Backup strategy - mini-DV or not?

[meles]

On a recent visit to my local Sony Centre, I was alarmed by the low number of mini-DV or HDV camcorders. It looks like Sony are heading down the HDD or DVD route, which worries me because my camcorders have always been mini-DV, and I've got about 50 tapes stored away as archives (with secondary backups on S-VHS stored on a different site in case of emergency). Is it time I started to rethink my backup strategy if I'm not going to have anything to play the mini-DV tapes on in a few years' time? I don't really trust DVDs to last, but is this mistrust perhaps unfounded? How is everybody else storing their stuff long-term now?

[senu]

I think tape will be around for a while if only because the Pro models still use it . However you are right they are fewer and tape has been marketed as old and obsolete to give the newer models a marketing boost
As such backup strategies may be called for.
Saying that, the Hi def HDD camcorders use a format which may itself be obsolete in the future or not
If they are backed up onto HDD ( which can crash fail) or DVDs (which are not robust in the long term ) then what?
I dont think there is any easy solution

[redsox_mark]

The trend is certainly going away from tape. But there is no need to panic. I expect we will see HDV models at least for a while. Then you'll be able to get cheap used tape camcorders on ebay...

I use my tapes as an archive; I also archive to multiple copies of DVDs.

[glesgaguyav]

Although I do not trust HDD camcorders, I store all my footage on removable hard drives as well as keeping the origional tapes.
The price of large hard drives is relativley low these days and as long as they are stored in the right conditions they should be fairly future proof.

[dejongj]

There is the possibility to go hybrid! What I do is use my old (Sony TRV-900E) camera to make computer backups. So the files from my DVDCamcorder (or from another source in AVCHD format for example) get backuped up in their original format to tape....

I use DV Backup on my Mac, but for PC there is dvstreamer and might be others. Then again hard disk space is so cheap now that in price it would be a comparable solution...

[meles]

Originally Posted by glesgaguyav

Although I do not trust HDD camcorders, I store all my footage on removable hard drives as well as keeping the origional tapes.
The price of large hard drives is relativley low these days and as long as they are stored in the right conditions they should be fairly future proof.

Yes, that's a good idea so long as you've also got the tapes and something to play them on. I do have a USB drive to store a selection of stuff I really can't afford to lose, but I was worried about the demise of the tape format in the future. If tape goes, you'd need copies on multiple hard drives, because if your terabyte hard drive crashes, that's all your video lost in one go. I think I'll hope that mini-DV has got a few years left, and the price of USB drives will fall low enough in that time to make multiple drives an option. They're still a bit expensive for that at present.