Do you have a back up system in place for your computer? If you have ever had the misfortune of a fried hard drive, you probably know the importance of having some sort of back up in place. Recently, we have been reaching the maximum capacity for data on our home computer, laptop and back up hard drive. We’ve had to do a lot of shifting of data and have come to the conclusion that it’s time to upgrade the back up system.
Sometime in early 2003, we lost everything on our computer. Our PC was only about a year old and we couldn’t believe the hard drive failed. The worst part about that event was that it was right after my first child was born. Every picture, every financial transaction… E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G… gone. When my tech guy tried to recover the files, all he could come up with was one tiny scrap of data from Quicken from 1993. From that point on, we made a point to install a back up plan. Something to protect us from that awful feeling of loosing everything.
It’s amazing how quickly you can fill up a hard drive with various pictures, videos and the many documents created for both business and personal life. We have been looking into either buying a new computer or an additional back up external hard drive and after may online searches and trips to the computer store, we finally bought a new 2 terabyte hard drive. I always think that it’s important to weigh all your options when making this type of upgrade.
Recently, I was reading a great article in Family Circle on having a back up plan and the author has some really good data on what’s type of plans are out there. Be informed and see what your options are! Here are a few highlights…
Virtual Services – Online Services: A remote, online, or managed backup service is a service that provides users with a system for backing up and storing computer files. Online backup providers are companies that provide this type of service (courtesy of wikipedia)
- Annual expense, typically cost $50-$100 per year.
- Need to have high speed internet to support these services.
- You can schedule back ups or do them manually, it depends on what your needs might be.
- Files will be stored off site and can be a challenge to retrieve.
- Installation and re-installation can be a hassle.
- Various Services: Carbonite – Backblaze – Memeo – Norton – Mozy
External Hardware/Drives:A disk enclosure (aka hard drive) is essentially a specialized chassis designed to hold and power disk drives while providing a mechanism to allow them to communicate to one or more separate computers (courtesy of wikipedia).
- One time cost, typically $50-$200
- Plugs into a USB and you can download or copy as needed.
- Back up multiple PCs onto one drive.
- Easy to use and store.
- Back ups are done manually.
Important Tips
- Create a schedule or reminder for your back ups so you are consistent.
- Test your systems regularly so you can ensure your information is getting recorded properly.
- Create additional back ups that can be stored off site, in case of fire or flood.
- Duplicates never hurt anyone! Burn a disc or use a thumb drive.
