How often are you backing up?

Having a discussion with some writers at a forum recently it became obvious that many were not backing up their computers at all, or their websites online. Consequently if they got a virus that affected their computer and put it out of action, they ran the risk of losing all of their material and/or not having access to it for awhile. A couple had had their websites hacked and destroyed and they had no way of replacing their websites quickly. Having a secure web server is a must, but that’s another story, for another time.

Now, if your computer is not your livelihood that might not be the end of the world, but just think for a moment if you’re dependent on what you do on that computer to help make a living, then it’s a different story altogether.

How often are you backing up? And what are you backing up to?

I have a Western Digital ‘Book’ and I choose to do manual backups almost nightly. Why do I do it manually? Because I like to have my computer running at an optimum (read: fast) during the day and having backup software continuously run its inventory program in the background drives me crazy as it slows things down. I much rather do the manual back up at night time when I’m not doing client work and just before I head off to bed. Besides I can see the back up is actually happening the way I want it to. And because I use straight drag’n’drop I can access the files on the back up system quickly without having to restore anything.

However, you can elect to use the backup software and change the settings to suit your needs – what I’ve outlined above works for me, it might not for you.

Whatever way you choose to operate, it is most important that you have a regular back up system happening and it should be to something that is very easy to disconnect and pickup and take with you so that it’s not left on your premises if you’re not around (in case of something happening) or so you can connect to another computer or laptop anytime you wish.

Now there are those handy jump drives too – they’re getting very heavy with diskspace and are minimal in size and lightweight to carry. You can choose to wear them on a chain around your neck or pop them in your wallet – very handy.  But they could be easy to lose too, so need for care is imperative.

I can remember when I used to back up on 12 floppy disks, then changed to a CD backup. Once that got to around a dozen CDs being constantly rewritten to, it was time to consider an external hard drive.  Amazing how quickly things change in such a short time, isn’t it?