Hints & tips

Backups

But are backups really necessary?

So many people get the message about backups only after they've had a disaster. It could be a burglary, a hard disk dying, a fire or just Windows getting scrambled. If you use a computer for more than browsing the net then surely you've got stuff you'd really hate to lose - photos, notes, plans, whatever. Maybe you store your emails locally too. And it would be such a pain to have to rip your CD collection to the computer again.

So get paranoid - I always like to think that if we were away and a meteorite reduced our home to rubble that it would not be a disaster in data terms. We might have a laptop with us but even if not we have an external drive with all our data in a friend's cupboard, refreshed every few months, and online backups of the important data (photos, documents and emails and even some ripped music) backed up online. So to get going all we'd need to do is get a new computer or two, check up access password hints via our Googlemail email account, get hold of the  spare external drive and re-install applications.

Here's a diagram showing how very paranoid (or thorough) I am about backing data - I've never lost anything significant:

Note that it's not just data I back up. I also have mirror images on an external drive of the Windows partitions on the two computers. That way, if everything gets really scrambled or the disk drive fails physically I can get back to exactly where I was a few weeks ago, including all my applications installed and running. Then it's just a matter of updating the data from more recent backups. But on our desktop the data is on a separate partition so would be unaffected.

How do I make backups?

People used to back up to CDs then DVDs and memory pens. But none of those can hold much data, especially if you have your photo and music collections to back up. So now it's basically to an external USB  hard drive, to another computer or online.

There are all sorts of programs that will manage your backups for you but if making data backups to an external USB drive I prefer to simply copy all my data folders across using 2 copies of Windows Explorer. That way I can plug the external drive into a different computer and get going at once. If I'm looking for a file in OurData\OurDocs\Eric\Holidays\Vietnam that's where it will still be, ready to view or amend. Using a backup program instead often means you need to have that program installed to retrieve anything from the backup. And since music and pictures are already compressed you rarely save significant space by making a compressed backup.

For backing up to an external drive kept offsite I use the nice, free utility from Fbackup and make a compressed archive protected by a password.

When buying an external drive check whether it's got a separate power brick or takes its power via USB.

There are lots of people offering online storage, which is very secure compared with an external drive in a cupboard somewhere in the same house as the computer. I use Carbonite's online storage. It is reasonably priced (under GBP5pm) and very easy to use. You just right click files or folders in Windows Explorer, add to Carbonite and it marks them with a little orange dot that turns green once they've been backed up. Make  sure the uploads are not going to make you breach any monthly download/upload data limits with your broadband supplier. I've got an unlimited deal so I'm even backing up many Gb of ripped CDs in MP3 format.

If you have two computers and want to be able to use them interchangeably then you want bi-directional synchronisation. I use the wonderful synchronisation software from Allway Sync. It's very reasonably priced and I couldn't find a free equivalent. It keeps our laptop and desktop beautifully synchronised, handling renames, deletions, changes and new files. The only thing it can't do is synchronise within our Outlook email database. Syncpst does a good enough job there. For files we change often I use Syncplicity to synchronise them automatically via the web.

Some people use a NAS (Network Attached Storage) drive to hold their data but I can't see the point - it's not much use away from home.

How do I get an accidentally deleted file back?

It may well be in the recycle bin in which case it's easy to restore.

If not it's quite easy to drag files or folders accidentally onto others - if you let go at the wrong time they quietly move into the folder you were hovering over at the time. It's not deleted - just hidden.

If a file is really messed up and you cannot get back with an undo option then it's back to backups. So back up often! Don't forget that if it's a photo it might still be on your camera's memory card.

How do I back up my emails?

This varies greatly according to what email system you use.

If your emails are purely online, accessing Googlemail, Hotmail, Yahoo etc through a browser, then you're in their hands. They will back up your emails OK but there are always dangers. If you don't use an account for a while or if some automated software doesn't like something you said in an email (eg "that really went down a bomb") there's a risk that they will just close your account and you may not be able to get back in. I find the best way of backing up important emails from an online account is to set up a Gmail account online then install the Thunderbird email client on your computer(s). Set it up to use IMAP and it will synchronise your Gmail emails on each local computer and also leave them all online.

With Outlook Express just make backup copies of its dbx wab files (Tools, Options, Maintenance, Storefolder tells you where they are kept).

With Outlook try a search for *.pst in Windows Explorer or File, Data File Management in Outlook will tell you where the pst (& pab) file(s) you need to backup are located. From within Outlook it’s File, Import and Export, Export to File.

You can also move your Outlook data file from the absurd default location, eg in XP it was the impenetrable

to somewhere more sensible. Do a Google search on move outlook.pst to find out how. I have always completely ignored the recommended Microsoft data locations in favour of ones much easier to back up, eg in Windows 7:

Windows Live Mail has export options via the File and Tools menus.

Don’t forget to also back up your email contacts.

Also do not forget to back up your browser’s bookmarks. In Internet Explorer it’s File, Import and Export, Export Favorites to produce an htm file with all your links neatly listed. Firefox stores them in any case in the file bookmarks.html.

How to get large files somewhere else?

Email is often very limited in the size and type of attachments you can send. I work on a rule of thumb that if you attach more than 5Mb of photos to one email it will only reach some people.

Putting files online can work well, eg my collection of photos on flickr - much neater than constantly inflicting heavy emails on friends around the country and world. For large files Yousendit and Dropbox let you upload large files that you can give access to so others can download them. More techie people than me can set up repositories of files that can be downloaded via ftp (file transfer protocol).

If you're on a network (eg you share the same router) you can make the relevant folders shared and move files as if on the same computer. And many companies use shareable document repositories using Microsoft Sharepoint, Xerox Docushare etc.

But sometimes sending physical media is simplest. You can get a lot of photos on a CD and nowadays memory pens can be very cheap too. Or you could physically transport the files via an external disk drive.