Poor Man's EMP

Discussion in 'Technical' started by duane, Aug 28, 2015.


  1. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    We all read and try to prepare for the possible "EMP" event that may destroy our electricity and our computers some "X" time in the future. I have had my data destroyed several times over the years and would like to hear other comments on the effects of "poor man's EMP" on their preps. While I hate to date myself our first computer was a 100 something bus followed by a Sinclar with a tape recorder for storage and programming. The first computer language we studied in college was BALGOL for our Borroughs main frame. That was followed by an IBM with two floppies, one with the program, a "borrowed" copy of Wang Dos, and the second for memory. I could not afford the 2 years pay for a Winchester drive and paid a months pay for an IBM monitor, rather than a TV, which gave you any color of a sort of tan you wanted. With the advent of the 286 and the TRS80, I selected the 286 and never looked back. Now to the subject at hand. The data and programs on the audio tape never made it to the IBM format on the IBM large floppy, the data on the IBM floppy never made it to the DOS format in the 286, that never made it to DOS 6, that never made it to Windows 3, then with the changes from floppy to CD 's to DVD, from the 100 meg memory cards I used to use to the memories I now use. I have an old box of at least 100 floppy disks with what at that time were my invaluable prep and computer information that I can no longer read and I have old computer back ups of my data for old computers that no longer exist and no system to recover the data. In addition I have lost my data due to hard drive crashes, which used to be common, inability or being to lazy to transfer data from one format to the replacement format, one fat system to the next, and having my computer hacked by people wanting me to send $500 to Russia for a computer protection program that would allow me to open my computer. My computer tech said that if you did not have a good backup you were sc****. Well I tried the backup and I was sc****. I now have portable hard drives, DVD's , and memory sticks, but have no idea what will work with the Windows 7 and the storage systems data format in 5 years. Being a newbe, I have been going back and reading the archived posts in order to keep from asking stupid questions on things covered in the past. I keep getting the dreaded "page not found" message on the do0wnloads etc or an add for some Indian porn site. Other than paper copies, which are not feasible for a few hundred meg of e-books and going to Linux in order to get some order to the updates, what would you suggest?
     
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  2. Ganado

    Ganado Monkey+++

    I here ya. One of the guys on here told me for simple data protection get an old microwave and store your data in that. Which is one of those brilliantly simple, inexpensive ideas. Not sure if you can fit a laptop in there or not. And if no electicity how do you run it. All thinks to plan and tinker with. I have started getting hard copies of things I consider critical.

    BTPOST is probably has the most info on this type of thing and a great deal of thought and experience on this topic. Hopefully he can help you and post here so we can all see his thoughts.
     
  3. BTPost

    BTPost Stumpy Old Fart,Deadman Walking, Snow Monkey Moderator

    Loss of your Data, can take MANY forms, as illustrated by @duane 's post.... I have been caught by the "Poor Mans EMP" just twice in my long career in computing. Once with my first Personal Computer, a Tandy Color Computer with Tape Drive. Tape Drive scrambled two years of programming, by "Eating" every tape I put in it. Total loss... Learned my lesson, with that one, and ALWAYS made Multiple Backups, of EVERYTHING, after that. The second was the loss of a years worth of Backups on a DataGeneral, because some Yahoo, didn't read the labels on the DiscPacks, and threw them out, into a Dumpster, that got emptied, once a month, but this time it was emptied that next morning. I still have DSS Tapes, and Drive from 15 years ago, in my Office Desk Drawer. I keep Multiple Images of ALL My HardDrives, on TimeMachine Images, residing on multiple 20TB Drobo Drives. I keep Legacy MacOS 9.x.x CPUs running to support the Cannery's Auto-Documentation System, and have backups of those Hard Drives as Images that get transferred to the Drobo's, nightly. I have Images of the Original MacOS 1.0.a 3.5" Floppies from our original Mac 128K PreProduction Beta Hardware. As hardware changes, and Data Storage improves, I move my Backups , to the next Generation, for Storage. Oh, Yea, and One Set of those Backups gets rotated into my EMP Proof Storage, annually. Hard Drives and BlueRay Double Density, Double Sided Platters are cheap enough, to use for Long Term Storage. If you do NOT have a Backup Plan in place, then you are NOT, being a wise Prep'er, in the Data Domain....
     
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  4. melbo

    melbo Hunter Gatherer Administrator Founding Member

    A necessary part of data storage is also keeping up to date with storage formats.
    A box of VHS tapes would do me no good these days.
    Please report any posts that have dead links or porn. Most of our downloadable files have been moved into our Resources section which could be why you're getting page not found errors. Resources | Survival Forums
     
    Last edited: Aug 29, 2015
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  5. ghrit

    ghrit Bad company Administrator Founding Member

    Neither do I have a zip drive. At one point, I had a machine with zip, tape, 5-1/4 AND a 3.5 drive in it. Still have one with 3.5 and zip.. I still have media that won't ever be used again in human existence, and I do NOT know why I keep it around. All the data has been migrated forward. Might be time for a weeding out of the 'puter parts bins.
     
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  6. techsar

    techsar Monkey+++

    Ya mean I can get rid of my SCSI tape drive, controller card and tape backups?
    Recently, data storage has really accelerated. A 128 GB thumb drive...shoot, I would have killed for that in the mid 80's as opposed to a 5mb Winchester drive.
    I do tend to keep several past generations, both in media and hardware, to access older data. But as I get the "old" stuff updated, it seems that newer formats appear.
    A never-ending race :)
     
  7. JohnSteven

    JohnSteven CHUNKY MUNKY


    We had a "Borroughs" on-campus in SUNY Potsdam (circa 1985)
    ....
    I remember when my Comp-Sci room-mate announced his "huge" upgrade to a 20-Meg hard drive
    (on his 286 MHz IBM-PC)

    -time fly's when you're having "Fun"

    (and... YES... that's a 20 Megabyte upgrade.... "Mega")
     
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  8. JohnSteven

    JohnSteven CHUNKY MUNKY


    old VHS tapes can be used as a source of cordage to tie wood-poles together in making a lean-To or a teepee.
    POSSIBLY.
    Maybe.

    :)
     
  9. RightHand

    RightHand Been There, Done That RIP 4/15/21 Moderator Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    I remember getting my first 20 meg drive and thinking "I'll be able to you this for years and years" LOL At least I was able to get rid of all the cartons of 8" floppy disks I had in my office
     
    JohnSteven likes this.
  10. BTPost

    BTPost Stumpy Old Fart,Deadman Walking, Snow Monkey Moderator

    The first Cannery Accounting System was run on DataPoint Z80 Hardware and 8" Floppies. It took 60 floppies to hold a seasons worth of Data, and a backup took 8 Hours with Floppy Disk changes every 2 minutes. You have No Idea how we loved the first Winchester 10MB Cartridge Drives, that could hold a whole seasons Data on just 2 Cartridges, and a Backup only took 30 minutes, with just 4 Cart Swaps. I wrote the Finished Product Inventory and Shipping system for that System. It was used for 10 years, until the DataPoint Hardware was replaced with PCs, and my code wouldn't run on the New Hardware. I was happy to no longer support that Code, when it was replaced.
     
  11. kellory

    kellory An unemployed Jester, is nobody's fool. Banned

    Actually, I had an idea for reusing 8track tapes, as a camera medium, for fore and aft simultaneously recording for accidents. There are small cameras that use 1/4" tape to record, and the 8 track is 1/2", so it would be fairly simple to set both recording heads together.
    Being a format that is a continuous loop, means it would capture continuously, but would hold everything leading up to an accident.
     
  12. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    When I look at the pattern of change in computing, where it has consistently migrated to being increasingly more mobile, I can't help but think if we aren't the next storage devices. At the very least, humans would become the RAM for futuristic computing and data would be stored in "cloud" configuration. We have moved from the antiquated tech of the past, to laptops and netbooks, touchpads and smart phones. We now see watches being worn to perform tasks a smart phone could on its own, and pretty soon we will see the age of transhumanism dawn with implants and ocular jewelry.

    I would stick with USB and solid state drives until the next storage medium comes around. But, there's always time to swap, provided you don't wait 20 years to do it.
     
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