Name: Tess
Home: St. Louis
Public Service Announcement
Back up your stuff!
Our power flickered out on Saturday, and when we tried to reboot our desktop it wouldn't start. I had a few minutes of panic as I thought of all our photos (which we haven't printed out since October '05) and all my writing--but then we hooked up my laptop to the external hard drive and ascertained that everything had been backed up. Whew. Then today, Tom reinstalled Windows and that fixed the problem. I'm very grateful to be typing this back on my desktop.
That's the danger of keeping everything digitally--unless you back everything up, you risk losing it all in a second. I know several people who have lost irreplaceable pictures when their computers went down. We have thousands of pictures, but very few prints. I only print hard copies of my stories when I'm ready to send them to magazines--but I don't keep them. This blog is not at all backed up; I've saved a couple months' worth of archives, but for the most part I'm blithely trusting in Blogger.
It also struck me funny that our desktop was down for 24 hours, but we're so thoroughly wired that we were unfazed. Instead, Tom and I both moved to our laptops and felt secure in the knowledge that our files were backed up. In fact, we have 5 computers in this house (although two of the laptops are very old and rarely used).
Our power flickered out on Saturday, and when we tried to reboot our desktop it wouldn't start. I had a few minutes of panic as I thought of all our photos (which we haven't printed out since October '05) and all my writing--but then we hooked up my laptop to the external hard drive and ascertained that everything had been backed up. Whew. Then today, Tom reinstalled Windows and that fixed the problem. I'm very grateful to be typing this back on my desktop.
That's the danger of keeping everything digitally--unless you back everything up, you risk losing it all in a second. I know several people who have lost irreplaceable pictures when their computers went down. We have thousands of pictures, but very few prints. I only print hard copies of my stories when I'm ready to send them to magazines--but I don't keep them. This blog is not at all backed up; I've saved a couple months' worth of archives, but for the most part I'm blithely trusting in Blogger.
It also struck me funny that our desktop was down for 24 hours, but we're so thoroughly wired that we were unfazed. Instead, Tom and I both moved to our laptops and felt secure in the knowledge that our files were backed up. In fact, we have 5 computers in this house (although two of the laptops are very old and rarely used).
posted by Tess | 8:15 PM
3 Comments:
Tess,
Don't want you to feel bummed that you don't have any comments on your blog! (I saw that in an earlier post of yours and it made m chuckle). OMG about your computer! I'm trusting in gmail and Blogger to save everything too. How would back that stuff up anyways other than to cut and paste and cut and paste endlessly. What a hassle? I finally bought an external hard drive, and I laughed b/c I did it b/c I have not yet printed my photos yet either-starting exactly the same date you mentioned--October 2005--which was when I got my digital camera. Then there's all that music and the thought of putting all those cds on itunes AGAIN. So, I hope that in the event of a power failure--which although we don't live in the midwest we are having our fair share of--my iOmega will save me! Yikes! And, FIVE computers??? That is too funny. Emily
I had my laptop video card go about 6 months back. I had an incremental backup from a month previous and a major backup from about 4 months before that. When the laptop gave out, I couldn't remember exactly when I had last backed up. From a data recovery standpoint I was very lucky!
What timing it is that I came across this post! When I got back from lunch (lil'daddy and I met mommy at starbucks) our digital clock in the kitchen was blinking and the stove clock read "PF" for power failure! I only had my new laptop for a few weeks but I might just get a backup going!
Thank you for writing and sharing this
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