It seems that with each incremental improvement in technology, we always lose something. When we had floppy disks, they offered limited storage and were sensitive to environmental factors. But when they worked, at least they worked reliably.
Then came optical media like compact discs. They offered significantly more storage and were also a bit more robust (except when they got scratched). However, copying data to them was no longer a simple matter of `copy c:\foo.txt d:\`. Now we had to 'burn' the data via special programs. And because discs were non-rewritable, you essentially had single use storage media.
For the past few years I've been using a NAS drive at home. It's a good way for me to store my 1 Tb collection of family photos, videos, and music. But I'll be damned if my NAS drive and computer talk to each other reliably each time. On my wifi N network, the state of the mounted directories is still slow to retrieve. Copying data back and forth is annoyingly slow too. It has a built-in backup feature which just won't work.
Other people I know use attached USB drives. They are mostly happy with their experience with some exceptions. There are times when the drive will spin for minutes on end even though no application is using it. And then there is existential fear of misplacing the drive itself.
Do you feel the same way as well? Have you discovered something that eases some of these frustrations?
Then came optical media like compact discs. They offered significantly more storage and were also a bit more robust (except when they got scratched). However, copying data to them was no longer a simple matter of `copy c:\foo.txt d:\`. Now we had to 'burn' the data via special programs. And because discs were non-rewritable, you essentially had single use storage media.
For the past few years I've been using a NAS drive at home. It's a good way for me to store my 1 Tb collection of family photos, videos, and music. But I'll be damned if my NAS drive and computer talk to each other reliably each time. On my wifi N network, the state of the mounted directories is still slow to retrieve. Copying data back and forth is annoyingly slow too. It has a built-in backup feature which just won't work.
Other people I know use attached USB drives. They are mostly happy with their experience with some exceptions. There are times when the drive will spin for minutes on end even though no application is using it. And then there is existential fear of misplacing the drive itself.
Do you feel the same way as well? Have you discovered something that eases some of these frustrations?