Simple Manual Method To Backup
Outlined below is a simple method to backup your data. This may be useful for home users who do not have a big budget, or bad consequences if a data loss occurs.
- Purchase an external hard drive, or alternatively a USB stick if you do not have that much data to backup.
- Make a catalogue of all your important data that you would like kept. Some potential sources of important data include; your email, word documents, your pictures, your videos, your bookmarks. The most simple way to accomplish this is to keep a notepad around with you while you are working and note down what you use.
- Organize your data so that it is in a few folders if not already in this format e.g. my documents, my videos, my images.
- Create a folder with the date on the external hard drive.
- Copy all the data from your folders into the folder with the date folder.
- You now have a backup of your important data.
- Periodically do the backup, once a month or sooner depending on how much new data you have on your computer.
- In case of a data loss on your computer, just copy the files from the external hard disk back to the computer.
Advantages of this backup strategy
- Does not require any extra software
- Provides good enough protection for most people
Disadvantages of this backup strategy
- Requires manual work, and so can easily be forgotten to be done regularly.
- Onus is on the user to identify the files and folders which need to be copied
- External hard disk could also fail, two simultaneous failures are unlikely but possible, this can be mitigated by backing up to two separated devices.
- As the external hard disk is still connected to the computer it is still possible to lose all data in damage to the location where the computer is situated. This can be mitigated by locating the hard disk somewhere else.