When Did you back up your computer?
It is a nice summer day, you enjoy being creative, and hate doing mundane tasks… but you really should. One of those mundane tasks is backing up your computer hard drive. At some point every hard drive will fail! Also, computers may be lost or stolen. You may accidently damage a critical file or pick up a virus which locks or destroys your files. There is no perfect way to do backups, so decide what is best for you.
Method One: Pay a fee to have your hard drive constantly backing up to a commercial service when you are internet connected. The service protects you if your drive fails or the computer is lost or stolen. If you have large files, backup can be slow. Similarly, if you have a catastrophic drive failure, it may take a long time to download all of your files to a new drive. The service will not protect you if you make a user error and mess up or delete an important file and do not realize it for some time. The service will merely back up your work, potentially deleting good files in the process. This method might be best for people with limited data, who are only concerned about system failure, and who would not do a more hands-on backup.
Method Two: Back up your system continuously to an onsite hard drive. The backups and restores would be faster than backup services. You are not protected against a power surge, theft, fire, or other disaster. Additionally, you may back up errors. While better than no backup, I do not recommend this method alone.
Method Three: Periodically (say once a week or once a month), copy your drive onto an onsite backup drive. This protects you from backing up your errors, if you make a new copy without deleting the old one. You will not necessarily back up your most recent files (though you can copy them to a thumb drive or email them to yourself, assuming you are diligent and do so). You are still vulnerable to the disasters mentioned in method two. I do not recommend this method.
Method Four: Have two hard drives in your home, and back up to each one every other time you back up. You would be safer than method three, but still fairly vulnerable. This method might work for people not concerned about theft and natural disasters.
Method Five: Back up to a drive or two at home (in case you need to restore something you accidently messed up or deleted). Make an additional copy on a slim drive. Store it offsite, possibly in a bank safe deposit box. This is the method I recommend and use.
Assuming you are faced with a hard drive failure, computer theft, or erasing important files and not realizing it for a week, would you recover quickly? If not, please design and implement a recovery plan today!
I would like to thank Dr. Margarita Posada Cossuto for helpful comments.
by Ronald Shapiro
Method One: Pay a fee to have your hard drive constantly backing up to a commercial service when you are internet connected. The service protects you if your drive fails or the computer is lost or stolen. If you have large files, backup can be slow. Similarly, if you have a catastrophic drive failure, it may take a long time to download all of your files to a new drive. The service will not protect you if you make a user error and mess up or delete an important file and do not realize it for some time. The service will merely back up your work, potentially deleting good files in the process. This method might be best for people with limited data, who are only concerned about system failure, and who would not do a more hands-on backup.
Method Two: Back up your system continuously to an onsite hard drive. The backups and restores would be faster than backup services. You are not protected against a power surge, theft, fire, or other disaster. Additionally, you may back up errors. While better than no backup, I do not recommend this method alone.
Method Three: Periodically (say once a week or once a month), copy your drive onto an onsite backup drive. This protects you from backing up your errors, if you make a new copy without deleting the old one. You will not necessarily back up your most recent files (though you can copy them to a thumb drive or email them to yourself, assuming you are diligent and do so). You are still vulnerable to the disasters mentioned in method two. I do not recommend this method.
Method Four: Have two hard drives in your home, and back up to each one every other time you back up. You would be safer than method three, but still fairly vulnerable. This method might work for people not concerned about theft and natural disasters.
Method Five: Back up to a drive or two at home (in case you need to restore something you accidently messed up or deleted). Make an additional copy on a slim drive. Store it offsite, possibly in a bank safe deposit box. This is the method I recommend and use.
Assuming you are faced with a hard drive failure, computer theft, or erasing important files and not realizing it for a week, would you recover quickly? If not, please design and implement a recovery plan today!
I would like to thank Dr. Margarita Posada Cossuto for helpful comments.
by Ronald Shapiro
