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Choosing Which Data to Backup (Track This Article)

After covering a whole lot of events during the day, I entered my office to load these images from my digital camera onto my computer. I was carefully arranging these photographs on my computer. Time passed by. It was well past midnight.

I connected to the Internet and was browsing websites pertaining to my interest. All of a sudden, I started observing obscene messages and photographs on my computer screen. Even before realizing as to what was happening, my screen turned blank.

Sensing some kind of a power trip or a loose connection at the switchboard, I tried my level best to revive my computer system. I prayed with all my might for some miracle to happen. To my dismay, nothing happened. Upset and frustrated over what was happening, I went to bed. All my life’s precious collections of digital photographs were stored on my system. Some of these photographs were award winning ones. I prayed to God with all my might to save these precious collections.

The next morning I invited a computer technician to come and take a look at my computer system. After close examination, the technician reported that I had been attacked by a deadly virus. All my data and precious collections on my computer had been wiped out. For a moment, the world around me came to a standstill. All my years of effort had gone in vain. I never had a backup of all this data. Adding to this, I had my important files pertaining to my client. Life should not have been harsh on me but then these are lessons that one needs to learn in his or her lifetime.

Today, with advancements in technology, you have data recovery companies and software that help you retrieve data from any kind of backup medium. However, there are chances that these options do not always work.

Mine was one such situation. There are many ways in which you can lose data. Your system can be damaged in a power surge or even a short circuit or fire. I don’t want you to undergo a similar situation and that is the reason I felt that I need to caution you beforehand. Now, let us take a look at the kind of data that you need to backup on your computer system.

What Data do I Backup?

Though it might be a straight forward question, there is no single straight answer to this. Making a final decision on what data I need to backup is a personal thing that might differ from one individual to another. However, I can provide you with a generic list of things that you need to backup on your computer. Here is the list:

Precious family and travel digital photographs

Software setup files that you might have purchased or downloaded from the Internet

Financial data such as bank records, insurance receipts and monthly installment information.

Music or video that has either been purchased or downloaded from the Internet

Internet bookmark links to some common websites that you visit.

Your emails address book, phone book and client or personal correspondences.

Email archive files

Personal diary

Important project information and project related files that you have executed in the past

Official files that you might be working on out of home

Literature such as e-books, articles or your personal poems that you might have penned.

Data Backup - The Final Word

Today, you have numerous software in the market that can help you take regular backups of your data. Even Windows XP has an inbuilt feature to backup your data or you can use one of those numerous software on the Internet to backup your data. Depending on the volume of data, you can use one of the numerous types of backup media to store your data.

There are two common mistakes that people usually commit while backing up data: In the first place, they store the data that has been backed up in the same drive as the operating system. This means that people will lose their data when an operating system crashes.

In the second place, people who backup data using a medium such as DVD or CD tend to place them in the same location as where the computer is present. If you are unfortunate, when there is a fire at your place, you might end up losing both the original data and the data that has been backed up. So use your discretion while backing up data. Data is precious. Save them.

Article Castle - Articles Resources: http://www.articlecastle.com

James Walsh is a freelance writer and copy editor. For more information on computer crime and Computer Forensics see www.fieldsassociates.co.uk

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