Backup solutions vary with need, following is a basic backup plan requiring little or no investment:
1) Backup Step One: Centralize all your personal data
One of the things that makes so many backup solutions complex is the fact that your data is scattered in many places. Backing up becomes much easier to manage when all your personal data is centralized. This is really what the "My Documents" folder is for, so let's just finish the job and get all our data (desktop, email, address book, favorites etc.) into the "My Documents" folder. I like to use the Microsoft PowerToy TweakUI to accomplish this.
TweakUI is a great little freeware tool you'll want to have around anyway. After installing, you'll be able to launch TweakUI from the programs menu (Start button>Programs>Powertoys for Windows XP>TweakUI). I prefer to start by simplifying the "My Documents" folder by moving it to a new folder "c:\docs\". Then I do the same thing for the Desktop ("c:\docs\desktop\") and the favorites ("c:\docs\favorites\"). Finally, create a folder to store your email and address book database ("c:\docs\email\"). Moving your email database is a bit tricky and differs depending on which email software you use. Maybe I'll create a little email tutorial later for Outlook Express (since this is by far the most common email client.)
TweakUI will move the location of your special data folders but won't move your data. You'll have to locate the old location and copy data over to your new folders. I know this is a bit of a pain but you only have to do it once and then all your future backup becomes very very easy!
2) Backup Step Two: Figure out where you want to archive your data.
Data loss usually comes in a few known flavors: accidental deletion, hard drive failure and hardware theft (usually in the case of laptops). All three of these scenarios can be avoided if your data is regularly duplicated to a second drive or a second computer.
Of course, the best possible backup solution is to backup to a second physical location -- but this is not always feasible. For most users, backing up to a second computer or even just to a second hard drive is a reasonable level of data security.
In my home example, I'm going to use a second computer. At home I have several computers (including a couple laptops). They have all had their data centralized as described in step 1. We set up an old computer as a file-server (it's a noisy old box where we stick all our old hard drives.) That computer was put together from old parts and can hum away noisily in a closet.
If you don't have the parts to throw together a file-server, at least pick up a second hard drive. I just saw a 250gb drive on stealdeals.net for $69 -- or you can pick up an old 40gb from Ebay for practically nothing. Just think, a few minutes of your time and a $5 second-hand drive might well save your business! By the way, this will also work fine with an external USB drive -- but then those are usually way overpriced!
3) Backup Step Three: Get your data backup onto autopilot!
I feel strongly that any backup software that does not run automatically will ultimately fail you. You are busy and when you are most busy is exactly when you cannot afford to lose your data. Some people try to backup their data to DVD every week or two but forget to do so in the middle of their busy season. How many days' data can you afford to lose? For most people, even one day is too much. This is why push-button backup is not sufficient (although it sounds easy). There is a lot of freeware out there that is "set and go" -- you configure it once and your data is always backed up.
In fact, if you've centralized your data and chosen a data location, setting up automated backup software is extremely simple. If you are running a file-server like I am, simply run the backup program on the file-server and have it backup your data folders from over the network. I'm personally using Back2zip but you can use a number of free backup software alternatives to accomplish the same thing.
In this example, I set up Back2zip to run after midnight and to backup each of our computer's data folders. Each data folder is stored in a ZIP file (ZIP-64 style so the archive can be of any size.) The load on the network is completely unnoticeable since only file timestamps and modified files are moved across the network. In all, this is a fantastic way to use old hard drives to provide an extra layer of data security!
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