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Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

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Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#81

Post by VorpalWay »

parineum wrote: post #77
VorpalWay wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could also use an OS that doesn't tend to have dodgy updates that brick your system, such as most Linux distro. Nor force you to update if you don't want to. Funny how a large company like Microsoft can't figure out QA, but volunteer Linux distros with much less resources can. (A lot of Windows specific software works in wine these days, Valve's investment into improving it for games have helped for applications…

> You could also use an OS that doesn't tend to have dodgy updates that brick your system, such as most Linux distro. I haven't done it recently but back when I was learning Linux, I definitely bricked my fair share of installations updating and installing things. It was probably fixable to a more experienced person but it wasn't to me. Linux is a lot of things but brick-proof for novice users isn't one of them.

It has gotten a lot better from what I can tell, though that is just based on what I see others struggle with (or not struggle with as may be the case).

I can't judge this directly (I'm in way too deep, running Arch etc), I first started using Linux seriously in 2004, stopped using Windows except for gaming by 2006, and touched it less and less over the years. I have not used Windows 11 at all.

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#82

Post by lxgr »

Fnoord wrote: post #74
lxgr wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure I understand, are you saying that you were using MiniDiscs or other MO media and were experiencing bit rot? Making ATRAC the exclusive and mandatory codec for MiniDisc Audio was another typical unfortunate Sony move but in my view doesn't discredit the strengths of the physical storage medium.

Honestly, I wasn't being specific. I like a specific music genre, and within this music genre some unique content was saved to DAT and Minidisc. The DATs were lost, and so the only available medium has been based on Minidisc.

So your data only survived in a lossy format, because MiniDisc, but it did survive, also because MiniDisc? The quintessential MiniDisc experience :)

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#83

Post by cwillu »

sva_ wrote: post #64
avadodin wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought two-three times. Maybe a dozen. I always treated all kinds of writeable CD/DVDs as if they were one-write and done. To be honest, it hurts every time I write to an SSD drive — which is all of the time these days.

I just checked using $ sudo smartctl -a /dev/nvme0n1 Percentage Used: 2% Data Units Read: 7,173,143 [3.67 TB] Data Units Written: 22,666,414 [11.6 TB] That's after about 2 years of use. I think SSDs can take quite the beating nowadays.

7 years of use :D

    Percentage Used:                    3%
    Data Units Read:                    77,182,320 [39.5 TB]
    Data Units Written:                 83,995,559 [43.0 TB]

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#84

Post by Sohcahtoa82 »

booi wrote: post #78
sva_ wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just checked using $ sudo smartctl -a /dev/nvme0n1 Percentage Used: 2% Data Units Read: 7,173,143 [3.67 TB] Data Units Written: 22,666,414 [11.6 TB] That's after about 2 years of use. I think SSDs can take quite the beating nowadays.

You write 3x more than you read? Seems like a strange access pattern. Maybe something is going haywire with logging?

Could be a log ingestion server or surveillance camera recorder.

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#85

Post by TacticalCoder »

sva_ wrote: post #64
avadodin wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought two-three times. Maybe a dozen. I always treated all kinds of writeable CD/DVDs as if they were one-write and done. To be honest, it hurts every time I write to an SSD drive — which is all of the time these days.

I just checked using $ sudo smartctl -a /dev/nvme0n1 Percentage Used: 2% Data Units Read: 7,173,143 [3.67 TB] Data Units Written: 22,666,414 [11.6 TB] That's after about 2 years of use. I think SSDs can take quite the beating nowadays.

The oldest NVMe SSD I have at home is a Samsung 950 Pro (the 256 GB version!) which I bought in late 2015 IIRC (and put on a ASUS Z170-A mobo, that already had a NVMe slot) and which has been in use that whole time (but mostly light desktop use):

    Percentage Used:                    27%
    Data Units Read:                    48,801,760 [24.9 TB]
    Data Units Written:                 84,590,914 [43.3 TB]
    Power Cycles:                       228
And after 11 years it's still going strong!

Now it's not on my main computer anymore: I'm rocking a WD-SN850X (recommended here on HN when it came out) but the old Samsung 950 Pro is on the desktop computer my wife uses daily (and she WFH).

> I think SSDs can take quite the beating nowadays

For regular use definitely. In my servers I've got ZFS in mirroring though: you never really know when a drive is going to RIP.

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#86

Post by sandos »

Fnoord wrote: post #62
avadodin wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought two-three times. Maybe a dozen. I always treated all kinds of writeable CD/DVDs as if they were one-write and done. To be honest, it hurts every time I write to an SSD drive — which is all of the time these days.

For archiving, DVD is 4 GB and who knows how long the medium will last. LTO-6 drives go for 300-500 EUR refurbished. You need a FC switch or HBA. Each tape holds 2+ TB uncompressed data. As for NVMe, if you do a lot of writes (e.g. DB's, Docker), go for enterprise. If you do that, grab one with PLP. You'd use it also as a cache for ZFS.

As overseeing backing up, from various optical media to disk, just don't use the optical stuff!

This was a huge international conglomerate, doing CD backups for decades. Now it turns out these precious backups only worked 96-98% of the time. Terrible stuff.

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#87

Post by wolvoleo »

Fnoord wrote: post #62
avadodin wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought two-three times. Maybe a dozen. I always treated all kinds of writeable CD/DVDs as if they were one-write and done. To be honest, it hurts every time I write to an SSD drive — which is all of the time these days.

For archiving, DVD is 4 GB and who knows how long the medium will last. LTO-6 drives go for 300-500 EUR refurbished. You need a FC switch or HBA. Each tape holds 2+ TB uncompressed data. As for NVMe, if you do a lot of writes (e.g. DB's, Docker), go for enterprise. If you do that, grab one with PLP. You'd use it also as a cache for ZFS.

Fibre channel HBAs really cost peanuts. Because there's tons on the second hand market and the only ones who want them are enterprises who don't buy second hand shit without a support contract (they usually dump them when the support is up, that's why there's so many working ones on the market)

So I get €300 cards for €20, it's a joke. Really great though because they're really amazing for tying storage together and they can do point to point just fine. No switch needed.

The one drawback is the convoluted software chain around it, I used to work with SANs but if you don't it might require a little investigation :) The client side is pretty easy, the target side is harder (this is the part that is normally covered by a SAN).

But the biggest problem with LTO drives and home use for me is the terrible noise they make. If 3D printers sound like robots having sex, this is more like robots getting tortured.

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#88

Post by wolvoleo »

sandos wrote: post #86
Fnoord wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For archiving, DVD is 4 GB and who knows how long the medium will last. LTO-6 drives go for 300-500 EUR refurbished. You need a FC switch or HBA. Each tape holds 2+ TB uncompressed data. As for NVMe, if you do a lot of writes (e.g. DB's, Docker), go for enterprise. If you do that, grab one with PLP. You'd use it also as a cache for ZFS.

As overseeing backing up, from various optical media to disk, just don't use the optical stuff! This was a huge international conglomerate, doing CD backups for decades. Now it turns out these precious backups only worked 96-98% of the time. Terrible stuff.

Actually 96-98% is not great but not terrible if you're employing some kind of parity scheme across multiple discs. It just means 1 in 20 (or 1 in 10 to be safe) extra discs in the mix.

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#89

Post by wolvoleo »

sva_ wrote: post #64
avadodin wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought two-three times. Maybe a dozen. I always treated all kinds of writeable CD/DVDs as if they were one-write and done. To be honest, it hurts every time I write to an SSD drive — which is all of the time these days.

I just checked using $ sudo smartctl -a /dev/nvme0n1 Percentage Used: 2% Data Units Read: 7,173,143 [3.67 TB] Data Units Written: 22,666,414 [11.6 TB] That's after about 2 years of use. I think SSDs can take quite the beating nowadays.

They can yes but they do need to be powered at least once a year or they'll lose data too.

Re: Tested: How Many Times Can a DVD±RW Be Rewritten? Methodology and Results

#90

Post by wolvoleo »

rkagerer wrote: post #39
avidiax wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One hint for the wary: Don't delay feature updates for the maximum allowed in the group policy editor. I couldn't figure out why I was getting forced reboots for updates despite other policies requiring it to ask permission. Turns out that if the update hits the group policy maximum, it forces an update immediately, other policies be damned. So set it to the max - 14 days if you want some time to apply updates at you…

If you don't want feature updates, go Windows 11 IoT Enterprise LTSC. It's a comparative breath of fresh air and what Windows should have been all along. No ads, no new unwanted bloat shoved down your throat, no mandatory TPM, and pretty much the longest security patch commitment of anything out of Microsoft. It works great as a daily driver.

Yeah it still has some annoyances though. Still telemetry crap, still forced updates (you can turn them off with a GP just like on regular but still, I didn't expect it on LTSC). It even tries to get you to sign in with a Microsoft account. It's an improvement but not as I expected.
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