Anne,

I would definitely go with an external hard drive.  They are inexpensive, 
have a lot of memory, and are easy to use.  They may have the same problems 
as an internal hard drive, but the external hard drive is used much less and 
can last for a very long time.  Just handle it with care.  It may sound a 
bit foolish to say, but what are the chances that your internal hard drive 
and external hard drive die at the same time?  I would say their is a 
miniscule chance of that happening.

Thumb or flash drives carry much less memory and are easily misplaced 
because of their small size.  Since you have image files, and I assume many, 
I doubt you will be able to get your entire database onto one flash drive 
once you have completed your inventorying, photographing, and other data 
entry.

DVD's and CD-RW's and their burners are probably the cheapest and least 
reliable way to go.  And, as you pointed out, the cost can actually build up 
quite quickly when you have a lot of memory to back up.  Plus, DVD's and 
CD-RW's are easily scratched or broken.

That's my two cents.

Mike Dressler
Collections Assistant
Alabama Museum of Natural History


>From: Anne Lane <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: Museum discussion list <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: [MUSEUM-L] Digital Storage Media
>Date: Wed, 23 May 2007 13:56:57 -0400
>
>Good afternoon - We use Past Perfect as our collections database, and
>periodically I have been backing it up to CDs. If I include all the
>image files, I'm up to 4 discs per backup. This gets a little clumsy
>after a while, as well as costly. I am nervous using the cheap
>office-supply, 100-per-spindle CDs for our precious data, but we can't
>afford to chomp our way through spindle after spindle of the better
>quality CDs. Our office computers don't have DVD burners. Is there some
>reliable, large-dapacity storage medium that I could use for these
>backups, something I could take home with me, preferably something I
>could re-use rather than having to use it once and then discard it?
>Thanks,
>
>Anne T. Lane
>
>Anne T. Lane, Collections Manager
>The Charlotte Museum of History
>3500 Shamrock Drive
>Charlotte NC 28215
>704-568-1774, ext 110
>[log in to unmask]
>
>
>
>=========================================================
>Important Subscriber Information:
>
>The Museum-L FAQ file is located at 
>http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed 
>information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail 
>message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should 
>read "help" (without the quotes).
>
>If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to 
>[log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff 
>Museum-L" (without the quotes).

_________________________________________________________________
Catch suspicious messages before you open them—with Windows Live Hotmail. 
http://imagine-windowslive.com/hotmail/?locale=en-us&ocid=TXT_TAGHM_migration_HM_mini_protection_0507

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).