HDV Archiving: MiniDV or HDD
 

The tapes I am currently using in my XH-A1 are Sony ME DVM63.
They are marked for use in HDV/DV recording and are about $8 each.

One thing that occured to me is that for archiving I can get a 1TB hard disk drive for under $400 and store 1000G/12G per tape ~ 83 tapes. The cost in that case is $4.82 per hour, as opposed to $8 per hour with HDV-rated MiniDV tapes.

When using higher-end Canon or Panasonic tapes, which run about $15-$20 per tape, cost vs. benefit of using HDD is even greater. Has anybody considered/used that option as a viable long-term storage alternative to MiniDV tapes? It also saves the camera heads as you don't have to capture the tapes each time you want to go back to editing your old footage.

There's been a bunch of discussion on this topic, if you'll search the forum. A dual-format archival might be best--store tapes off-site and have your disks for online "archival".

As a side note, most people don't see using the "HD" tapes as necessary. I use the Panasonic AY-DVM63PQ (or 83's) in my cameras for both HD and SD. Much cheaper than the "HD"-labeled tapes, and to my knowledge nobody's ever proven there to be a difference worth the increased price.

YMMV,
Matt

But keep in mind that hard drives can fail, and losing one with a lot of footage on it could be a problem, so to be safe you'd want two sets of drives with duplicate backups at double the cost per hour of footage. Better to just keep the original source tapes, and/or archive to less expensive miniDV tapes.

By the way, HDV records just fine on the Maxell miniDV tapes from Sam's Club which cost about $22 for an 8-pack, or under $3 per tape.