Management Solutions
What things should be considered when selecting an imaging system?
Document Management Elements
Selecting the right document imaging system can be an exciting task. There are many aspects to consider to make sure it fits your organization's needs. Using the expertise gathered from over twelve years of creating document imaging solutions for our customers, we've assembled a list of things to look for, including some essentials and some nice extras.
Storage
Whether you are the keeper of the public record or just storing office correspondence, a solid storage system is a must. Even electronic images need a place to reside, and for the purposes of imaging, this place needs to be long-term, expandable and reliable.
There are many different storage media available for imaging. Each one has its own strengths and weaknesses. For an imaging system, a good storage system must encompass changing technologies, increasing numbers of document volumes and the tests of time. Selecting the right medium depends on your needs and your budget.
In short, there are five storage options:
Magnetic Media
With the fast response times and dramatic drops in hard drive prices, magnetic media such as hard drives or RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) systems are becoming a popular choice for storage of document images. These devices are relatively inexpensive and can be linked together to store large numbers of documents. In addition, magnetic media provides the fastest response time. (The time it takes to store and retrieve a document.) The problem with magnetic media is that while inexpensive, they still cost more than optical media and their moving parts are subject to mechanical failure. That's why computer personnel regularly schedule backups of hard drives: If data is erased or damaged, it can easily be restored from backup.
Magneto-Optical Storage
With the drops in hard drive prices, the attractions of magneto-optical storage are quickly fading. Magnetic Optical (MO) disks are reliable and can store large amounts of data. In addition, MO disks can be placed in a jukebox that can hold over a hundred disks at a time. MO technology is slower and more expensive than large hard drives. The drawbacks of MO technology include the expense and fragile nature of the media: As with magnetic drives, the information is written on a spinning platter, which can be erased or damaged. This type of damage would require restoration from backup.
Compact Disks
Most people are familiar with CDs from music and data disks available at many retail outlets. CDs offer a safe and reliable media that can provide long-term storage for images, in some cases up to 100 years. Disks can also be stored in jukeboxes that can hold 500 CDs at a time. Furthermore, CDs do not require any specialized hardware or software to retrieve information. The drawback with CDs is their limited storage capacity: A standard CD can only hold around 12,000 pages of documents. CD jukeboxes and towers make it more convenient to store large number of documents on large numbers of CDs.
DVDs
Visually similar to CDs, these disks offer the same storage capacity of a MO disk without using moving parts in the media or requiring special software for decoding. With the life expectancy of CDs, DVD represents the best long-term option for reliable document imaging storage. The drawback to this media is its high cost. Currently, affordable DVD recorders do not exist, but all indications are that the industry will make DVD available for mass usage within twelve months. When they are, they will probably make MO disks outdated.
WORM
The final storage medium is WORM (Write Once Read Many). This media format is not readily available and requires specialized hardware and software to operate. Because of the limited number of companies that provide materials and support for WORM technology, it is not highly recommended. The most important thing to remember is that a good document imaging system must be able to use any media format currently available - as well as those on the horizon - to provide long term document storage.