What is better, creating Recover Discs or Recovery USB?

[prajjwal101]

I want to create a recovery media for my laptop running windows 7 home basic. so i just want to make sure what would be better for creation of recovery media, DVDs or a USB flash drive? because I heard discs are prone to get corrupted as compared to USB.

So what should i use? i'm really confused

 

[marsmimar]

Here are the expected lifespans of various data storage methods:

Magnetic data and cassette tapes: 10-20 years
Nintendo Cartridge: up to 10 years
Floppy Disk: 10-20 years
CDs and DVDs: 5-10 years unrecorded 2-5 years recorded
Blu-Ray: Not certain, probably over 2-5 years recorded
M-Disc: 1,000 years (theoretically)
Hard Disk: 3-5 years
Flash Storage: Depends on write cycles, 5-10 years or more

Source: Data storage lifespans: How long will media really last? - StorageCraft

Bear in mind that these lifespans could be shorter, or longer, depending on things like manufacturing quality control, how the end user treats the media, etc. I have several hard disks and CDs that are over 10 years old and still working just fine. I have DVDs approaching the 10 year mark and working well. I also have a couple of 64MB and 128MB USB flash drives that are well over 10 years old and still working. But I've also had brand new flash drives fail out of the box as well as CDs, DVDs, and external hard drives.

My suggestion is to buy quality name brand products, make your recovery media, test it, and then create a second set of recovery media on a different product. (One set of recovery media on CDs and one on a flash drive.) Test the media once in a while to make sure it's still working. And maybe make new recovery media every couple of years "just in case".

And don't forget to make periodic system images. Recovery media will usually restore your computer to original factory configuration and then you have to reinstall everything from scratch. A system image is like a photograph of your entire hard drive and you can restore your computer to the same condition it was in when the system image was made. If you make a system image once a week (for example) your computer will never be more than a week out of date.

Perhaps others will join in with other suggestions and thoughts.

 

[prajjwal101]

My suggestion is to buy quality name brand products, make your recovery media, test it, and then create a second set of recovery media on a different product. (One set of recovery media on CDs and one on a flash drive.)

thank you for your suggestion but the thing is my laptop is of hp and they allow one recovery media creation.. that means i cant create a second set of recovery media, thats why i dont want to mess things up