Why you should backup your data

If you calculate what you would need to outlay in time, money and sheer frustration caused by hardware failure and lost data:

• Paying a computer technician to trawl through a crashed computer hard drive attempting to restore your precious data - with a possible unsuccessful outcome resulting in tears and frustration.
• Re-purchasing software that you don't have copies of on CD 
• Begging friends and family for copies of their photos (so you at least know what they look like...)
• Drinking bottles and bottles of vodka to numb the pain and put off telling your boss that all your important work files have mysteriously gone down the drain 

Compare all the above, to the cost involved in purchasing an external backup storage device, plus the short regular increments of time spent to backup your valuable data... Most people will agree that the value of data far outweighs the time and cost of backing up. If you have ever lost valuable files, you will most certainly agree that it is more than worth your while to have a process of backing up.

So which is the best way to backup?

The short answer is: It depends. Basically we all work differently and use our files and computers in a way that suits us. For some people the best option is to use the built-in (Windows) backup feature, which enables you to select folders (or entire drives) on your computer - and have the system regularly perform a backup on these files. Other people choose to backup or sync (Synchronise) their data using paid or open source (free) software. Another solution that is quickly becoming more common is to backup to a "Cloud" environment (meaning that your data is stored on a server accessible to you from any computer).

The main thing is that you DO backup your important files... 

I have used SyncToy and SyncBack for keeping identical copies of all important files in several locations. Currently I'm using SyncBack and haven't had a problem with it so far. It is quick and easy to set up profiles and have them run automatically (on start-up, daily, weekly and so on), there are also a range of settings you can tweak to suit your needs.

Technical description of Storage Devices

I have borrowed some of these descriptions from my younger brother (who is a whiz at explaining things)...

There are two major types of USB storage:

1. Flash storage ('Solid State', so called because there are no moving parts inside it) Most mp3players, 'flash sticks', 'thumb drives' etc.
2. IDE USB storage (or External USB hard disk drive - this is just a converter to allow a hard disk to live outside of a computer and usually needs to be plugged into the mains socket). 

Consider both storages in terms of a stone tablet: With flash, we chip our words into the tablet. With external hard disc drives, we paint ink on the tablet and then swing it around a couple of times so that the ink dries.

With flash, we will eventually chip away so much of the stone that the tablet breaks. With an external hdd, we will never break through the tablet, but inevitably, we will slip one day while drying the ink and the tablet will go flying and break.

The bottom line is that hardware does fail at some point in time - if you make sure that your your eggs are in more than one basket (so to speak), you will be less likely to cry when one of your storage drives conks out for good.