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Date:      Mon, 1 May 1995 18:18:47 -0700 (PDT)
From:      Jaye Mathisen <mrcpu@cdsnet.net>
To:        Nate Williams <nate@trout.sri.MT.net>
Cc:        Poul-Henning Kamp <phk@ref.tfs.com>, Terry Lambert <terry@cs.weber.edu>, obrien@leonardo.net, hackers@FreeBSD.org
Subject:   Re: Compress dumps?
Message-ID:  <Pine.BSD/.3.91.950501175121.27465Q-100000@mg1.cdsnet.net>
In-Reply-To: <199505011803.MAA01024@trout.sri.MT.net>

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What Nate neglects to mention is that it was crappy hardware, trashed
cache, and generally screwed up machine... :)

I personally haven't had any tape problems in recently.

On Mon, 1 May 1995, Nate Williams wrote:

> > > I always want to cry when someone suggests stream compression on
> > > dump formats.
> > 
> > Terry,
> > 
> > In my 10+ years in computing, I have >once< had a chance to restore
> > from a damaged media which were still partially readable. 
> 
> In my 10+ years in computing, I have had *multiple chances (experiences)
> trying to resurrect a dump from damaged media.  I can count on the my
> fingers the # of restores I've had to do which were bad, but it's not an
> experience I'd go through again if I had a choice.
> 
> > Comparing that to how many tapes I've written, streams based compression
> > is a very low risk thing to do to save money.
> 
> Compared to how many tapes I've written and how many went bad, I would
> *NEVER* do stream based compression.  Note, my experience has been that
> the failure rate is not very high, but for the cost of a few tapes the
> cost of *my* time to get the backup (if possible) and the cost of lost
> work of the developers it isn't an issue.
> 
> > How about this observation btw:
> > 
> > If I can compress at least 3:1, I can make two copies, and still save
> > 33% on media... (Assuming you fill them of course).
> 
> The price of backup media has never been an issue for me.  If price is
> an issue for you, then rotate your tapes.
> 
> 
> Nate
> 



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