Deleted 12,000+ Digital Files

I'm not better than anybody. I just have an arrangement that allows me to grab one object if my house catches fire.

 

CD's are a great format indeed, they are very easy to import to my digital library

 

Hmmm this statement opens up all kinds of possibilities.

 

If you store it on a hard drive or burn a disk, then you can hold it in your hands. Think about it: if you download something, it's on your computer's hard drive. You can hold it. Think about it.

 

Thank you for walking me through that complex abstraction.


Nonetheless -- from page #5:

"My main point is that I do not trust the storage options for digital files. It may be neurotic, or whatever, but it doesn't give me a sense of security/stability. CDs provide a tangible sense of ownership.

I have had computers die on me, external HDs fail, and I don't find value in an off-site storage situation -- nor do I necessarily trust it.

I know where my physical sh#t is. And I know what its future holds, unless my house burns down. Call me whatever -- but this approach brings me the most comfort and joy with regard to my musical life."

 

So, it's nothing more than a feeling (pun intended). I guess you trust not dropping and scratching your vinyl, or your CDs developing uncorrectable errors (although rare, it can happen) or scratched beyond the capabilities of your error correction circuits in your CD player.

My point is that nothing is to be trusted. When you realize that, you can handle music stored on hard drives.

 

Yep. And I’m sure no one has been fined by the city for public nuisance/junkyards created by digital hoarding.

 

Hits me because I am in the process of converting my entire collection INTO digital. So far I'm up to about 10 TB and only about half way there (Hi-rez or FLAC for 95%), but at least I know what I have now instead of trying to dig through boxes. Just no other way for me to organize it. But hey, that's just me...

 

Yeah -- but you're talking about isolated incidents. Anomalies. I'm talking about potentially losing large volumes in one fell swoop.

I ain't gonna tempt fate.
(My Gypsy Wife has put a curse on my music collection, theoretically...)

 

Sorry for being off-topic, but I wonder whether we'll ever see an official release of all of the episodes (as originally broadcast). To my knowledge, there's no way to obtain a lossless copy at the moment? The sound quality of the version floating around is ok but not great.

 

That's why you make back-ups, something most people never, ever think about.

 

2 full automated back ups at home and 2 stored elsewhere in a secure building (1 of which gets brought home every few weeks for update while the other stays safely locked away).

I'm not losing my collection! (again! )

 

I've got about 100 DVD-R data discs of albums downloaded during that golden age of share-blogging from a few years ago, and I have the entire collection backed up on two separate drives. But I can appreciate digital file fatigue, it takes discipline to keep organized and properly tagged, and given the nature of the format, there are times when I don't feel a strong connection to that collection. Ideally, I'd I own each of those albums on CD or vinyl, but more than a few things - obscure, bedroom-recorded Industrial cassettes from the 80's will never get a legitimate release, so this remains the only format...

 

I'll never understand how or why people keep trusting just one device to store everything. Mechanical failure can and does happen. Fires and floods happen. Theft and little opsie accidents happen. Things become permanently "misplaced" or come up permanently missing. I don't care how careful or secure people think they are, things happen. I've lost recordings, gave them away, or mistakenly/foolishly sold them off. Good thing I found the backups I wasn't lazy enough to make.

I once had a CD copy of "U Like Pina Colada" by Da Real One back in 1998. When I was able to make CD-Rs soon after, I put it on a CD-R comp. I sold that CD when I got hard up for extra cash at one point, or wanted to cull the herd. The comp got misplaced. But, the time came fairly recently where I needed that song. For years I looked for it online, in stores, everywhere, and could not find it. Looked for it on CD, tape, and vinyl. Turns out there is some legal issue with the song, and it was originally issued on some small label, and that's why it's so hard to find. It got to the point where people I asked didn't even know what the song was. I wound up grabbing a bad-sounding copy of it off YouTube, low-bit and mono. Terrible.

So, one day, while trying to clean up the CD mess in my home, I finally found the CD-R comp I had made more than a decade ago. I ripped it with EAC, and got a perfect rip of the stereo mix, and it sounds good. My point to this story: back it up! You just never know when you might need it! You better believe I now have five backups of that song!

 

I like both: something I can hold in my hands AND having it all BACKED UP on hard drives. It took me too many years obtaining great music, tracking down the best possible sounding versions of said music.... Having backup is essential in my opinion, and more than one backup. But that's just me. If you can live with it, then good for you.

 

I like the idea of owning hard copies of everything - can't you just burn the digital into CD's? or even better BDR?

 

CD-R and DVD-R degrade much easier than any magnetic support. Just sayin'...

 

I listen to vinyl or on my NUC - I was just suggesting to the OP

 

That is a problem.

 

Serious question: would the OP have done this if he/she couldn't post about it at SHF immediately afterwards?

 

Contradiction at it's finest....

My iPod/iPhone works great in the car, at home or on a walk, and I don't lose sleep over my 2 harddrives, 3 if you count my laptop & iTunes. I'll pull out my Beatles record collection for sh!ts & Giggles, but rarely do! Myself, I don't miss the physical touch or dust collectors.

And thankfully, I don't have to rent music in my car......

 

Whenever I have an existential crisis in regards to digital files, I just caress my flash drive and it all goes away.

 

Once I started purchasing and relying on hi res capable portable digital audio players, moving to purely digital media as a preferred source became my modus operandi. For the most part now I either rip my CDs (or blu rays, etc.) or download from HDTracks etc.

 

That's why I ditched CD-R and went to storing on hard drives. Hard drives really are more robust. All you have to do is either keep them powered up or plug them in every few months. hard drives also save living space. Yeah, I know some of you live in multi-room mansions.

My friend had a Maxtor external drive that he forgot was there for seven years (he's not computer savvy). When I discovered it under the desk against the wall, we were shocked that it was still running perfectly.

 

It's funny, I'm in the process of unloading all my CDs and LPs, though I'll probably hold onto my HD full of ripped CDs even though I never use it. I have subscriptions to Apple Music and Spotify and frankly can't understand why CDs still exist.