I stopped burning CDs a while ago because the pile exceeded the
capacity of a handy dandy wire mesh drawer thing I picked up a
Wal*Mart one day. (The media are filed alphabetically by the name I
happen to plot on the medium when I burn it.)
So now I grit my teeth and assemble a DVD worth before burning.
As for recovery, I use a program called Portfolio by a company named
Extensis, which basically is a database into which one can bring any
type of file even RAW. It's not cheap and got lots of bells and
whistles which I haven't even begun to figure out. The most
tiresomely necessary part of it is that one must keyword to get the
best effect from the search feature. But then, any search feature
will find more results if it's given more data to search, so such is
life.
I keep a set of DVDs off site, at a friend's house, in a selection of
fake leather binders which also conveniently come from Wal*Mart.
Most people use them to truck their CDs around from house to car and
friends' house.
Of course there are lots of other methods and databasing programs out
there. iView Media Pro, ACDSee, iPhoto come immediately to mind.
And there are lots of other storage approaches - backup hard drives
seem to be fashinable among those who believe the lifespan of a hard
drive is about the same as that of a CD. But it isn't, so I prefer
removable media.
--
Emily L. Ferguson
mailto:elf@xxxxxxxx
508-563-6822
New England landscapes, wooden boats and races, press photography
http://www.vsu.cape.com/~elf/
