on CD rom. I've used Nero and I've also trying mastering the CD and then copying the files directly to it. In each case, I can successfully save the documents, but then the computer won't let me save anything else to the CD. This is frustrating. I need to back up new documents several times a day, and can't break out a fresh CD everytime I do this: aside from the cost, I'd be swimming in CDs within a week.

Isn't there anyway to use a CD rom as ongoing backup?

Thanks for your help. :)
Click to expand...

It could be that Nero is closing your CD session after every write. You should use a Rewritable CD, which would act like a hard drive / disk. If your computer is not too old you could invest in a USB device for small backups.
 
Actually what you're looking for (it seems) is the multisession option in Nero; create a multisession CD and then update it as/when needed. Works with CD-Rs. CD-RWs offer similar functionality through UDF but I never used it myself.

But as NV suggested, if you really need multiple backus per day you should be looking at alternative media types that allow more frequent rewrites with less hassle - USB "keys" (with flash memory) are a good choice for this purpose.
 
If you are backing up your files constantly you should use some other type of media besides CD's. USB Flash drives are great for this sort of thing. Depending on what type of files you are saving a 1 Gig USB Flash drive shoud be more than adequate.

Check these out. http://pny.com/products/flash/attache.asp
 
If its more than a Gig your absolute best option is a MO Disk. These are the best bet because its only possible to write and delete info at a specific temperature which is maintained by the drive. They look like large MD and have the same protective sleeve. They are a bit pricey to get going although ebay may have some. The media can go up to 1.3Gig last time I looked at them. Be warned though some of the older machines will only go to 230 or 600(ish) MB.

Here is a reasonable one for around $224.00

http://www.pcuniverse.com/product.asp?pid=495959&m_id=32


The Good:
The basic principles of MO technology are straightforward enough. First, the media surface is initially insensitive to magnetic forces. To enable polarization similar to that of a hard drive, the surface is heated precisely by laser. It loses its ferromagnetism when what is called the Curie point is reached. While it cools, the MO drive's write heads remagnetize the surface.

The Bad and Ugly:
But all this comes at a price - MO drives are much slower than CD/DVD drives or even fixed disks. For this reason, the technology has never made it to the end user market and is still referred to as a niche product.

Still the safest bet for files that need to be kept for a long time.
 
If he's writing to CD as it is now the USB flash drive would be his best bet and at a considerably lower cost than the MO drive. You can store and keep files on the USB drives for a long period of time. I should mention that PNY now offers a 2 Gig USB drive.
 
They have 4gb USB drives now. You have many options. Use a CD-RW. This way you can drag and drop files onto the cd. however it is considerably slower than a flash drive.

Another good option is getting a big compact flash card. They're hardy and go up to 8gb. I've even heard a cf card surviving a wash cycle and a dryer cycle.

What you can do is get the cf card and a cf card reader. They're small nowadays so it's quite portable. Plus you can buy loads of cards and use it in different equipment like digicams and pda's.
 
Thanks everybody for the advice. Up until now I have in fact been using USB drives. They work great, but I discovered how fragile they are: my son bumped one the other day, broke it, and now I apparently can't recover the data. I am using rewritable CDs, and have tried the multisession option in Nero, but that didn't help.

I guess I'm just gonna have to use multiple USB drives, so as to have a backup of my backup.

Thanks again.
 
I use a removable hard drive.

I image my main drive to the removable, pull the removable out and put it in the safe.

It's fast. There's no compression or partial or incremental backup stuff going on. It's just an exact image. And it doesn't just back up my data files but it backs up all my software with all of its updates and service packs and patchs, all my drivers all dlls that all seem to work pretty much correctly, all my settings, everything. It gets everything, every file on the disk, so I'm not going to, post-crash, discover that I have everything backed up except that one obscure little file that was burried six directories deep in some obscure corner of my disk but which contains... or rather contained... the license key necessary to make use of all the other files or some such thing. So, if my main drive dies, I can be back to where I was with all my software installed, serviced, patched, updated, etc., all my drivers and settings all working again in about three minutes.

Three minutes is about what it would take to install the removable disk and change the BIOS settings to boot off of the removable disk instead of the built-in disk.

Even if my whole computer blows up, I can install this removable disk into a new machine and take up pretty much were I left off.

When I do service packs and upgrades or install new software, I back up my entire drive onto the removable first. If something goes horribly wrong, I can be back where I started in twenty minutes.

And the cost of this little scheme is about $125 for the drive and the removable mounting kit.
 
I use the Creative software instead of Nero. Creative has an application called DirectCD that formats a CD-RW disk so it can be used just like a floppy drive or small hard drive. Files on a DirectCD disk can be edited, deleted, and saved directly without sessions. Perhaps Nero has a similar feature?

Externals hard drives are too expensive, IMO, but adding a new EIDE drive inside the computer can be done for $50-$60.

Good Luck,
Bob
 
I run windowz XP.

A couple of weeks ago, I had a strange case.

The Ethernet stopped working. I literally checked the forum the previous night before closing down, then rebooted the next morning and found no internet and no access to anything else on my Ethernet.

The link light on my router wasn't even on for the port the computer was plugged into. I tried a different router port and tried replacing the cable between the computer and the router, reseating all connectors, etc. I rebooted several times. It looked like the Ethernet port on my main PC had died. I suspected I'd need a new motherboard. But, I decided to try one more thing. I got out my backup hard drive, installed it, changed the BIOS settings to boot off of it, and booted. Lo and behold my Ethernet port worked again. So, I did a search for all files on the built-in drive modified since my last backup and copied those to the removable drive (in other words, I salvaged the work I'd done since my last backup), copied the removable drive to the built-in drive completely, and rebooted off the built-in drive. The Ethernet is working fine again.

All I can figure is that some driver or dll file or something somehow got corrupted and I was able to restore a working copy of it from my backup.
 
Bob W said:
I use the Creative software instead of Nero. Creative has an application called DirectCD that formats a CD-RW disk so it can be used just like a floppy drive or small hard drive. Files on a DirectCD disk can be edited, deleted, and saved directly without sessions. Perhaps Nero has a similar feature?
Click to expand...

Note that this is different recording style - multisession is basically ISO9660 (where quite some space goes to aste for each additional session) while CD-RWs use UDF which allows incremental changes (and ultimately total medium'blanking, "reformat").

Nathan: recovering data from a damaged USB key may be trivial exercize, depending on what was damaged (your local electronics geek / radio amateur could help you out with this or at the very least point you towards even bigger and more capable a geek :D ). Since USB keys have no moving parts (unlike recorder units for magneto-optical and optical media) and due to their size and principle of operation (they don't chemically degrade as CD-R/RW media do) they are IMHO still a better choice. Just get one that is sturdy and shiny enough so your kid won't trample it again :) There are plenty to choose from and you'll be hard-pressed to fill up even 1 GB with text documents (which is what you're archiving, right ?).

Externals hard drives are too expensive, IMO, but adding a new EIDE drive inside the computer can be done for $50-$60.
Click to expand...

On top of that they are also far more fragile than units with no moving parts - granted, hard drives have solid enclosure but what's preventing you from buying a solid USB key ? I'd strongly advise against external/removable HDs for backup purpose (in that case just use internal mirroring RAID field - "backups" are performed transparently and if one drive dies you have all your data stored on the other one).

Since this is a knife forum, why don't you get one of the pen-makers to create a nice *thick* damascus tubular enclosure for you ? How hard can it be for them anyway (given how awesome their pens look). You'll get pretty AND sturdy USB "key" this way.
 
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