Dec 17 2007
Backing Up My Life
I hadn’t really thought at all about backing up any of my computers until my desktop started showing me a screen that I think might be related to the blue screen of death. To this day I still haven’t got a clue what was wrong with it except that it decided not to work for three days and was eventually miraculously cured after I gave it a rest for a day.
I had a few years worth of photos, all of my websites, and plenty of other goodies on there so I have to admit that having dodgy screens show up mae me a bit nervous and I suddenly started rethinking my lack of a backup system.
Around the same time I stumbled onto this post about travel gadgets that mentioned the Seagate Free Agent GO (an plenty of other nerdy goodies). It was exactly what I wasn’t looking for but should have been and I ordered one of the 160 gig bad boys. I was going to go with an 80 gig one because my websites really don’t take up much space at all. But then I figured I could load the sucker up with music and will also need some serious space for all those wonder photos I’m bound to take so decided to go the whole hog.
I think I paid about 70 quid online and it was delivered in a few days. It’s saved my life since coming home because I forgot to buy a UK to Canada plug adaptor for my laptop. I’ve been able to copy all my files to the hard drive, including the install files for Photoshop, and have pretty much been working on my parent’s laptop as though it were my own. This will work in net cafes too and that’s where I think the thing is really useful. Sure, backing stuff up is great but being able to plug and play anywhere has so far been really handy.
I’m still a bit nervous because all of my photos are on the drive and nowhere else. I read lots of really good reviews but a couple that said the drive shat itself on them. If that happens and I lose my photos I won’t be impressed so I guess I’d better back up the back up!
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I've been travelling since January 2008 living off earnings from the web. Follow me as I bum around Asia and beyond, getting up to mischief and working online as I go. 
I would advise storing a backup on a hosted server in a folder with limited permissions… that way you have access to everything anywhere that you have a connection.
It won’t be as handy as a portable drive, but you will be taking advantage of your hosts data redundancy.
Then if you back up anything new once a month or so, you will always have a copy.
Since most of my work deals with websites, all of my work is backed up on the three machines I work with on a regular basis as well as on my server.
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Gustafson
http://www.TheVeiwFromHome.com
You’ve just reminded me I have to back up before getting on the plane home tomorrow! Off to the land of the long white cloud and slow internet so have a great Xmas if Im not back!
A lot of my friends got these when at uni and for traveling they are perfect, you can fit years worth of photos in one place! just make sure you dont drop it in water or loose it, then you will be buggered!
I’ve had my old desktop computer die with the blue screen of death and I lost a lot of good pictures that way. Afterwards I bought a 320 GB external hard drive, and this past month I bought ANOTHER external, this one 500GB. Not to mention I bought 1 terabyte of server space . Am I scared? Yes. But I am prepared!
Gustafson that’s a good idea. I was thinking about uploading everything to a folder on my server but I’m not sure if those photos will be too huge. Online backup is something I still need to check out.
Jeff if anyone is going to drop it or ose it, it will be me! But I guess I’ve just got to risk it.
Holy crap Jen… my, what a big hard drive you have!
I second backing up to your server! At least your faves.