Pastey posted:

It's kind of funny to think that even with all the methods of data storage invented in the last 40 years or so, paper is still the only thing that we know for sure will still be here hundreds of years from now and retain it's data. Assuming it's stored correctly of course.

As far as I remember, the figures (on average) are something like this:

Magnetic media - 10 to 20 years
Factory pressed CDs/DVDs/Blu-ray - 30 to 50 years
Archival quality CDRs/DVD-Rs/Recordable Blu-Ray - 100 years
SSDs and other flash based media - 3 to 6 months unpowered, longer based on write cycle, max probably 10 years


Paper - stored in a constant temperature/humidity environment - indefinite


I keep reading stories from time to time about newly researched mediums that could last millennia, but as far as I know nothing has made it to market yet even in the high end. There may be some really esoteric stuff in use by the NSA or some such, but I haven't read baout it yet.

If anyone has any inside knowledge of this I'd love to hear about it.