Make sure you backup your data - now
And that's what happened to Busines 2.0, one of the few magazines I actually buy (the others are Fast Company and Wired). According to some news Business 2.0 lost its main content server with all the material for the next issue.
They did backups. But apparently didn't test the backup lately - and the process failed to restore the so needed content.
Lucky for them most of the material was sent to lawyers for review and approval - but all the art work needed to be redone.
How are you doing today? Here are some tips:
If you are running Windows Vista, the Backup and Restore Center offers a handy basic file backup and restore, and in some versions (Business, Ultimate, Enterprise) a Complete PC Backup and restore option. It will copy the entire hard drive to an external drive and you will be able to restore your digital life to the exact image of that backup. It will do incremental backups, meaning you will be able to do faster backups over time.
Try an on-line service. There are free ones (up to 5GB) such as Xdrive, and some inexpensive options such as Carbonite. These are set and forget things, and they will copy your data to servers over the Internet. Of course you will need some fast broadband and an unlimited account or at least a large allowance for all the data backup. In New Zealand you can also try local solution NZDrive.
Try a backup to another computer. You could use Memeo and forget about this. Set it to backup your files to another computer on your network, and forget it. It's all automatic. And Memeo works on Windows and Mac OS.
Get into the home network server space. Try Windows Home Server. This might need a bit more knowledge, and more hardware, but it's getting to a point where some households have more than one computer, and this is an automated solution for backup nightmares. It will store automatic backups from all PCs in your network, and allow for restores over the LAN.
And of course test the restore to see if it all works. After all storing the data away but not being able to retrieve is not fun.
Most importantly: practice safe computing.
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Comment by Paranoid, on 4-MAY-2007 04:22
Tough break for commenter Antzzz - but the lesson is clear: storing backup copies at the same site is a recipe for trouble. Whether it is a thief, a natural disaster, or some other terrible accident (like a fire or something), backup data kept at the same site as production data is vulnerable to many of the events that cause it to be needed. Finding an online service that a) works and b) you trust is hard - Mauricio mentions a couple (I use ElephantDrive - so far, so good).
Question - does Memeo run on two computers that one user controls, or does it peer up with other anonymously, or something like that?
Comment by AndrewTD, on 30-MAR-2008 12:26
There are a few portable USB connected external hard disk drives, with built in backup software available these days.
Has anyone had experience with these - would you recommend them in gerenarl over the "over the net" style of backup, and are there any particular brands/models people recommend?
(I'm looking to build a solution to backup my daughter's PC that she can take with her when she leaves home.)
Comment by InverAnton, on 22-MAR-2009 16:01
I now have a network of 2 XP computers. Backup software on sale seems to offer just a timed task. That option already comes bundled with XP. That's pretty useless if it fails because the recipient computer was off.
What I want is a program that will do an incremental backup once daily when both computers are on. One is on most of the time, the other just now and then.
Alternatively, do any offsite storage outfits offer software bundled in with the cost of backup. (I'm not rich.)
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Comment by Antzzz, on 3-MAY-2007 15:44
I'll second that - had a burglary the other day and my partner's laptop with her uni notes on was taken. Insurance can replace the laptop, but the data is gooooooone... Thankfully they were obviously only looking for easy stuff to carry and didn't taken any of the PCs in the house with years of photos etc stored on them.
So a valuable lesson in why offsite backups are needed - all the RAID in the world won't save you if a thief takes the whole PC...