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The data on your hard drive is the most criticalitem inside your computer, and the only itemwhich can not be replaced. It may be anunwanted hassle and expense to replace adeective memory module, monitor, orprocessor, but there is no replacing data oncelost.In addition to the possibility o a simple harddrive ailure, the threat o internet borneworms and viruses has become an increasingrisk to data loss or corruption. Although youmay not be able to provide absolute protectionto your hard drive, there are various ways thatyou can ensure that the data on your harddrive is protected. Five methods o backing upyour data are summarized below.

1. USB Flash Drives

Although I am not recommending that ashdrives be used or the actual data storage,they are a convenient means o transerringdata rom one computer to another. Importantfles can be quickly loaded onto a device suchas the

MINIDISK-512-DGRY-CS

USB 2.0 FlashDrive, and transported to another computeror sae keeping. Installation and operation isextremely simple, and other than perhapshaving to install a sotware driver, the use oa USB ash drive is a matter o having anavailable USB port on your computer. Justabout every computer produced over the lastseveral years has USB ports included, withmore modern systems supporting the USB 2.0standard. USB 2.0 allows or data transerrates o up to 480 MB/s, which is a tremendousimprovement over the original USB speedlimit o 12 MB/s, and allows a user to fll theirdrives with data in a relatively short period otime.Although the storage capacity o ash driveshas increased greatly over the last year or so,users are still limited to common sizes o512MB and 1GB. Mass storage is obviously notan option, but even 512MB may be enough tobackup your “My Documents” older, severalalbums o MP3s, or other important fles to bestored elsewhere.

2. CD and DVD Writers/Re-Writers

The alling prices o CD andDVD writers/re-writers havemade them a staple o justabout every moderncomputer. These devices cantypically be ound installedin a computer case, butexternal devices supportingUSB 2.0 or Firewire are

5 Ways to Backup your Data

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Jason Kohrs

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available or greater exibility and ease oinstallation.A combination drive, such as the

NU Technology DBW-521

, will provide the user a high speedCD reader/writer, as well as a DVD reader, orunder $40. The extremely low price o thedrive (and the blank media) makes or aninexpensive means o creating data backups,and the re-writable media increases theconvenience by allowing the same disc to beerased and reused many times. The mainlimitation o using a CD writer or databackups is that the discs are generally limitedto a capacity o 700MB per disc. Not nearlyenough or a ull backup, but adequate orarchiving key fles.The popularity o DVD writers/re-writers hassurged thanks to dropping prices, and theyare pushing the stand alone CD burnertowards extinction. DVD media aords theuser ar more storage capacity than a CD, andDVD burners can generally burn CDs as wellsas DVDs. The recent availability o doublelayer DVD burners, such as the

Sony DW-D22A-DO-N

, represents a large boost in the capacityo writable DVDs, taking the previous limit o4.7GB per disc and nearly doubling it to8.5GB.With proper storage, CD/DVD media canprovide long term storage that can not be jeopardized by hardware ailure. The data ona CD or DVD can easily be read by just aboutany computer, making it a good choice orarchiving fles that aren’t excessively large.

3. External Hard Drives

As the name might imply, external hard drivesare generally the same type o drive you mightfnd inside your system, but housed in asmaller, external enclosure o its own. Theenclosure will eature at least one datainterace (such as Firewire, USB, or Ethernet),and the capacity is only limited by the size ohard drives presently available and the user’sbudget.The

Ximeta NetDisk

is an example o anexternal hard drive that provides a user theoption o connecting an additional 80GB,120GB, or 160GB o storage to their system byusing either a USB 2.0 or Ethernet connection.Installation or such a device is rather simple,and may involve the installation o some basicsotware, as well as making the necessaryconnections between the computer and theexternal enclosure.The capacity o external hard drives makesthem ideal or backing up large volumes odata, and many o these devices simpliy theprocess by including sotware (or hardware)eatures to automate the backup.For example, some Seagate External driveseature a “one-button” backup option righton the case.In addition to being a convenientmethod o backing up large volumes o fleslocally, most external hard drives are compactenough to be portable. The inclusion o acommon data transer interace, such as USB,allows an external hard drive to be connectedto just about any modern computer or datatranser, or or more than one computer toshare the external hard drive as a back up.

4. Additional Hard Drives

By simply adding anadditional hard drive toyou system, you canprotect yoursel romdata loss by copying itrom your primary driveto your secondary drive.The installation o asecond hard drive isn’tdifcult, but doesrequire a basicunderstanding o theinner working o a computer, which may scareo some users. We do oer a “how-to” sectionon our site or many tasks such as installing a

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hard drive into a computer system.To take the installation o a second hard driveto another level o security and reliability, thehard drives may be installed in a RAID array.RAID stands or a Redundant Array oIndependent (or Inexpensive) Disks, and canbe confgured in several manners. A thoroughdiscussion o RAID and all o its variationswould be an article all by itsel, but what maybe o interest to this discussion is what isknown as RAID 1. A RAID 1 array requires twohard drives o equal size to be installed on aRAID controller, which will then mirror onedrive to the other in real time. Manymotherboards now come with RAID controllersonboard, but the addition o a PCI slotcontroller card, such as the

Silicon Image Sil0680

, is an inexpensive purchase that willadd RAID to any system. With a RAID 1 arrayin place, i one hard drive should ever ail, thesystem won’t miss a best by continuing to runon the remaining good drive, and alert theuser that one drive may need to be replaced.

5. Online Storage

Online services, such as

Xdrive

, allow users toupload their fles to a server or sae keeping.Although it may be convenient to have thedata available wherever an internet connectionis available, there are a ew limitations.The services generally charge a monthly eerelative to the amount o storage spacerequired. At Xdrive, or example, 5GB ostorage costs $9.95 per month, which canquickly add up to more than one would spendon any o the other options discussed.Security is supposed to be very tight on theseservices, but no matter how secure it mayseem, it is still just a password keeping pryingeyes rom your potentially sensitivedocuments.The speed o your internet connection willalso weigh heavily on the convenience o yourbackup, and no matter what type o connectionyou have; it can’t compete with local datatranser rates.Final WordsAlthough not a comprehensive list o optionsavailable or backing up your data, the fveitems listed provide some simple and relativelyaordable means to ensure that your data isnot lost. Data loss is an extremely rustratingand potentially costly situation, but one thatcan be avoided.

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