When  your computer’s hard drive fails is not the time to think about having a backup. I say when, because there is no “if”; your drive will eventually fail. It just happens.

Having a backup plan running and in place makes everything so nice.
Losing your important photos, documents and emails from not having a backup, not so nice.

So, how do you get a backup going and make sure your digital life doesn’t go up in smoke?

Home computers generally do not need the backup protection business computers need, and you can get away with the more simple solutions available. However, if your home computer is your business computer, like mine, you should consider business level PC backups.

There are various “one touch” backup drives on the market which seem to come with everything you need to “set it, and forget it”. I have personally not used one of these drives and cannot vouch for them, but a single backup, located in the same room as my PC… Doesn’t sound to safe to me. Am I going to remember to grab that hard drive, along with anything else I need, should a fire break out?

Many versions of Windows have built in, or add-on in the case of XP Home, software from Microsoft that will create various types of backups. I have used these in the past, and while everything appears to run fine – it doesn’t always. When I was recovering from one of my massive backups, several of the files could not be read and my backup was toast. The Windows backup software also isn’t very easy to use, especially for ‘non-technical’ computer users. Personally, I give it two thumbs down.

So what’s my current method for doing backups of my data? Backing up my PC is actually two part, and quite inexpensive!

Part 1) All of my important data files are saved on a USB MyBook 1TB Mirroring Edition.
This handy little device connects through USB, and provides 2 500 gigabyte  drives, but only a single hard drive is available on my computer, as they are mirrored. Whenever I copy data to the one 500gig drive, it is mirrored (exact copy) on to the second hard drive. I keep all of my important data on the drive – Quicken data, photos, web sites, invoices, etc. Should one of the drives fail, I simply replace it and the data is rebuilt from the other 500gig backup drive.
The problem: if a file gets corrupted, it gets mirrored, giving me two damaged copies of a file. Add to that, all my data is still in the same place.
That’s where part two comes in to play.

Part 2) If there was ever a fire, I don’t want to have to think about grabbing a drive. That’s where Bastionpoint Technology’s managed offsite backup solution comes in to play. Every night, my main hard drive (the one with Windows and all of my software) and select files from MyBook are backed up. Any changed data is securely and magically transported over the internet to two offsite servers. My whole computer and all of my drives could melt into a smoldering puddle of plastic and charred metal, and I won’t lose any of my files. I just get another computer, call up Bastionpoint, and get rolling as if nothing ever happened. And, if any of my files get corrupted, the good backed up copies can be restored.

I’m interested in hearing – how do you do backups for your business’ computers?
Leave a comment and let me know!