Most photos are now digital, raising the need for safe and reliable storage.
Park Se-young shares with us a number of options for keeping and managing your digital memories.
Digital photo collections are more compact compared to boxes of photographs, but it's difficult to say which method of storage is safer.
For instance, standard print photographs can still be recognized when partly damaged or stained.
However, digital files can vanish even if they're partly damaged.
This is why the method of digital file storage is important.
There are three major types of digital storage: magnetic, semiconductor and optical.
Magnetic storage writes digital data as magnetic patterns on magnetic tapes or disks inside audio and video tapes, floppy disks and hard disk drives.
It was once a common form of data storage, but its use has been on decline due to the slow reading and writing speed.
Semiconductor storage records data as electrons.
Data is saved by sending energized electrons to the floating gate, where all data is recorded, ...and deleted by attracting the electrons away from the floating gate.
USB flash drives, memory cards and solid-state drives are all made of semiconductors.
Semiconductor devices are commonly used due to their small size and fast speed, but data can be easily lost due to shocks or errors.
In an ordinary environment, …experts say the lifespan of a hard disk is approximately five years …while that of a solid state drive is about three years.
To safely store data over the long term, the best option is optical discs like DVDs and Blu-ray discs that write and read data using laser technology.
If the discs are properly stored, the data can even be passed on down generations.
"Because DVDs and Blu-rays can store data for about 100 years, your valuable data can be preserved for long periods of time without losing it.
As for photos and videos of important memories, experts say they should not be kept only in computers and phones …but backed up often.
Park Se-young, Arirang News.
