In the past couple months I have noticed a major increase in service calls through Jones PC Repair which involve major data loss, or at least the threat of it. Things such as 3 years of family photos, the past 5 years book keeping for businesses, and other files which are this important should not have their backup left to chance. For this reason I have decided that a basic data backup scheme will make for a wonderful post this week.
For starters there are several types of data which you may have on your computer. There are those things which you want to keep, those you need to keep, and those which would be devastating to loose. Each type of data requires its own minimum backup scheme, however, when in doubt it is always to above and beyond the bare minimum when it comes to data backup.
To begin with here are some rules for data backup:
- Always keep at least three copies of anything you feel is important.
- Use three different formats/media for these backup.
- Keep archival copies of these backups which extend back at least 3 backups (ie. Jan 2010, Feb 2010, Mar 2010).
For the average home user these files will typically be photos and for businesses these will be your financial records. The first of the three copies will typically be stored on the hard drive in your computer. Unfortunately, this is as far as most people will go with securing their data and they will likely feel a lot of stress if/when that computer has problems.
Because the first copy is stored on the hard drive in your computer, you will need a second backup location and/or media. For convenience this can be an external hard drive or a flash drive. These can be purchased at just about any electronics store and are not too expensive, well worth the $10 – $100 to keep your data safe. The price here depends on the amount of data you need to backup. This will bring us up to two copies, however, both of these copies are still stored within your home and there is the possibility of flood, fire, or natural disaster damage. For most of your data the loss of your home would be more devastating than the loss of the data, but the loss of all your family photos and tax records requested by the IRS may be worse.
For these files you need to have some form of off site storage. One option here is to purchase another flash drive or external hard drive to keep at work or the home of a family member or friend. This could also be stored in a safety deposit box for added security. However, with high speed internet availability and cheap storage these days there are many online services which offer inexpensive online storage. This allows you to backup all your files online with a password and access them from any computer with internet access from anywhere in the world.
Set up this backup system and nothing short of the collapse of civilization will cause you to loose your data. Now, you will likely not backup your files to all three of these sources every time you change any one of your files, right? For this reason you will also need a backup schedule. My recommendation for most people is to copy the files on your computer to the flash drive or external hard drive at least weekly and to your off site storage at least monthly, of course the more frequent you backup your files the better. This also takes care of rule three by providing you with a copy of your most recent changes on your computer, one week old files on your flash drive or external hard drive, and one month old files on your off site storage. The reason this is needed is to make sure that if you get a virus which corrupts your files you do not loose all the backups as well. If your files were updated across all there backups instantly then any corrupted files would be lost instantly in all three backups as well.
For more information on data backup or to get your backup scheme setup ASAP, contact me through Jones PC Repair, (828) 398-0304, or fjones@jonespcrepair.com.
