Back-up ... please
This column is a bit like your mother telling you to wear your gloves, eat your vegetables, and pick up your socks. We know it’s the right thing to do but we put it off and don’t get around to it. Backing up our computers sounds like a fun way to spend a Sunday doesn’t it?
My cautionary tale happened a few years back to my trusty Dell tower that I nicknamed “Big Dog”. I was busily writing a marketing plan for a client when suddenly the hard drive started to make funny noises. I saved the work (thankfully) and within minutes the whole drive just gave up. I had no back-ups at all. Over 3 years work was on that drive. I nearly cried. I carefully shut it down and called my trusted repair guy. He listened carefully, calmed me down and arranged to come by later that afternoon. I spent a few hours worrying and pulling my ancient Mac laptop out of mothballs.
When the service guy arrived I hovered over his shoulder as he unpacked his kit and opened the cover of Big Dog and laid it on its side. I held my breath as he powered it up and after what seemed an eternity there was the desktop and the icon for my hard drive. Gingerly, he opened it and all my files spread out before me tantalizingly close, yet so far. He asked me to prioritize what was to come off first and began to get them onto another external hard drive he’d brought with him. One by one the files slipped off my injured mutt and safely installed themselves on the new disc.
Big Dog had died and I lost some email and my music collection, but the photos and all my work was saved.
I ordered another hard drive from Dell and waited. Forty-eight hours later I was speaking to a Dell rep stationed in India who talked me through a hard drive transplant and I was back in business. My service guy transferred my files back to my computer and “Bigger Dog” was hard at work fetching files and doing my bidding.
I was determined this would not happen again and so off to Advance Electronics I went and purchased an external hard drive I named “Gator”. Up until last weekend Bigger Dog and Gator worked together keeping my data safe. I recently switched to an Apple Macbook and “Gator” was re-formatted to serve my new Mac. Other than the search for a free Mac based software back-up program online (www.versiontracker.com) things went swimmingly.
You can back-up to CD-ROMS or DVD’s but does mean remembering to do it on some sort of schedule and it can get mighty expensive. There is the storage of all those discs to consider too.
There are now online options for backup too. I confess I have never tried them, but I don’t want to commit my data to some web-based server that might go bankrupt or be hacked.
The other great option for you folks with a small amount to data (1 to 3 Gigs) is to use a Flash Drive (sometimes called a thumb or jump drive). These little wonders let you plug them into a USB report and transfer your files onto them. These little guys have no moving parts so they are tough. I keep one on my car keychain and store just the files I am working on that week. (You never can be too safe can you?) Best of all a 1 Gig flash drive will set you back only 50 to 100 bucks.
You don’t have to buy an external drive but when your computer quits unexpectedly you are going to remember that I told you so.
My cautionary tale happened a few years back to my trusty Dell tower that I nicknamed “Big Dog”. I was busily writing a marketing plan for a client when suddenly the hard drive started to make funny noises. I saved the work (thankfully) and within minutes the whole drive just gave up. I had no back-ups at all. Over 3 years work was on that drive. I nearly cried. I carefully shut it down and called my trusted repair guy. He listened carefully, calmed me down and arranged to come by later that afternoon. I spent a few hours worrying and pulling my ancient Mac laptop out of mothballs.
When the service guy arrived I hovered over his shoulder as he unpacked his kit and opened the cover of Big Dog and laid it on its side. I held my breath as he powered it up and after what seemed an eternity there was the desktop and the icon for my hard drive. Gingerly, he opened it and all my files spread out before me tantalizingly close, yet so far. He asked me to prioritize what was to come off first and began to get them onto another external hard drive he’d brought with him. One by one the files slipped off my injured mutt and safely installed themselves on the new disc.
Big Dog had died and I lost some email and my music collection, but the photos and all my work was saved.
I ordered another hard drive from Dell and waited. Forty-eight hours later I was speaking to a Dell rep stationed in India who talked me through a hard drive transplant and I was back in business. My service guy transferred my files back to my computer and “Bigger Dog” was hard at work fetching files and doing my bidding.
I was determined this would not happen again and so off to Advance Electronics I went and purchased an external hard drive I named “Gator”. Up until last weekend Bigger Dog and Gator worked together keeping my data safe. I recently switched to an Apple Macbook and “Gator” was re-formatted to serve my new Mac. Other than the search for a free Mac based software back-up program online (www.versiontracker.com) things went swimmingly.
You can back-up to CD-ROMS or DVD’s but does mean remembering to do it on some sort of schedule and it can get mighty expensive. There is the storage of all those discs to consider too.
There are now online options for backup too. I confess I have never tried them, but I don’t want to commit my data to some web-based server that might go bankrupt or be hacked.
The other great option for you folks with a small amount to data (1 to 3 Gigs) is to use a Flash Drive (sometimes called a thumb or jump drive). These little wonders let you plug them into a USB report and transfer your files onto them. These little guys have no moving parts so they are tough. I keep one on my car keychain and store just the files I am working on that week. (You never can be too safe can you?) Best of all a 1 Gig flash drive will set you back only 50 to 100 bucks.
You don’t have to buy an external drive but when your computer quits unexpectedly you are going to remember that I told you so.
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