Chuck The Geek.com

My PC backup strategy for disaster recovery

July 29th, 2008 by Chuck Sharp

I have many types of data on my PCs. I value different data differently, and different data changes at varying frequencies. Here are few principles of data protection that I buy into:

1. Backup all data you would not like to lose, period. How many of us don’t follow this rule even a little bit?
2. Backups should spread across space. Data backups should be as physically separated from the originals as possible. In other words, don’t keep your home PC backups on your home PC. Really, don’t keep them in your home, if you care about the data (wedding pictures?).
3. Backups should be taken as snapshots in time. If I delete a file today, I want to get the last backed up version of that file. File replication is a great strategy to keep your eggs in multiple baskets, but if you delete a file, you might delete it in all replicated locations too. Don’t let this happen to you. Keep other forms of backups.
4. Data should be protected in proportion to its value. Measures taken should be no more and no less than the value of it in case of loss. If it’s easier and cheaper to re-create than to restore, than don’t back it up. Along the same lines, you don’t need to create DVD, mirrored hard drive, Mozy, and thumbdrive backups of the latest download of Firefox. Nor do you need to do that for old work data, assuming you’ve already created backups. You probably also only need minimal backups of certain multimedia and reference materials.
5. Backups should be done as frequently as needed to feel good about them. This varies with the data being backed up. If your music collection changes very gradually, then maybe you only need to back it up every 6 months or so. That’s ok, as long as you feel good about it. Your master’s thesis should probably be backed up 10 times a day. If you enjoy sleeping soundly, anyway.

I use file replication, drive imaging, DVD archives, and online (Mozy) backups to protect my data. Here’s the breakdown:

File replication: I use Foldershare (see my Data Access post) to keep files synchronized across 3-4 PCs at all times. The only data not auto-synchronized is my music collection, because I keep it manually sync’d pretty well, and it’s fairly static.

Drive imaging: I use Norton Ghost to create images of my system partitions. Ghost makes a big file that holds a picture of the hard drive, in essence. If I really screw up my computer, I can use ghost to copy that image back in place like nothing ever happened. I only do this for the system partition (C:), not my data partition. I rely on these other methods for my data.

DVD backup: I make DVD archives of my data every once and a while. It’s just nice to have a hard disc with your data on it. In particular, it’s good to have snapshots in time of my data. (What did my resume look like 12 months ago? Ah, there are my 2007 archive discs…)

Online backup: I use Mozy to store remote copies of my data. $55 a year gives me this peace of mind. Honestly, I’m still testing it, but it seems good so far. The backups are slow, but ok once the first backup completes. I only backup my home desktop, which of course has replicated versions of all data I care about.

Good PC maintenance: Treat your PC right and it will treat you right. Scan the disks once in a while, defrag it, run all the spyware and antivirus tools, and keep a firewall running. Don’t install programs willy-nilly, and protect your PC like you protect your car (or like you should protect your car).

Entry Filed under: PC Basics, Review