I wish Internet search engines had a cutoff date option. I have searched on this topic and essentially all of the results are out of date (and thus of little value.) On this forum I found a thread from 2017 regarding CentOS 6 - again not helpful. Here is what I am after...

For years I used CD and later DVD media for data backup. It got to the point that is was cheaper to setup a server with mirrored hard drives. Also a lot more convenient. I see that there are now BD disks with a capacity of 50 GB which are available for a couple of $ US. This might be handy for some more important data which I wish to store off site. BD writers are also inexpensive and would appear to work in a Linux machine. The question is software.

I have for years used k3b for writing DVDs. However, it does not support BD as best I can tell. My searching brought up a lot of discussion about licensing issues related to BD - not clear if that had to do with copyrighted movies, encryption etc. or something about the BD format itself. I just want to burn my data to BD media. Can anyone clue me in to what software might be a good choice? I run CentOS 7 and Ubuntu 20.04 mostly.

TIA,

Ken

Yes, one could use a blu-ray to backup data. Might be better to use a tapes or m-disc 100Gb disc's. Burning to an organic disc is not really secure.


I guess it is what all you want to backup. A lot of times I'd boot to a different OS to backup with.

Anyway, this is a start. http://www.troubleshooters.com/linux/blu-ray-backup.htm

I'd assume your distro has a dedicated backup or typical used backup program that will equally work well with blu-ray.

You're not alone doing backups on BD-R's. I do it as well. You could use M-Discs however I always have used regular media and when stored properly they should last for a while as well.

Right now I am using 50 Gb BD-R's and found that not all drives support all media very well. My newest drive does not support the 50 Gb Primeon BD-R's and I went through over 50% coasters (max 2x) while an older USB 3 Samsung drive had no issues writing the same media at 4x.

I still do my backup burning in Windows (I bought Ashampoo) and I would like to switch as well.

One thing I also have been searching for is a Linux replacement for the simple but reliable Abemeda software I use to index all content. It does not seem to exist for Linux, although I almost can't believe it... I am even prepared to re-index my 300+ collection of media, however I do need a piece of software that is going to last..

Found this article about burning BD-R's in Ubuntu using K3b.

Also you could try to use the last Nero Burning ROM Linux version release. Its final version came out 10 years ago but that does not mean it can't still be helpful..

Maybe read the extensive detail supplied in this thread.

Thanks jefro,

Tape! That brings back memories (nightmares). I had a Conner (bought out by Seagate) tape drive on my Win NT machine. When I died cusomer "service" told me it was out of its 2 year warranty. I had a receipt that showed I purchased it less than a year prior...

For my most important data I tend to store it on multiple media and periodically consolidate and reburn it (e.g. from several CDs to fewer DVDs.) I will look at the m-disk. Of course when 1 TB microSD cards become available or $20 US all bets are off. And that will probably not be so far in the future.

I roll my own as far as backup. For my annual important data I create a Veracrypt volume file just the size of a DVD, copy my files to it and burn. For my monthly I copy to a couple of flash drives and microSD cards encrypted with LUKS/dm-crypt.

Thanks Hermani,

Media vs. drive conflicts. I have fought that with CD and DVD media. I used to use Nero on Windows. k3b looks similar so I have been using it for quite a while although I do not use KDE. Let me have a look at the article you referenced.

Thanks syg00,

I will read that thread as well.

Perhaps I really don't want to use Blu-Ray media

Ken