There is also the additional problem of diskette failure to contend with. All too often there is a bad sector on a diskette, and the backup will fail without warning. Unfortunately, the user normally doesn't find this out until they are attempting to restore some critical data and get a disk read error. If they would only warn us of impending failure. Lower-priced large hard drives and increasingly large programs have moved most computer systems to tape drives for backups.
Tape cartridges are susceptible to many of the same hazards as floppies.
Not only are they sensitive to magnetic fields and contamination, but they need more attention than does a floppy. Constant use and writing to the same segment of a tape will dramatically increase the tape's failure rate. This is the only way to achieve a degree of certainty that the backup was successful. In one case, during a routine maintenance call, we found that our client had been going through the motions of a backup. As if this is not enough, many computer users express annoyance at the noise associated with the tape drive reading and writing to a tape during a backup or format.