Thank you for Archive Creator

elequin said:

This may be off-topic for the Canon DSLR forum, but fits in with
this discussion a bit.. I'm looking forward to trying Archive
Creator this coming weekend, and will probably end up purchasing it
so that I can back up my over 40 gigs of images...

I want my backups to last, to burn right the first time, etc. I
have a Yamaha 24x CD-R, and was wondering.. What media do people
recommend that's rated at a high speed, is 800MB, and is of a
quality to last a very very long time? What is considered "the
BEST" CD-R media? I don't want to unknowingly make a coaster and
end up losing data because I cleared off my hard drive later...

BTW, thanks Michael T for your active participation in these
forums! This is a major reason I'm considering AC.

• Eric

Click to expand...

MichaelT said:

Don Race said:

Like most I keep putting off the inevitable--- archiving my images
in their original state plus copies of images that I have
minipulated. My backups have been spotty at best and have been
looking for a program that created an indexed archive of these
images onto CD or better yet onto DVD (DVD is not yet an AC
feature) . Over the weekend I heard about Archive Creator (AC) by
Michael Tapes--- I downloaded the demo, that only creates a single
cd, to see if it was compatable with my computer-- it was so I
purchased the pre-release version for $30--- what do I have to
loose except my entire library that is on a raid 0 array (If I
loose just one disk of this array the entire logical drive is
capoot!)

I have images that go back to 2000 and quickly found that I had
over 36,000 images according to AC (I'm a pack rat, I keep
everything I shoot). The first big mistake I made was having AC
archive all my images at once, it was very slow and the index file
was 380meg that gets copied onto every CD and took up over half the
storage of the 700meg CD and was going to take over 136CDs for my
archive..... I sent off a note to Michael and he asked me to phone
him to discuss.

I called and talked with him and I have to tell you Michael is very
passionate about this product and explained how AC works in detail
and told me to split the archive up into more manageable sessions.
I did so and in my case I am archiving by year--- not only is the
index smaller but it cycles CD burns faster. Michael then went
into some of the upcoming changes as a result of all the feedback
he has received including putting the index on the first CD only.
The index contains an HTML viewer of thumbnails/preview images that
are burned by AC onto the CD's.

Anyway AC, as I told Michael, is a gap killer and with all the
knowledge he has on the technical aspects of the media and CD ISO
standards this product will only get better. I should be done in
the next day or so archiving my images and will include this as a
regular part of my D60 workflow.... I will sleep better now that I
know the images of my growing family will be around for years to
come and I highly recommend AC. I might also add that I have no
affiliation with this product and I just met Michael on the phone
for the first time this morning!!!

For more info:
http://www.pictureflow.com/

Don,

Click to expand...

Thanks so much for the kind words and nice to meet you this morning
on the phone. I enjoyed our conversation. There is always knowledge
to share in both directions.

I might mention that while, as you determined, that the archiving
36,000 file in one Archive Set is not the best method to do your
archive, it is a testiment to AC that it is able to churn through
thsoe files, making 2 images of each one along the way, plus an
HTML page. A total of over 120,000 files were involved and over
90,000 would be written to each CD in your set. While we do not
recommend such an Archive set, as you have learned, the program was
designed to be very robust and handle most anything that is thrown
at it. And this is the pre-release version. It will only get better.

Thanks again for your kind words, and also remember that you can
leave an archive session after buring a few disks, shut off your
PC, amd come back the next day and contiue on from where you left
off. The last archive set is remembered so that you can continue or
burn another set of disks (always a good idea...and on 2 different
high quality media...and have the verify function on).

Enjoy..
--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...

MichaelT said:

DavidP said:

MichaelT said:

Thanks again for your kind words, and also remember that you can
leave an archive session after buring a few disks, shut off your
PC, amd come back the next day and contiue on from where you left
off. The last archive set is remembered so that you can continue or
burn another set of disks (always a good idea...and on 2 different
high quality media...and have the verify function on).

Click to expand...

--
The Unofficial Photographer of The Wilkinsons
http://thewilkinsons.crosswinds.net
Photography -- just another word for compromise

Click to expand...

Yes...the temoindex folder is left there so that the burn process
can continue the next day or another copy can be burned. This is by
design.

The point Iwant to make here, is that it is non-accumating. I do
not want people to think that we are bulding a mess of files in
their AC folder. The next time you process an Archive File
Selection List, the old TempIndex folder is deleted and replaced by
the new one.

In a future version, these TempIndex folders are planned to be
copied to a master Index folder so that you have a Master index of
ALL your archives..if you want it. This will be very very cool. (to
use your words)..

--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...

pwc said:

Michael,
I do have a bit of feedback after using your product, in regards to
the index. I like the idea of possibly putting it just on the
first disc, but it would be even better if this were an option. So
on a 20 disc set you could have it just on one. But on a 5 disc
set you might want it on all. Just a thought.

Click to expand...

Peter Carey said:

Also, and this might have been brought up before, it would be great
if the program cached the index creation. I archive some 3000
images this weekend and it took a long time on each disc just to
recreate the index file (which was about 70MB I think). If it just
dumped it on the HD some place temp. and then when each new CD was
put in it dropped it on first then the actual files, that would
speed it up.

Click to expand...

Peter Carey said:

thanks
pwc

MichaelT said:

Don Race said:

Like most I keep putting off the inevitable--- archiving my images
in their original state plus copies of images that I have
minipulated. My backups have been spotty at best and have been
looking for a program that created an indexed archive of these
images onto CD or better yet onto DVD (DVD is not yet an AC
feature) . Over the weekend I heard about Archive Creator (AC) by
Michael Tapes--- I downloaded the demo, that only creates a single
cd, to see if it was compatable with my computer-- it was so I
purchased the pre-release version for $30--- what do I have to
loose except my entire library that is on a raid 0 array (If I
loose just one disk of this array the entire logical drive is
capoot!)

I have images that go back to 2000 and quickly found that I had
over 36,000 images according to AC (I'm a pack rat, I keep
everything I shoot). The first big mistake I made was having AC
archive all my images at once, it was very slow and the index file
was 380meg that gets copied onto every CD and took up over half the
storage of the 700meg CD and was going to take over 136CDs for my
archive..... I sent off a note to Michael and he asked me to phone
him to discuss.

I called and talked with him and I have to tell you Michael is very
passionate about this product and explained how AC works in detail
and told me to split the archive up into more manageable sessions.
I did so and in my case I am archiving by year--- not only is the
index smaller but it cycles CD burns faster. Michael then went
into some of the upcoming changes as a result of all the feedback
he has received including putting the index on the first CD only.
The index contains an HTML viewer of thumbnails/preview images that
are burned by AC onto the CD's.

Anyway AC, as I told Michael, is a gap killer and with all the
knowledge he has on the technical aspects of the media and CD ISO
standards this product will only get better. I should be done in
the next day or so archiving my images and will include this as a
regular part of my D60 workflow.... I will sleep better now that I
know the images of my growing family will be around for years to
come and I highly recommend AC. I might also add that I have no
affiliation with this product and I just met Michael on the phone
for the first time this morning!!!

For more info:
http://www.pictureflow.com/

Don,

Click to expand...

Thanks so much for the kind words and nice to meet you this morning
on the phone. I enjoyed our conversation. There is always knowledge
to share in both directions.

I might mention that while, as you determined, that the archiving
36,000 file in one Archive Set is not the best method to do your
archive, it is a testiment to AC that it is able to churn through
thsoe files, making 2 images of each one along the way, plus an
HTML page. A total of over 120,000 files were involved and over
90,000 would be written to each CD in your set. While we do not
recommend such an Archive set, as you have learned, the program was
designed to be very robust and handle most anything that is thrown
at it. And this is the pre-release version. It will only get better.

Thanks again for your kind words, and also remember that you can
leave an archive session after buring a few disks, shut off your
PC, amd come back the next day and contiue on from where you left
off. The last archive set is remembered so that you can continue or
burn another set of disks (always a good idea...and on 2 different
high quality media...and have the verify function on).

Enjoy..
--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

MichaelT said:

pwc said:

Michael,
I do have a bit of feedback after using your product, in regards to
the index. I like the idea of possibly putting it just on the
first disc, but it would be even better if this were an option. So
on a 20 disc set you could have it just on one. But on a 5 disc
set you might want it on all. Just a thought.

Click to expand...

The plan is to have 4 options...
1 - As it is now...Index on all disks
2 - Index on first disk only along with as many archived files as
will fit
3 - Index alone on a seperate disk
4 - Index on 1 disk with no archived files (for presentation of
proofs in one step to CD)

MichaelT said:

Also, and this might have been brought up before, it would be great
if the program cached the index creation. I archive some 3000
images this weekend and it took a long time on each disc just to
recreate the index file (which was about 70MB I think). If it just
dumped it on the HD some place temp. and then when each new CD was
put in it dropped it on first then the actual files, that would
speed it up.

Click to expand...

The complete index is on the HD. That is not the issue. Before each
CD is written, an ISO image must be "prepared" to be burned to the
CD. This has to happen for each CD, and the image is different for
each CD and must be preapred seperately for each. All CD burning
programs do this at some point in their process, it is just that AC
burns multiple disks in a row, so it is more noticeable. But once
you insert the new disk...you can walk away and just consider it as
part of the burn.

I hope that this is helpful..

Click to expand...

pwc said:

I like the 4 options idea. What about another option to write a
copy to the local HD? I know you had mentioned something like this
before. Some place to keep all the indexes so I don't have to grab
an idividual CD each time and so I can search across all my archive
sets.

pwc
PS, sorry if this has been hashed over before. I've been away for
a bit.

MichaelT said:

pwc said:

Michael,
I do have a bit of feedback after using your product, in regards to
the index. I like the idea of possibly putting it just on the
first disc, but it would be even better if this were an option. So
on a 20 disc set you could have it just on one. But on a 5 disc
set you might want it on all. Just a thought.

Click to expand...

The plan is to have 4 options...
1 - As it is now...Index on all disks
2 - Index on first disk only along with as many archived files as
will fit
3 - Index alone on a seperate disk
4 - Index on 1 disk with no archived files (for presentation of
proofs in one step to CD)

Peter Carey said:

Also, and this might have been brought up before, it would be great
if the program cached the index creation. I archive some 3000
images this weekend and it took a long time on each disc just to
recreate the index file (which was about 70MB I think). If it just
dumped it on the HD some place temp. and then when each new CD was
put in it dropped it on first then the actual files, that would
speed it up.

Click to expand...

The complete index is on the HD. That is not the issue. Before each
CD is written, an ISO image must be "prepared" to be burned to the
CD. This has to happen for each CD, and the image is different for
each CD and must be preapred seperately for each. All CD burning
programs do this at some point in their process, it is just that AC
burns multiple disks in a row, so it is more noticeable. But once
you insert the new disk...you can walk away and just consider it as
part of the burn.

I hope that this is helpful..

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Cattle-Dog said:

Michael,

Am I correct in assuming that this master index will be located on
the local drive and have readily available thumbs and viewing
images as well?

If not, may I suggest it?

Click to expand...

Cattle-Dog said:

I've been dreaming of an automated process to archive RAW's and
TIff's, and leave a thumb and viewable JPG locally. I could store
tons of screen sized JPG's moderately compressed, for showing on
the monitor, emailing, upload to pbase, etc. Then if I needed to
print, I could grab the TIFF off the DVD (for me, when you get it
working) the master index tells me to fetch. Or if their is a new
"must have" raw converter/process", I can grab the orginal RAW too!

Click to expand...

Cattle-Dog said:

Sounds like you have another winner, and will probably end up with
more of my money. lol

Click to expand...

Cattle-Dog said:

Chad

MichaelT said:

DavidP said:

MichaelT said:

Thanks again for your kind words, and also remember that you can
leave an archive session after buring a few disks, shut off your
PC, amd come back the next day and contiue on from where you left
off. The last archive set is remembered so that you can continue or
burn another set of disks (always a good idea...and on 2 different
high quality media...and have the verify function on).

Click to expand...

--
The Unofficial Photographer of The Wilkinsons
http://thewilkinsons.crosswinds.net
Photography -- just another word for compromise

Click to expand...

Yes...the temoindex folder is left there so that the burn process
can continue the next day or another copy can be burned. This is by
design.

The point Iwant to make here, is that it is non-accumating. I do
not want people to think that we are bulding a mess of files in
their AC folder. The next time you process an Archive File
Selection List, the old TempIndex folder is deleted and replaced by
the new one.

In a future version, these TempIndex folders are planned to be
copied to a master Index folder so that you have a Master index of
ALL your archives..if you want it. This will be very very cool. (to
use your words)..

--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...

--
Cattle-Dog

Click to expand...

David R Stout said:

Michael

The icing on the cake for me would be the ability to print a CD
index card containing, say, 40 small thumbnails (like the old Kodal
PhotoCD Index Prints) with the option of adding a title and date.

Click to expand...

David R Stout said:

As an aside, I am looking for a program that will create an image
file from almost any program output rather like PDF Writer. For
example, I'd like to produce an index print for all of my CDs but I
would like to send these as image files to an online printing
service to print on real photo paper. Any clues as to where I would
start looking?

Click to expand...

David R Stout said:

Thanks for a great product.

Click to expand...

David R Stout said:

David

Click to expand...

MichaelT said:

David R Stout said:

As an aside, I am looking for a program that will create an image
file from almost any program output rather like PDF Writer. For
example, I'd like to produce an index print for all of my CDs but I
would like to send these as image files to an online printing
service to print on real photo paper. Any clues as to where I would
start looking?

Click to expand...

How about Qimage?

http://www.ddisoftware.com/qimage/

Has the most printing options around plus great resampling
algorithms. Not sure about the ability to go to a file rather than
a printer, but write to Mike C. If he doesn't do it I am sure he
knows who does..

MichaelT said:

Thanks for a great product.

Click to expand...

Thanks, David..

MichaelT said:

David

Click to expand...

--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...

David R Stout said:

The latest version of Qimage does what I want. Another fantastic
product. So, I use AC to create my CDs and Qimage to create the
jewel case inserts.

Thanks

David

MichaelT said:

David R Stout said:

As an aside, I am looking for a program that will create an image
file from almost any program output rather like PDF Writer. For
example, I'd like to produce an index print for all of my CDs but I
would like to send these as image files to an online printing
service to print on real photo paper. Any clues as to where I would
start looking?

Click to expand...

How about Qimage?

http://www.ddisoftware.com/qimage/

Has the most printing options around plus great resampling
algorithms. Not sure about the ability to go to a file rather than
a printer, but write to Mike C. If he doesn't do it I am sure he
knows who does..

David R Stout said:

Thanks for a great product.

Click to expand...

Thanks, David..

David R Stout said:

David

Click to expand...

--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

MichaelT said:

Don Race said:

Like most I keep putting off the inevitable--- archiving my images
in their original state plus copies of images that I have
minipulated. My backups have been spotty at best and have been
looking for a program that created an indexed archive of these
images onto CD or better yet onto DVD (DVD is not yet an AC
feature) . Over the weekend I heard about Archive Creator (AC) by
Michael Tapes--- I downloaded the demo, that only creates a single
cd, to see if it was compatable with my computer-- it was so I
purchased the pre-release version for $30--- what do I have to
loose except my entire library that is on a raid 0 array (If I
loose just one disk of this array the entire logical drive is
capoot!)

I have images that go back to 2000 and quickly found that I had
over 36,000 images according to AC (I'm a pack rat, I keep
everything I shoot). The first big mistake I made was having AC
archive all my images at once, it was very slow and the index file
was 380meg that gets copied onto every CD and took up over half the
storage of the 700meg CD and was going to take over 136CDs for my
archive..... I sent off a note to Michael and he asked me to phone
him to discuss.

I called and talked with him and I have to tell you Michael is very
passionate about this product and explained how AC works in detail
and told me to split the archive up into more manageable sessions.
I did so and in my case I am archiving by year--- not only is the
index smaller but it cycles CD burns faster. Michael then went
into some of the upcoming changes as a result of all the feedback
he has received including putting the index on the first CD only.
The index contains an HTML viewer of thumbnails/preview images that
are burned by AC onto the CD's.

Anyway AC, as I told Michael, is a gap killer and with all the
knowledge he has on the technical aspects of the media and CD ISO
standards this product will only get better. I should be done in
the next day or so archiving my images and will include this as a
regular part of my D60 workflow.... I will sleep better now that I
know the images of my growing family will be around for years to
come and I highly recommend AC. I might also add that I have no
affiliation with this product and I just met Michael on the phone
for the first time this morning!!!

For more info:
http://www.pictureflow.com/

Don,

Click to expand...

Thanks so much for the kind words and nice to meet you this morning
on the phone. I enjoyed our conversation. There is always knowledge
to share in both directions.

I might mention that while, as you determined, that the archiving
36,000 file in one Archive Set is not the best method to do your
archive, it is a testiment to AC that it is able to churn through
thsoe files, making 2 images of each one along the way, plus an
HTML page. A total of over 120,000 files were involved and over
90,000 would be written to each CD in your set. While we do not
recommend such an Archive set, as you have learned, the program was
designed to be very robust and handle most anything that is thrown
at it. And this is the pre-release version. It will only get better.

Thanks again for your kind words, and also remember that you can
leave an archive session after buring a few disks, shut off your
PC, amd come back the next day and contiue on from where you left
off. The last archive set is remembered so that you can continue or
burn another set of disks (always a good idea...and on 2 different
high quality media...and have the verify function on).

Enjoy..
--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...

Taz61703 said:

And yes...before everyone jumps on me and pounds me unmercifully
for sticking with an old, outdated, and clunky OS...I DO understand
that I'd probably benefit greatly by upgrading. However, I've got
everything set up like I like it on my computer, and it runs so
smoothly with very rarely a crash or a BSOD, that I just hate to
make any changes. Kinda like a comfortable old pair o'
slippers...kinda shabby but it gets the job done in a very
comfortable fashion.

-Taz

Click to expand...

Ben Davenport said:

Michael,

Kudos on your new product. I will be registering shortly at the
pre-release price. With regards to burning 2 copies of each CD, if
I burn two copies of the same CD in the set in a row, will AC save
the ISO image and not re-create it? Have you considered adding an
option to burn multiple copies? Looks like now I have to either
burn the complete archive set, then burn it again, or I have to
check each CD in turn and burn two copies of it manually. Not a
terrible burden, but seems like it could be streamlined.

thanks,
Ben

Click to expand...

MichaelT said:

elequin said:

This may be off-topic for the Canon DSLR forum, but fits in with
this discussion a bit.. I'm looking forward to trying Archive
Creator this coming weekend, and will probably end up purchasing it
so that I can back up my over 40 gigs of images...

I want my backups to last, to burn right the first time, etc. I
have a Yamaha 24x CD-R, and was wondering.. What media do people
recommend that's rated at a high speed, is 800MB, and is of a
quality to last a very very long time? What is considered "the
BEST" CD-R media? I don't want to unknowingly make a coaster and
end up losing data because I cleared off my hard drive later...

BTW, thanks Michael T for your active participation in these
forums! This is a major reason I'm considering AC.

• Eric

Click to expand...

I am preparing my notes for an FAQ on our site on this topic, so
please wait for the full report there, but here are some findings
that I will preview here.

Caveat: These notes are based on my personal research and
experimentation. They repesent my personal opinions and nothing
more. They do not represent an official opionion of PictureFlow
LLC. You should make your own decisions..

--Don't pick disc by brand. A brand is a marketing company and it
could be manufactured by any number of factories, and it can change
from batch to bath. So a Menorendem 48X 700Mb disk that you buy
today may be different than the same brand and model that you buy
to morrow or next week.
--Some brands that do not change are Mitsui and Verbatium (made by
Mitsubishi). They market their own disks.
--Different drives like different disks
--Most disks except the premium brands are the same quality whether
you pay $.10 or $.40.
--Some disks are terrible even though they are marketed by a good
"brand". Yesterday major brand failed 2 out of 3 disks
--16X of same brand performed better than 48X of same brand
--I choose to buy 650MB disks
--If I burn a 700MB media I still only burn it to 650MB (or so)
--I only use top quality media for long term archive.
--Burning at 24X may take the same time as 40X and be a safer burn
(less Burn-Proof Gaps)

I have decided on Mitusi 650 Gold. (Also Kodak Gold was similar but
no longer available)

Some of this is dependant on the dirve. The drive I am testing with
right now is a Plextor 40/12/40a.

Like I said..the above is based on my testing and research so far.
More will be published at our site in the FAQs and testing,
research and reporting will be ongoing. There are many opinions on
this topic. Mine is only mine. YMMV.

The most important messages are...
--use good media
--always verify data written
--a slow verify means a marginal burn
--have at least 2 archive copies
--be careful with storage..many problems come from bad storage
--top surface of disk is also delicate...not just bottom
--don't put label on disk
--never remove label from disk

I hope that this has been helpful..

--
Regards,

Michael Tapes
http://www.YarcPlus.com
http://www.ArchiveCreator.com
http://www.michaeltapes.com

Click to expand...