What's the best format for archiving for future hi res?

Hello,
I've got FCP 6 running on OS X 10.6.8.
If I upgrade the system I'll have to upgrade FCP and will lose a lot of my old video files in the process (at least it'll take a LOT of work to get them back to the way they were.)
So I'd like to save my videos in the best resolution for future use. At this point I've only got copies for hi res YouTube and standard res DVDs.
In the future I might want to go to Blu Ray or whatever else is current. What's the best file type to save them out as?
Also, should I do this through Compressor or straight from FCP 6?
I know hard drives fail, so what would also be the best way to store them? Thumb drives? Data DVDs?
Thanks.

Neal Fox wrote:
...  I know hard drives fail, so what would also be the best way to store them? Thumb drives? Data DVDs?
All media can fail ... my first home-made DVDs were killed just by letting them lay in the bright sunlight for 20 minutes ...
So, aside 'future-proof codecs', for long-term strorage a smart back-up-strategy is essential.
And here come hard-drives back again into the game:
to copy/clone a hard-drive, you simply drag the content from Drive#A to Drive#B - done. (no need to watch the time-bar grow...)
to copy 'disks' ... that is a more complex procedure... not to mention, a disk doesn't fit as much data as a drive, so you have to repeat that steps multiple times.
There are no numbers avail about non-mechanical storage media (sticks, SDcrads, SSDs) on the log run...I 'killed' several sticks and SDcards, just by using them.-
Magnetic media ... hmmm, older audio-tapes got rust; a German manufacturer (BASF) got 'famous' in the late 60ies for using the wrong 'glue', so the iron particles felt off from the plastics after some decades of storage..
Finally, 'hardware' - anybody remembering SCSI? 5 1/4" floppies?? MO-drives? ................. (firewire < chuckle> )
You can actually read a 500y old Gutenberg Bible, but in 50y, most of our 'data' is gone, poof, nirvana....
(no, I'm not grumpy )

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