From: Douglas County Historical Society <dchs@douglashistory.org> Date: Sat, 5 Feb 2022 14:07:51 -0600 Message-ID: <CAOJc7HtrjX91fEYdpYBdVqhYxEdauJGDaiGKrGz+Zcw8+Mgt8Q@mail.gmail.com> Subject: Re: Obsolete Media Laboratory setup
Two things to think about while you are rescuing photos and documents from
old media.
1. Are the rescued files usable in current format? Files created with
programs like Word, Wordperfect, Works, Wordstar have declining
readability. Part of the rescue tools kit needs to be software to read
and convert the formats. For photos convert to .tif or another lossless
format.
2. Storage media and backup. At minimum use a 3-2-1 concept. 3 copies,
2 types of media, 1 offsite. The offsite solution could be a usb
harddrive or online (cloud) storage. Onsite I like to have a working copy
and a archive copy. Types of media could be server storage or NAS
(network attached storage), usb drive backup, online (cloud), I stay away
from CD/DVD storage and use Flash Drives as only temporary devices not as
storage or backup. Having 2-3 usb backup drives is a good idea should one
fail.
Final thought, "No one was ever fired for having too many backups".
Jon Winter
Douglas County Historical Society
1101 John Avenue Superior WI 54880
Business Manager
715-392-8449
On Fri, Feb 4, 2022 at 11:02 AM russhanson <russhanson@grantsburgtelcom.net>
wrote:
> At the Sterling Eureka and Laketown Historical Society Museum in uptown
> Cushing, WI (Polk Co NW Wisconsin) we have decided to create a small
> office room as our "Obsolete Media Laboratory."
>
> The question is -- what obsolete media should we be thinking about and
> what equipment will we need. We think much of the equipment may be
> available by donation from folks attics or buyable on Ebay or the thrift
> shop.
>
> Our idea came about when we finally got WIFI to our museum building
> and began in earnest to make use of it with our computer equipment. As
> the computer person for the group, and an old media conversion
> enthusiast, I looked at our equipment -- 2009 computer, printer and
> scanner with a couple of more modern laptops and two newer pieces of
> equipment, an large format negative scanner and a foot pedal operated
> camera on a stand for photographing items rapidly (i.e. old record
> books).
> Those last two are shared resources funded by the Wisconsin
> Historical Society mini-grants and are rarely actually at the museum,
> one being at the Burnett Co Historical Society this winter copying their
> slides and negatives and the other at the Luck Museum being used by the
> Polk Co Genealogical Society for old township record book copying. They
> give us photograph and document digitizing decently. Added to that is a
> donated stack scanner that does double-sided scans of regular or legal
> paper as well as 13x19 flatbed capabilities. It won't print, but scans
> fine!
>
> Anyway, the 2009 computer has a 3.5-inch floppy diskette drive in it,
> something that will read a type of obsolete media. Another old computer
> available will read 5.25-inch floppies. So we realized that we have the
> core of an "obsolete media" lab to digitize these old storage media.
>
> We think adding a reel-to-reel tape recorder, a cassette tape
> recorder, a mini-cassette tape recorder and maybe a record player deck
> will give us audio conversion capabilities. The earphone output can be
> connected directly to the microphone input on a computer and free audio
> software can clean it up well.
>
> We were given a 16mm projector with the 1970 movies to teach Driver's
> Ed from the local high school last year and so can play that kind of
> media. We hope to get an 8mm, Super 8mm movie projector too and a
> VHS/DVD player for video output. I tested projecting a movie in a
> completely dark room with a camera pointed at the movie screen on a
> tripod for recording it and conversion to digital and it was as good as
> the one we spent $125 for a professional conversion. So projectors are
> our inexpensive film movie conversion thought.
>
> We have to think about an old Macintosh computer with their media too.
>
> Our plan is to share it with other groups for processing their old
> media at either no cost or a minimal cost for the assistance if we need
> to do it for them. We hope to teach folks how to use the equipment we
> gather so they can do their own if they want.
>
> We do have a microfilm reader, a nonprinting one that was tossed our way
> too! With a new bulb and some adjustment of clutches, it works pretty
> well in a darkened room. Readable if not printable. I have tried
> photographing the projected images and it sort of works out, but not
> wonderfully, so am thinking about some better camera -- maybe a small
> phone type that could be velcro-ed into the projection box.
>
> What do you think? What do we need? And if you have some obsolete
> media or obsolete media players think of us before tossing it.
>
> A rather fun winter project for a retired computer professional who
> worked with just about any type of obsolete media ever invented from
> 8-inch floppies and paper tape, word processing magnetic strips and so
> on.
>
> I know we could hire this done, but my goodness the costs are high.
> About $5 for a floppy diskette!
> The photo attached is of a pristine loaded 2009 Windows XP computer,
> printer and scanner in the Obsolete Media Lab at the Cushing Museum. It
> has the 3.5 diskette drive in it, parallel and serial ports modem etc.
> State of the art for its time and works wonderfully!
>
>
> Russ Hanson
> Obsolete Media Laboratory
> Sterling Eureka and Laketown Historical Society
>
>
>