Back it up or pay!!!!!

[dawboxpro]

Just a retread on another thread. Back up your stuff!!! As Arnold says in an austrian accent "Dooo it knoww!)

(From another post)


I leave my os with only the programs since they can be replaced if a drive fails. Tracks and takes as well as cool samples you make up can't be restored when a drive tanks so leep that in mind when making your raid choice. Also, back up anyways. I have lost more good music from just plain using drives to store stuff. One drop of a backup drive or a small glitch could cause corruption so get a DVDRW and back up at least the bulk of a tune after the session is over.....

Your drives under the stress of digital audio only last a few years and after about two years of hardcore use day in and out they could simply tank. On the other hand I have had drives last for 4-6 years...

You can trust raid, but just like a pretty woman. You can never really trust it unless it is backed up to disk as well.

PS. Also make one more copy of your DVDRW or CDRW backup if you can. One scratch on one of those discs and your done!!! Put them in a box and tape them up!!!! I have lost many a good master from one scratch on the disc and bingo the backup will not load....

Also smart to make a tracking backup...The tracks as wave or aiff files one by one so if the bundle or condensed session corrupts you at least have raw tracks to work with...

Do not want to freak anyone out or make you think I have all kinds of issues. I have just modified and rebuilt my existing machine so many times that every time I do it it takes these things to keep it all working when you are reloading masters ect. ....I do it of course to know what works well and what does not...

If you do these things and keep it simple before hand you avoid the nightmare....

At the time your recording a song you may think it is not that great or not your best, but trust me after you go back to it 4 years later with an idea to make it that hit song you will want to be able to pull up every little detail!!!

Happy Raids!!!

Computers/Audio for Music
__________________
www.dawbox.com

[Joe Hannigan]

Amen, brother Dawbox! <G> Well spoken.

I am also a member of the "Church of Backing Up." (Lose a full day's work (or more) on a project, and you too will join our ranks immediately. :-)

We've got a three point plan in place now for everything we do:

1. The client gets two copies of any finished master, in addition to dupes, etc.

2. We keep all revisions of the project in process, and have the "Final" version on hand for extra dupes, copies etc., for the client. Average shelf-use time is about 1 yr from completion of the project.

3. We put everything else AWAY into a climate controlled storage facility that we rent offsite. Master CDs, DVD-Roms, any raw tapes (DATs, MDMs, etc.) and lately (if the project is large enough) entire HDs as well. If the project warrants it, we'll budget the cost of an external HD into the cost, and simply disconnect the drive and put it away in storage for "Someday".

They say that the only real way to know that data really exists is that it exists in THREE places. Hehehhe.... This is truer than most people want to believe.

It may seem over the top to some, but we have enough repeat clients that make it worthwhile for us. (not to mention getting rid of the clutter around here.) If you click on our website (westonsound.com) and follow the links to Studio/Our Facility/Archives, you can read more about it, and see some pics.

Trust Dawbox on this: back it up, or pay the price.

[NeilNense]

true that i lost a harddrive in 1998, and have been backing up ever since. i lost a 3 minute music video that took me a week to make. i wasnt gonna go though tha again.

even if your lazy dont they make plug and play "file servers" nowadays ?

[mding]

you can buff those scratches out

get a product called Novus scratch remover, available at Home Depot
its very similar to turtlewax car polish (smells like it too), which is essentially a very fine abbrasive. The Novus stuff comes in a pack with 3 bottles, 1 heavy, 1 fine, and 1 shine. Start with the heavy and finish with the fine. You can skip the shine.

[dawboxpro]

wrong you can't buff out a scratch on a cdr or cdrw when the chemical is so thin on the cd itself that it has actualy chipped away over time or gotten a finger print that has burned through it. The key is good media..... God I wish I could have just buffed out scratches but on some of the discs it is more like a chip, or a flake....

For light scratches that is a good idea though. I will try that out on a couple with minimal damage...

Thanks for the tip, it is a good one... Too bad I can't buff my platter on my bad hard drive. I will wait till the girlfriend gets home for that. (LOL):D

[mding]

i guess I was just assuming the scratched were in the plastic layer only

[Joe Hannigan]

Yes, just to be clear.....the actual DATA is on the "Top" area of the disc...just under the label. (That's why you have to be careful with paper labels, when putting them on the top side...it's easy to warp or scratch the actual DATA underneath.)

If you want to see it action, try this: Take a ruined or useless CD and GENTLY scratch the top of the CD with a razor blade (the side where the layer goes...) You'll find an incredibly thin foil layer....THIS is where the data gets written. When the foil comes off, you'll actually be able to see THROUGH the disc, because there's nothing else there.

Most people worry about the clear plastic underside of a CD, which is always a good idea, BUT.....

The laser actually looks THROUGH the lower, "Clear" layer, and reads/writes the info underneath/onto the foil.

Scratches on the underside don't necessarly hurt the data as much as they blur the image.....thus the error.

Buffing out the scratches often restores playability, because the laser can now read THROUGH the mess to get at the data under the foil.

But of course, if there's pits, dings, rips or tears in the FOIL ITSELF, yer screwed anyway..... You can easily see this with a CDr by just holding it up to a strong light. If you see any tine points of light, you've got errors.

Just so we're clear... ;-)

[dawboxpro]

So when the foil is chipped like some of the cd's are from using el-cheapo cd's your sol. All the more reason to follow the steps of backup discussed above in my original post.

I will take the cd restoration ideas to heart and give a few a shot. But I know that the ones that are finished are from the foil being gone or just plain cheap media that has actualy spoiled over time. After switching a few years ago to top notch media and allways protecting each side of it I have never had a problem.

That is why you should make multiple copies of a master because you never know how a scratch, chip or just plain malfunction of the cd-r/cd-rom will happen. you can spill pop on it, mess it up with a salty finger print, ect ect.

most of the cd's that ever went bad on me are from just plain moving them around and keeping them on a spool or spindle and they have rubbed each other picking up a collective hack here and there...Over all cheap media is to blame with a weak thin layer of foil and cheap chemicals that smear worse than robert smiths maskera.

I still have the original takes and the tracks un-edited, after listening to some of them 6 years later it makes me want to record them all over anyways go figure (LOL)

You put alot of work into something though and even if it is not platinum it still becomes part of you. I once read something about Tom Petty hating stuff he recorded because he just wanted to change it every time.

Thank god I did this to myself and not my own clients recordings!

I had upgraded my system to AMD64 with an Asus board a few weeks ago and my son knocked my drive cage holding 200G of music onto the floor. Bounce.....bounce went the hard drives in slow motion as I screamed like a girl getting scorpions poured over her in Fear Factor.

An hour later the data all came up with some tweaking.. That example right there promted this article about covering your butt. You think to yourself that would never happen, but it does and the data can go poof...


So treat your backups and your backups of backups like an atomic bomb. Remember it is digital data and one stupid move can be nuclear war on your data.

You say it will never happen to you. Ignore this post and give it time and you will be part of the oops club I promise that!

I have since transfered all my masters to 4G DVD backups and put them in a cool closet taped in a box making some extras to leave around and try new things with. That way if they get too scratched or go poof on the hard drive for any reason I still have the real thing..

It allmost sounds paranoid to a non musician, but you guys all feel me on this one. When you put as much work into these songs as we do they become like family.


Computers for Music

[dawboxpro]

Amagine what it is like for guys restoring old tapes for zepplin and the beatles. I heard that some of the stuff had tape stretch spots and warble that had to be edited out.. That kind of micro editing is an art in itself.


So when the foil is chipped like some of the cd's are from using el-cheapo cd's your sol. All the more reason to follow the steps of backup discussed above in my original post.

I will take the cd restoration ideas to heart and give a few a shot. But I know that the ones that are finished are from the foil being gone or just plain cheap media that has actualy spoiled over time. After switching a few years ago to top notch media and allways protecting each side of it I have never had a problem.

That is why you should make multiple copies of a master because you never know how a scratch, chip or just plain malfunction of the cd-r/cd-rom will happen. you can spill pop on it, mess it up with a salty finger print, ect ect.

most of the cd's that ever went bad on me are from just plain moving them around and keeping them on a spool or spindle and they have rubbed each other picking up a collective hack here and there...Over all cheap media is to blame with a weak thin layer of foil and cheap chemicals that smear worse than robert smiths maskera.

I still have the original takes and the tracks un-edited, after listening to some of them 6 years later it makes me want to record them all over anyways go figure (LOL)

You put alot of work into something though and even if it is not platinum it still becomes part of you. I once read something about Tom Petty hating stuff he recorded because he just wanted to change it every time.

Thank god I did this to myself and not my own clients recordings!

I had upgraded my system to AMD64 with an Asus board a few weeks ago and my son knocked my drive cage holding 200G of music onto the floor. Bounce.....bounce went the hard drives in slow motion as I screamed like a girl getting scorpions poured over her in Fear Factor.

An hour later the data all came up with some tweaking.. That example right there promted this article about covering your butt. You think to yourself that would never happen, but it does and the data can go poof...


So treat your backups and your backups of backups like an atomic bomb. Remember it is digital data and one stupid move can be nuclear war on your data.

You say it will never happen to you. Ignore this post and give it time and you will be part of the oops club I promise that!

I have since transfered all my masters to 4G DVD backups and put them in a cool closet taped in a box making some extras to leave around and try new things with. That way if they get too scratched or go poof on the hard drive for any reason I still have the real thing..

It allmost sounds paranoid to a non musician, but you guys all feel me on this one. When you put as much work into these songs as we do they become like family.


Computers for Music

[lpdeluxe]

I use USB 2.0 external drives which are disconnected when I'm not backing up. CDRs will corrupt over time! They are not a reliable backup. Sunlight and heat separate the dye layers and your data is as the mists of morn. Store them in a dark, cool place, and you really need backups of the CDRs in another format, as well.

Other thoughts: to make a scratched (not on the label side, as noted above) CD play, try spraying it with Armor All and buffing radially. If the scratch is really bad, get a Skip Doctor at Radio Shack or most chains. It really works, as long as the data hasn't been damaged.

[Joe Hannigan]

I agree with all of the above, and as I think I mentioned, the DVD-ROM and offline HD is a good safeguard in addition to multiple CD copies of the master(s).

If you have any access to cool, dry, and dark, no-sunlight storage - even just a closet - put your archives in there as well.

The latest addition to our storage methods is a sealed plastic bag (6x6 or 6x9 depending on the contents), and a little bag of cilica gel. Between the two, you seal out the outside air, and absorb the ambient moisture in the bag. It keeps things nice and dry, and for now anway, you're safer than you'd be without it. (I agree with you Dawbox about multiple CD storage on a spindle - that's as bad as the old stacked record damage back in the vinyl days).

You can find all kinds of good plastic storage options at www.varipac.com or call 800-388-4344

[lpdeluxe]

Actually, Ed, the way I heard it was "digital doesn't EXIST unless it's in at least 2 places!"

[Joe Hannigan]

Originally posted by lpdeluxe
Actually, Ed, the way I heard it was "digital doesn't EXIST unless it's in at least 2 places!"

Maybe I'm wrong, but I heard: "THREE Different Places".

[KX]

Here's another horror story

January 1st 2003: with good resolutions in mind, I do a virus check on my whole system. No virus but 1 drive (40gb) that was not backup yet (I wanted to make sure no viruses would be on the backup!) didn't survive
the test. When a friend of mine told me about "get data back" software it was too late...

[dawboxpro]

There should almost be group therapy for the pain suffered on this topic. Sob :(

Sometimes it can be a blessing for the songs that actualy sucked that you had to do over then you did them better. But the pain is in the performance and the moment in time that gets lost. Many songs remind you of a chapter in your life and the first performance of them is usualy the most heart felt if not the best or most polished...

It is like losing a great picture of a family member that has died. Songs do not have to be great, and not everything is worth saving but in a way stuff that you keep just shows progress as an artist.

The scary thing about media in general is that as technology progresses the very machine that played that media becomes exstinct. So it is just as important to preserve the machines that will be able to play back that media from that era.

It seems laughable but take a look at even 50 years of media and see the change, now look at even the last 10 and you see even more change than the last 50.

Even masters of the greatest recordings in history have been tarnished due to ignorance and lack of proper storage. Another problem is that in the moment and even a few years after it none of these artist know the grand scope of history they are making because not enough time has passed to even realize it.

Robert Johnson and the old blues greats never knew they were going to be cherished and re-mixed into popular culture in the form of The Beatles, Clapton, Hendrix, ect. They also lived and died never making a dime nor did they ever at the time get the fame of now puffed up super produced talentless powder pop acts of today.


Your nothing material, or the songs you think will never make it, or the ones the A&R rep never cared to plug into the grid may live into history defining an era and holding a place in your families history helping to explain who you were. In my opinion music does that better than any other art form. It may be buried in a little black box with you and un-covered 1000 years later.

It may do nothing more than stay in your family. I would kill to have recordings of my great grandfather because I hear the music gene is from him. So try to save what you can and continue to transfer it to other mediums from time to time...

When your 80 years old you will have something to pass on to explain who you were and what you were all about. you will also have something to listen to to remind you of the chapters and moments in life that are your music.

It all sounds cheasy and sentimental. But think about it...studio tricks and trendy sounds all wash away with time and all you have left is song and melody. That stands the test of a hundreds of years as proven by the greats. If you have a good song among them it will find it's way into history as surely as the anoying melody of the Andy Grifith Show...

I know this because my son whistles it and he has never even seen the show, just the intro. Chaka Kahns "Feel For You" dispite major 80's production still slams as she cuts through the top of all of that procution with one of the best soul voices of all time.

A great song is a great song do not get too caught up in the latest pro-tools plug in to give you that filter effect. Remember when STP "Stone Temple Pilots" used the mega phone for Sex Type thing? Now here we are with every modern rock act that sounds like a parity of STP and Pearl Jam tuned to B.

Let the music breathe, resist the urge to add that plug in that makes it sound like every other song out there. I am just as much the victim of it as anyone else. I often go back to recordings I loved as a kid, a teen, twenties, to get a grip on things. I have allways thought that todays music as of about 1998 is way too compressed and sqaushed to death for maximum volume competition. I am just not falling for it because it is a music trend just like too much reverb in the 80's.

Remember that a song is still as song and all the cool plug in's and great editing gear in the world will not help jazz up a crappy song, or a poor choice of gain stage, or rotten mic placement. When I feel the urge to put too much verb or another harmony part in there is means I need to re-take it because I am trying to hide a poor take.

I am no know it all by far, but I have made enough blunders in my recordings in the past to see them come 10 fold over the past 6 years from trial and error, research, and common sense with some talent...I still think I can do better most of the time. But the progress is there for me to hear over a span of even 3 of my own self produced Cd's.

Some of the old stuff I have done in analog studios is seriously dated production. So I simply updated it but dropping all the verb and all the production that was too over the top. A good song is a good song.

I almost fell over when I heard a country version of Photograph by Def Lepard, I like the rock recording myself, but broken down the song has country elelments and I can see why Mutt Lang loves producing his wifes stuff because all the production elements he used for them are evident in her works.

Take a song you think is supposed to be in one flavor and change it's style using production. It is a great lesson in the power of song. If it stands with an acoustic guitar as well as full production you may have something....

If you have anything to add please do. We all all learning from each other here and my opinions are not gospel but an offering to the alter of music and expression through technology.

:)

Computers For Music

[lpdeluxe]

Nothing like a near-tragedy to get the old heart to pumping, is there?

I agree with all of the above. My wife and I have lifetime portfolios of art that our kids will probably get, then their kids, wonder if anybody will care? It's the same with the music. I sense like you do that much of what I have recorded will sound as dated as a 1910 brass band a generation from now, but nonetheless it is still a way for us to speak to them and for them to hear us in our own voices.

If there is any playback equipment! so what will you archive your coffin favorites on? CDRs will corrupt like the flesh, hard drives will die before you do, maybe we'll finally have the ultimate bullet-proof solidstate memory?

Let's hope.

Or will music remain as ephemeral as it has been for nearly its whole history? I guess recordists are not the persons to ask!

[Joe Hannigan]

Dawbox, that was one fantastic and well written essay. (Any time you're in Philly, you've earned yourself a drink or dinner on me!)

You touched on quite a few parts of this discussion that are near and dear to my heart. There are moments when I'm looking at a client's leftovers, or something of my own that while isn't so spectacular, is still certainly worth saving for the future. Who's to say what is worth keeping, and what isn't?

Any time a project is completed, I find it impossible (and unconscionable) to discard the components as well as the finished product. Whenever possible, I save it all, on DVDr, CD, or even the entire drive itself.

As many of us fear, who's to say what will be even AVAILABLE for playing this stuff back in 50, 100 years?

I think most of us here would admit that our jobs have a slight edge on others in that we leave behind a finishded product, a definable example of the work and artistry that we do. Backing it all up safely is a primal need in that context. There's a remnant left behind that not every other line of work provides. (Not judging anyone else's profession, but I think we're all on the same page here....)

I have made a slow, deliberate effort to preserve as much as I reasonably can, from photos to current projects to old recordings from my analog days. Embarassing as well as revealing, my work (as well as my growing-up moments) are mostly still there, and I hope to keep them around for no other reason than a simple outline of what I've attempted to accomplish over the years.

It should be remembered that these machines, these toys that we get paid to play with, are no different from sculptures hammers, chisels, or paints and brushes used by other artists in different media. There are times when I look back and say: "Well, what the HECK have I accomplished after all this time, all this tweaking and editing?"

The calm answer that comes back is:"Oh wait, that's right, I DO have proof of who I am, and what I've done all these years. Good, bad, interesting or a major bore, the archives are the time-line of what I've done to date, and after I'm gone, it doesn't matter if it all ends up in a museum or a landfill, I am too close to it to judge for now. " That is why we save it all, yes?

I'd like to think we've each done SOMETHING of value after all this time, and if nothing else, I can't imagine being in any other business, having this much fun while I blunder along, with happy accidents occuring nearly every day.