Just like death and income tax, the third inevitability of life is that one day your hard drive will fail! Oh no, not another rant about backing up your data I hear you thinking. Doesn’t he go on about it. Well yes I do. Even more so these days, when I keep seeing the unhappy results. Things with moving parts can and do wear out, fail or simply get damaged. A recent client brought his laptop hard drive to me which had been accidentally water damaged. I know we shouldn’t park that cup of tea right next door to our laptops, but we all do it don’t we!!
The drive, exhibiting the infamous ‘click of death’ sound was physically damaged so badly that in the end it was not possible to recover his girlfriends dissertation. Data recovery offers no cast iron guarantees. One minute everything is fine and you are busy typing away happily, the next you’ve potentially lost everything. If you can’t put a price on the importance of your treasured documents, video or photographs, then you really need to make sure they are adequately protected.
One copy is never enough. In my opinion, you should look to have at least three copies of your most important files, preferably on different media and certainly not all stored in the same physical place. These days, when you can get free online storage from the likes of Google Docs or Dropbox for example, there really is no excuse. I would always recommend that one of your backups should be out on the internet. Then its potentially available to you wherever you are and however you are accessing the Web.
With the price of an external 4gb USB memory stick measured in a few pounds these days, you can give yourself a measure of protection for little more than the cost of a pint. Something is better than nothing! Go on, don’t keep putting it off. Get yourself into the habit of backing up your critical files regularly. Buy some protection today, otherwise I can guarantee that one day you will wish you had! Ok, rant over.