Before Disaster Strikes – Simple Backup Strategies

If you don’t have a backup then your PC is a ticking time-bomb.  

When I get called because a PC has died the first question I always ask is “Do you have a backup?”

In most cases the is no, which often means that years of accumulated family photos, videos, financial records and music downloads are gone forever.

Remember – photos aren’t kept in shoe boxes anymore!

So, before you pick up the phone in a panic let’s get your PC backed up.

Creating a backup – which type!

For IT professionals failure to create a backup is grounds for dismissal – and with good reason.  Creating a backup is the #1 thing you can do to protect yourself.

Creating a backup is easy and cheap to do, but you need to decide which method of backup is best for you.  There are two main options – an external USB drive or Cloud backup.

External USB Drive

Summary	Difficulty Rating	Time to complete
Install an external USB drive as a backup device		20 minutes + backup time (hours)

Advantages:  USB drives are cheap, fast and can be setup by anyone in minutes.  They are also great for moving data to other machines – such as when you buy a new machine and want to transfer your data, or take some files to another place.

Disadvantages:  External drives are in the same place as your main PC, which means that should you have a fire, flood, theft or other disaster then everything is gone and you are back to square one.

Buying a drive

The good news is that USB disk drives are amazingly cheap these days.  I have seen 2 Terabytes (2,000 GB) for around $80.  For the vast majority of PC users that is way more disk space than you are going to need for some time.

My general rule is that I buy at least double the disk space currently in use.  In my case that is about 1TB.  This is more than enough for a full backup, plus lots of ‘incremental backups‘.  If you are in doubt then buy a 1TB drive, which should be more than enough for more PC users.

I prefer USB powered drives because they are totally portable, can’t accidentally be left turned off, and I have fewer wires to get tangled.  Just be sure to plug it into the PC directly to ensure it has enough power.

Installation

Installation requires nothing more than plugging the new drive into the USB port, plugging in the power (if necessary) and following the instructions on the screen.  No tools are necessary, you won’t have to open up the PC, and if you can plug-in a toaster then you have the necessary skills to do this.   Once installed they can back up even the most bloated drive in a few hours.

Most USB drives are pre-installed with software that will automatically back up your important files on a regular schedule. Set up the schedule to back up your files at least once per week, and if you turn off your PC when not in use, remember to schedule the backup for when the PC is actually on.  It won’t work otherwise.  Once set up – forget it!

Note: not all external drives automatically back up for you, some need you to run a program or push a button on the drive to start the backup.  If you are not sure then the Maxtor One Touch family can schedule regular backups.

Cloud (Internet) Backup

Summary	Difficulty Rating	Time to complete
Setting up a cloud based backup		20 minutes + backup time (weeks)

Advantages: Backing up files to “the cloud” has several advantages – the most important of which is that all of your important files are stored away from your house.  Should disaster strike then you can always get your data back.

Other advantages are that you don’t have to worry about running out of disk space, and you can get access to your files anywhere there is an internet connection.

Finally, cloud backups are always up to date.  The software automatically recognizes when files have been added or changed and will back them up the next time your PC is not being used.

Disadvantages:

Recurring Cost:  Unlike purchasing an external USB drive, cloud solutions have to be paid for every year.

Speed:  When I installed Carbonite on my PC it took about three weeks for the initial backup to complete.  However, now that the initial backup has finished keeps up without any problem.

Installation

Personally I use Carbonite which I have found to work well.  Another popular option is Mozy.  But these are certainly not the only ones around.

Installing Carbonite is easy – download the software and select automatic setup.  The software will take care of the rest.

Carbonite also have a nice iPhone application which I have used to get access to files I needed on the road and email them to myself.  Nice.

What do I do?

Personally…I have both types of backup.

I have a 1TB USB powered external drive (“USB powered” avoids additional wires and it things a lot more portable) and a cloud based solution.

I use the 1TB drive periodically, but the cloud solution is my real backup.

This is fine for the occasional use (say a file was accidentally deleted), but I do have concerns about what is going to happen should I every have a major failure and need to get the data back.  Waiting another three weeks to download everything would be painful – hence the 1TB external drive.

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Too much?  I don’t think you can have too many backups if you want to keep your data safe.

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If you read this far you probably realize that a backup is a good idea.  So I am now going to ask you to do one thing.  If you don’t already have one DO IT NOW!  Yes, I mean, before you close the browser and forget.  Here are a couple of links to get you going:

Carbonite Online Backup

External USB Drives

In the next installment I’ll talk about setting up an anti-virus that won’t expire and won’t cost you a penny.

Related articles

• AsaDrive Announces a New Online Backup Free Trial and Backup of NAS Devices (prweb.com)
• A basic non-cloud-based personal backup strategy (hanselman.com)
• Clickfree 500GB Automatic Backup USB Hard Drive with Docking Station (woot.com)

When Great is Too Good

Some time ago Joanne’s computer started crashing frequently and running slowly.  When she took off for a visit to see family in British Columbia, I took the opportunity to check it over and discovered that her hard drive was failing.

Since the drive was a mess, I didn’t want to just clone it.  Instead I carefully backed up all of her files and then, over the course of several days, performed a fresh install of Windows and all of her software onto the new drive – a laborious task involving a never-ending cycle of installs and reboots.

I took care to put everything back exactly as it was before, right down to the desktop picture and location of the icons.  And that was my mistake…  After my hours of dedicated, painstaking work, Joanne came home and carried on using the computer as before – sans the crashes.  I looked on proudly, awaiting my kudos but none were forthcoming.  When I [slightly peevishly] pointed out that I had completely replaced the hard drive, Joanne merely replied, “Oh, thank you.” and that was it.

WHAT???  No adoring hugs and kisses, no offers to cook my favorite meal, and no mention of slipping into “something more comfortable“.  Clearly the amount of effort that went into making the whole thing seamless was not coming through.

At home I can take the fact that Joanne felt zero pain as a sign that I did a good job.  But what about in the work environment?

When the end of year when bonuses are being handed out, don’t you want people to remember something of your valuable contributions?

Telling people about your hard work and technical prowess generally isn’t appreciated, so you need to find more subtle ways to get credit.  Ironically, that sometimes means doing less than a perfect job.

I’ll give you an example.  On a business trip, I stayed in a hotel where they had treated the mirror with something that stopped it from fogging.  But they didn’t treat the whole mirror, just a large square in the middle, and I really appreciated having that square of visibility.  I was impressed that they had gone to the extra effort.  But would I have even noticed if the mirrors were completely fog free?  Unlikely.

If you are adding new functionality, then getting noticed is easy.  But if you are performing maintenance type activities, or are involved in something that aids efficiency, then you need to find other ways to be appreciated. That might mean making subtle, but obvious, changes just so that people know that things are from  “the new system“.

Occasionally the only option is to tell someone about the great work you did.  If you have to ‘toot your own horn’, then see if you can find a way to weave that narrative into the day-to-day work.  Tools that automatically notify people when jobs are complete are great for this (Jira would be a good example) – after all, it wasn’t you that notified people.

The sad fact is that excellent work often goes unnoticed simply by virtue of it looking easy.

Finding ways to get credit for what you do is tricky but, whatever you do, please try to be subtle – no-one likes a braggart.  If you do it right then you’re hard work will be noticed and, who knows, maybe you’ll find yourself sitting down to your favorite, home-cooked meal.