The thought has just hit me.

Currently our office backs up the server data on DVD+RW discs daily (6 discs, one disc per day). Data is just under 1 gig but grows to another 200mb over the year. "Rationalizing" the data at the end of the year removes most of the added bulk so it should go down again to just under 1gig.

I was thinking if it was better to use USB drives or even SD cards to back up the same data? 6 usb drives or 6 SD cards of 4gig capacity. (Why 4 gig usb capacity? Nothing much, just to match the dvd capacity for data.)

Why the random brain fart? Well, usb drives and sd cards has gotten pretty cheap, as low at P380 for a 4gig SD card and price is still coming down. USB drives cost a bit more but not by much.

Why the trouble of switching DVDRW to solid state storage? ... well sometimes DVDRWs might write "successfully" but when you try reading data off it, nothing comes out so it needs to be tested once in a while which can be a bother if the person doing the back up is in a hurry at the end of the day. Also, DVD writer drives don't last forever so it can be a pain when the current drive needs replacing because the server has to be shut down, take out the old drive, pop in the new, turn on the server and hope everything works as before.

Using solid state memory devices would by-pass the need of optical media which also tends to wear out after a number of write cycles. And if the solid state memory devices are more stable, the number of actual back up "units" can be cut down from the current 6 to 2 or 3. The cost would only be about the same for a DVD writer and a dozen dvdrw discs...

What do you think?