If you’re not on a network with a network administrator who backs up your data for you, and if you would find it very costly or inconvenient to lose the data on your computer such as your email archives, you should have a back procedure in place.
If you store all your files on your local ‘C’ drive and that drive is no longer accessible, it could be expensive or even impossible to retrieve that data. If you’re running a business, losing your data and email archives is like having a fire.
Here are two simple options to back up your data:
a. Purchase an external disk drive, available for less than $100 today, and use a software like Syncback, available as Freeware. Configure Syncback to automatically copy your important files to the external drive on a regular schedule.
b. Sign up with Carbonite, an online backup service that automatically backs up your files for US$50/year. If you use your computer to generate income, backing up your files is essential and this should be a deductible expense. I use Carbonite.
Backing up your Outlook email
If you use Outlook on a PC your email archive is ‘buried’ deep inside Windows in a PST file. The default location is: C:\Documents and Settings\User Profile\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\Archive.pst. If you have trouble locating it you can use this technique to find your Outlook PST file. Regardless how you backup your data, make sure you backup your email archive. This is not necessary if you use a webmail service like Gmail.
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{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
” … automatically copy your important files …”
While I endorse backups, as a system professional I’d like to comment on the phrase above.
Very few of us are qualified to KNOW, let alone decide, what files are important.
Most users are best advised to backup EVERYTHING to an external drive.
When the system crashes, even when Windows must be re-installed, many files will be required from obscure places, as your Outlook comment suggests.
Using a package that backs up EVERYTHING means that when you call the systems professional in to help rebuild your system, that syspro will have access to the files required to re-prime your favorite applications.
I have had too many phone calls where the user has backed up what THEY think are the essential files (typically “Documents and Settings”!) only to discover that their address book is gone, Gone, GONE!
You are quite correct. A terabyte, for heaven’s sake, is about $100.
“A company is known by the data it keeps”.
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