June 10th, 2015

When did you last back up your data?

What exactly got backed up?

If you are not sure about either of the above questions, it is time to get organized. No matter how fortunate you may have been so far, it is almost inevitable that a data crisis will occur at some point. There are rarely any second chances! You have to be prepared, because these disasters tend to happen in the blink of an eye and at the most inconvenient times.

What is a data crisis?

1. My hard disk drive crashed
   
2. We had a storm and all our electronic stuff is ruined
   
3. Someone stole my laptop
   
4. I opened a malicious email attachment and now my documents are all encrypted
   
5. I dropped my laptop and now it is dead. There is just nothing there at all.
   
6. I accidentally deleted half my stuff and can’t un-delete it
   

Backing up is neither difficult nor expensive

In a typical home or small office, both the cost and degree of difficulty are low. All you need is a portable hard disk drive and software to run the process. Get somebody like me to set up the software to back up all the folders on your computer that contain valuable data.

Typically this would include these folders: 

• My Documents
  
• My Pictures 
  
• Desktop 
  
• Favorites
  
• Email
  

Other common folders are MYOB or QuickBooks accounting folders and iPhone backups.

Once the software is set up, schedule a reminder or alarm on your phone to remind you to perform regular backups, say at least once a week. In a busy office, perhaps once a day is necessary. At crisis time, you do not want your most recent back up to be three months old!

Your first backup may take a while, depending on how much data you have, but future backups usually only take a few minutes, as they only have to process new items and changes.

Here are a few extra tips to help you protect your data:

1. Do not leave your backup disk plugged into the computer or the power wall socket between backups. If it is plugged in to the power you are at risk from electrical surges, and if it is plugged into the computer you are at risk from viruses. Just un-plug it when you have finished the backup. The portable drives don’t plug into the wall socket, so you just need to un-plug it from the USB port on the computer.
   
2. Don’t keep your back up in your laptop carry bag! Also, if your data is particularly valuable or there is a lot of it, consider having two backup drives and keeping one at a separate location (an off-site backup).
   
3. Every few weeks you should verify your backup. By that, I mean you should look on the portable hard drive and make sure you see what you expect. Look for recent documents, try opening a few of them. Look for pictures and make sure they are all there. You don’t want to find that something important is not being backed up.
   

What to do next if you are not protected

Give me a call or email me, and we can arrange a time for me to set up the backup as soon as is practical. A 500 Gig portable backup drive is about $80 (you may already have one) the software I use is free, and depending on how much data you have got, a visit from me should be about $100 or less for the first or main computer and $50 for additional computers.

You can use one portable hard disk for several computers with no problems.

Get started today and make backing up a habit!

You will have peace of mind and some day you will be glad you took this advice.

Dig​ital System Support Services