Do Digital Files Fade?
One of the advantages of digital imaging is the color in your photos can’t fade with time. But it turns out that files can still “fade.”
Many are starting to use Solid State Drives (SSDs) because of their speed. When an SSD drive is unplugged, the files actually degrade with time—sometimes in a month or less. If that happens, your data becomes corrupted and you will lose access to your files.
Don’t believe me? Geek out on this blog post from BackBlaze. SSD drives actually track wear-and-tear, and that wear can be a prediction of how long a drive can be left unplugged without file corruption. For a brand new drive, it can be as long as a year, but the more you use it, the shorter the time until corruption.
So, should you stop using SSD drives? No! SSD drives work great when used as intended. If you leave it attached to your computer so it is powered on regularly, then SSDs offer great speed advantages for actively-used files. But for backup they are not the right choice…that is what spinning Hard Disc Drives (HDDs) are for. HDDs aren’t perfect either, but they don’t need to be powered on to prevent data loss, and I’ve successfully pulled files off ten-year-old HHD drives.
If you are backing up to SSD drives, you should migrate those backups to HDD, and use the SSD for main storage, not backup. Remember it is up to you to keep all your precious photos safe. No one is going to do it for you.
If you are ready to finally get your backup under control, sign up for my "Don't Lose Your Photos" Workshop on Tuesday, July 25, where I'll walk you through the process I created to preserve the files of thousands of customers at West Coast Imaging, and which I use for my own personal files.