Hello, I am in the process of backing up my data for the year. But I was disappointed very badly when I found that some increamental backup sets on a CD can not be read anymore. I am an average careful person and I take reasonable care of my CDs. But how could this happen? I mean, how I could have done better to make all my CDs at least readable when I want them? Here are some clues on what happened to this particular problematic CD. It is stack on another CD in a case. The surface some how got dirty or scratched. I don't know if it is my CD drive to blame or the other CD underneath in the case. But I rarely move these CDs. Why it still got scratched? I just don't know why. Is it some kind of physical or chemical reaction happened? Maybe from now on, I shall always make two copies and put them in one box each separately, one under another CD and one on top of another CD. This way I still can keep four CDs in two cases. I also checked the status of all my CDs. Some of them are shining like new. Some of them already have scratches and perhaps dirt on them. I don't know how differently I treat them. This is really bad, boy. Some day, some of them cannot be read again when I want them. purely sad, apparently no nothing I can do now to protect my data. Any rescue measures can save those can not be read? Can I use water to wash the CDs? But how can I make or get those special spot-less water in car wash? Shall I use a dryer to dry washed CD? Can I ever get this problem solved and run zero risk of losing data?
Use high quality CDRs for backups, not the bargain spindles. Run diagnostics on your drive to make sure it's operating correctly before cutting a backup. Store your disks in jewel cases. If you have much in the way of disk capacity to backup through, CDs make a poor backup medium. Consider either one a DVD burner or one of the fairly cheap USB connectable high capacity hard drives.