Hi, I bought an 18TB WD Elements off Amazon, which was listed as " Used - Acceptable", and said something about damage to the outside. I took this to mean, at worst, someone had shucked the drive and sent a dud back, but the price was good in the Current Market Conditions, so I decided to take a punt.

It's arrived, and aside from some dents in the packaging (which I assume is what they were talking about in the description), the contents look pretty clean, and there's no sign of any interference with the drive (it was even in the original sealed plastic bag). What tests can I run so I can smoke test before the return window expires? Thanks!

I have a Canon scanner and Linux. Wanting to scan stuff in FADGI 3.8 4-Star standard. What's the best CLI program to do so? I tried scanimage but I don't think it supports 16-bith depth (only 24 and 48).

FADGI 3.8 4-Star spec:

TIFF, JPEG 2000
600ppi
Bit Depth: 16
Adobe RGB (1998), ProPhoto, ECIRGB_v2
Color

Hi everyone. I’m a photographer, and I’m looking to upgrade/change my storage for a half decade of photos. I’ve currently got a Seagate 5TB HDD but it seems to be very slightly misbehaving, despite only having it a couple years and seeing mild usage. I know nothing is truly permanent, but I’d love a drive that doesn’t worry the hell outta me every few weeks.

Budget is <$400 usd, preferably.

I’ve seen the WD 8TB being recommended, is that a decent one to pick up?

I know virtually nothing about this topic so any wisdom is greatly appreciated.

I know that the best video downloaders are yt-dlp and 4K Video Downloader. That's what I previously used. However, something happened to my computer and I'm now unable to use either of them. Can someone recommend a reliable web-based video downloader?

I had to wipe my Mac two months ago and I haven't been able to use my Backblaze backup since. When I try to Inherit Backup State, nothing happens. I've been going back and forth with their support team for weeks and I keep getting the same canned "have you tried turning it on and off again?" spiel.

I've had Backblaze in some form or another since 2019. They used to be awesome, reliable, great support, affordable... now this. A thing I paid for and can't use, because they just can't update their software correctly. Before this, I couldn't restore my files, because the date entry field in the web restore UI just straight up wouldn't work.

Anyone else getting lousy service from Backblaze lately?

I need some recommendations to update my personal media storage? I've been using this old Synology NAS and two 1Tb drives I bagged from my last job before being made redundant. However I feel like I'm stretching it's potential when it comes to storing and streaming my DVD, blu ray and 4k collection. Do I go down the route or buy a more capable NAS, going for quicker data transfer with some direct attached storage to my decent spec PC or just store on my PCs internal storage? I have about 500gb left on a 2TB SSD. Rest is taken up by games.

The two primary types of recordable Blu-ray disc technologies used for data archiving are HTL (High to-Low) and LTH (Low-to-High), alongside M-DISC as an inorganic variant:

HTL (High-to-Low / Inorganic): Uses an inorganic metal alloy or phase-change recording layer (such as Verbatim's MABL) that starts with high reflectivity and transitions to low reflectivity when burned. It is the standard, reliable choice for long-term Blu-ray archiving with an estimated lifespan of 50 to 100+ years.

LTH (Low-to-High / Organic): Uses an organic dye recording layer that starts with low reflectivity and increases as it is burned. These discs are prone to organic dye degradation and are not recommended for archival use.

M-DISC (Millennial Disc): Uses a rock-like, inorganic vitrified carbon/silicon dioxide layer that is physically etched (ablated) by a high-powered laser rather than altered via a dye or phase-change material. It is marketed for multi-century or millennial durability, though standard HTL inorganic Blu rays serve a similar archival function.

Google

Hi everyone, I need storage for objects and material library that I can pull into a current 3D projects, as well as said projects. Should I get an SSD or an HHD is fine? Thanks!

Does anyone know how to get a copy of the installer now that it’s been discontinued? I’ve been searching for a few days and been striking out.

Drive disconnected mid use so I restarted the pc and now it's clicking. Its a 12TB WD Ultrastar DC HC520 I've had for like 2 years now. Its full too. I don't mind buying another harddrive but I'm praying nothing is lost and it's all recoverable. What are the chances it's not before the tears start flowing. And before people say "you should've kept back ups". This was the backup, OF THE BACKUP. Assuming this is a mechanical / head failure. What are the chances my data is

gone. Is it more than likely that my 12 TB are untouched

So for whatever reason before I bought my HDDs I checked the storage compatibility page for the enclosure (DXP4800 Pro), and saw WD and 22 TB, and went bananas buying WD HC570 because I saw a good report on them from Backblaze... Well, compatible ones are a different model.

Well, they don't even appear on my BIOS, and the enclosure LEDs blink orange wherever I connect them. I had an old HDD and that one marks white LED, so all good. I don't have a PC or a way to test them somewhere else.

I bought them while traveling, no way I can return them now. On LLMs I asked and they keep mentioning something like:

SATA 3.3 Power Disable (PWDIS Pin 3): Enterprise SATA drives feature PWDIS on Pin 3. Because consumer NAS backplanes supply 3.3V across all power pins, the drive will receive a signal telling it to turn off and will stay completely cold. You will need to place a small strip of non-conductive Kapton tape over the first 3 pins on the drive's power connector so it can turn on.

Is that true? Do you have a video you recommend for doing this if it would make my HDDs work?

Or do you know if I'm screwed with these HDDs for now?

I want about 3 x 22TB HDDs, let me know if I have to follow the compatibility page or which ones you recommend.

Thanks!

I was troubleshooting a burning error when I came across a tidbit about using the slowest burn speed for archival purposes: "If this is critical long-term archival data, selecting 2x provides even tighter pit precision and lower block error rates (LER/SER)".

Is this true? Would this still be an issue even with data verification?

I shut down twice a day. Never considered the wear and tear on my 3 HD’s or is it not a big deal?

Hi! Following the 3-2-1 mantra I am looking for a cloud storage in which I can do weekly backups of some sensitive data (250gb). I have it stored in a headless debian server so i'm looking for something cheap but reliable (yeah I know), but especially that I can just set it up as a versioned cron job via cli with cryptomator or similar

Any suggestions?

What would be the best , most affordable temporary cloud storage option? My old laptop is dying on me (disk error) and I need to back it up just long enough to be able to afford an external drive with some decent storage on it. I’m big on privacy, I know I may need to pay a little because all the free options I’ve found have a small limit of data and I would rather not have all my data so scattered , I’d rather be able to keep it all in one (safe) place. Money is really tight right now so I’d really love suggestions if anyone has any

I picked this 2x 4tb HGST for $65 this morning off of FB marketplace. The seller pretended to not know how many hours the drive have accumulated. I should have known better when I was handed a white label (brown box) Hdd box full with static b a g and the plastic guide to hold an hdd for transport on a 11 years old drives. The original plan was to add this to my snapraid drives. Atm I'm not sure if it's still got plenty of life left as a media drive.

According to CrystalDisk:

Drive 1 have 73359hrs w/ good health.

Drive 2 have: 84309hrs w/ good health.

Hello friendos. First time poster

TLDR; I have some old 2000s PC CD Games I would like to backup and make ISOs of.

The tricky thing is navigating the old SafeDisc or SecuRom DRM.

Any recommended tools to make ISOs I can use to install my games? Linux or Windows options welcome. TIA

I came down stairs to the postman dropping the mail out of his delivery trolley from waist height onto the floor. I actually think landing on the corner might have softened the blow because there's such a crumple zone.

This box contained 3x 28TB Seagate ironwolf drives.

They were wrapped up in bubble wrap and packed pretty tightly in the box with those inflatable soft plastic bubbles.

How fragile are these drives? Do I need to be worried?

I have 3 other deliveries, two of them were delivered by the same guy, one is still to come. I know he dropped at least one of those boxes the same way and it landed flat.

does anyone know why this keeps happening it only happens on certain videos the download button is available and you press it and the video always downloads to about 66% then it says “can’t download video” so then i try to download the video using a 3rd party website and then it downloads but when you open the download there’s only audio but no video and it just shows the apple quicktime logo. does anyone why why this is happening or is anyone else getting this problem??

I have to back up maybe 10 TB of data, and some of it involves researching people who don't want to be researched. I have a couple friends storing a drive for me, but I need something that doesn't depend on another person. I've priced regular storage bins, safe deposit boxes, and the cloud, but they're either too expensive or require a minimum balance or renter's insurance. Any other ideas?

Was participating on a question here about "what is the oldest drive you still have operational" I answered my DS414J Synology 16TB SHR NAS, submitted...saw that Golden Gate had finally been released for my M4 Mac, and started the update process. I was way too concerned/distracted with the notice floating around that Mac would soon be favouring Silicon over Intel, and a lot of apps would not be supported anymore and could not get a straight answer if it was Golden Gate or the next operating system (whatever that is going to be) that I had no idea AFP was no longer going to be supported with Golden Gate.

The update finished, and despite multiple restarts and shutdowns it took way too long for me to realise AFP was no longer supported.

I panicked/grieved and spent money I don't have to buy a 16TB external hard drive (should arrive today) using old Macs I have (won't go higher than high sierra) that support AFP and mount to the NAS automatically, I would connect my new 16TB and start manually dragging everything off.

Then Erase the 4 x 4TB internal drives and use them however I wanted.

I am still stuck on this plan

Then my Plex Server on my main Synology, a DS1821+ kept unmounting, so I got recommended Automounter, I installed that and luckily that fixed the problem, but it also detected the DS414J, it couldn't mount it unless I installed the helper app, I did and after not having it for 2 weeks, now mounts like this never happened.

Now I am stuck between 3 options.

1. Move everything to the new external 16TB, erase the internal 4 x 4TB drives, and use them however I want.

2. Since the DS414J is only Cancelled TV Shows and Ongoing TV Shows, the biggest being Cancelled TV (9TB) I would put that all on the external 16TB, freeing up 9TB from the NAS, and 7TB left on the 16TB, and then offload potentially 2 other drives onto the DS414J, thus freeing them up.

3. Just leave everything as it is and have a brand new 16TB that I have no idea what to do with.

The main things that worry me is if Automounter is ever no longer supported, I would not be able to mount to the DS414J anymore, I was convinced I didn't/couldn't switch from AFP to SMB (I tried multiple times but nothing worked) I guess it did but it only works through Automounter.

And the internal 4 x 4TB drives in the DS414J NAS, the power on cycles/hours are

Drive 1: 49731, Drive 2: 49714, Drive 3: 49710, and for some strange reason Drive 4: 3811

It says they are "healthy" and no errors come up when I run S.M.A.R.T tests, so if I do decide to wipe and use them individually, I don't know how long each drive will last.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I have been poking around RustFS since it went GA. Thinking about it to accomplish my multi-site 3-2-1 back up scheme. Haven't tried storage replication over WAN., but so far I really like it.

Has anyone else poked around with it?

Is it worth switching from Google to Immich? Many people have recommended it to me; what exactly makes Immich better or more convenient?

I don't trust cloud services, though Google collapsing is the least likely scenario. The only downsides are the cost and the risk of my account getting locked for some trivial reason—though I honestly don't know what illegal act I’d have to commit to actually get banned.