24 September 2010

Backup Averts Disaster

Do you have a back up system that backs up all your data? Always?

I was just reading my email 2 days ago when it happened. My 4 year old iMac, which had been running very slowly for a few days, closed down altogether and wouldn't reopen. At all! My husband tried the things that he could find in his Apple directions to do and when that didn't work, he called Tech Support and talked to some nice young men about what to do. It ended up that their recommendations failed too so today we took my computer to the Apple repair shop near us. The diagnosis: "bad block" on the hard drive. They'll install a new hard drive and, luckily (thank you, John), I have all my data backed up.

Hence my exhortation to make sure you have a back up drive that automatically backs up all your data on a regular basis. It makes my head ache and my heart sink to think about losing everything on my computer. Unthinkable! You really need to do this!

5 comments:

  1. As a computer professional, I have to agree. Most computers have CDRW's, if not DVDRW's, so the notion of taking 'incrementals' should be beyond very few.

    "Incremental Backups" are backups taken of 'adds and changes' since the last full backup.

    It's taking that 'Full Backup' that's a difficulty for some people because they don't have the equipment to store a whole hard disk worth of stuff.

    If you don't have it- get it. Make sure it's high on your list of things you NEED - 1 TERABYTE external hard drives are now cheap as dirt - so if you have enough money to have a computer and Internet access, you have enough money to go out and buy and external drive.

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  2. Having just lost my MacBook, I concur.

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  3. Wow, Lou. I don't even understand a lot of what you said except for the conclusion but thanks for chiming in because others will. And you're right, it didn't cost much at all.

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  4. I'm glad for you that you had the back-up. You're right, it would be a tragedy to lose everything. I've got an external hard drive that does the job for me, but (knock wood) in 22 years of using a computer at home, I've never had to use it to restore lost data. Viruses, on the other hand? Gah.

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