PSA: take some time in 2023 to back up your/your family's CD-Rs (and other recordable media) full of memories you threw into storage 10+ years ago; there's a decent chance they've started to rot!
the tenuously thin layer of dyes/adhesives holding the data *will* break down over time, rapidly so if their environment is uncontrolled, the surface was previously nicked/contaminated, or they were cheap ones to begin with
thanks to error correction, and with the help of free, modern file forensics tools (e.g. PhotoRec/TestDisk) even damaged disks may have recoverable contents. use your OS or a disk imaging tool to save a raw ISO/"master" image ASAP, which you can later mount (or carve) for the files within
cloud storage and USB drives are cheap today (especially in comparison to the size of CDs and JPEGs from the 2000s), and what price would you wish you could pay to get the data back once it's truly lost?
@0x56 I definitely strongly recommend this, although Aaru (https://github.com/aaru-dps/Aaru) is better for data recovery from discs. It also makes sure you use an appropriate format, iso isn’t always the right one.
Also worth noting: CD-R/RW will rot sooner than DVD-R/RW (and presumably later media like Blu-ray) will, because CDs were made with very little protection between the label layer and the data layer, while DVDs separated the two by a thick layer of plastic. So get the CDs done before the DVDs.
vince
Adam Demasi