Are you faithfully backing up
your PC?
If you are not,
because of cost, time, or not knowing how, now is the time to
start thinking about it again. Remember that presentation you
worked on yesterday? – what if your hard drive crashed today? How
many hours do you have into the project? You'd have to recreate
the whole thing. You've heard it all before, but today I have a
simple solution for you.
Last year I researched
and wrote a recommendation for backup services. At that time I
came to the conclusion that @Backup was the way to go. I liked it
because it was automatic, reasonably priced, easy and off site.
You can read the article at
http://www.yourvirtualresource.com/backupcomparison.htm
Well, hold on, I've
changed my mind. @Backup, for the amount of data I need to backup,
was becoming unreasonable. I was backing up less and less of my
information. I then went to backing up only my important documents
on CDs. At first, it took only two CDs and was not difficult. As I
added clients and client files, web sites, audio clips and photos,
this became a five CD project that was taking too much time. And I
have to tell you, I don't delete any of my clients' files. And I'm
glad I don't – just today one of my clients asked for a database I
had prepared for her in 2005. It was there and she was quite
impressed.
My new solution.
Pick up a little
Seagate external hard drive. I've put one in my store, Kate's
Kiosk, at
http://astore.amazon.com/yourvirtualre-20 or click the link
below – the Seagate external hard drive is the top left product in
my Recommended Products.
This 160 GB external
hard drive includes backup software called BounceBack which is
extremely easy to use. I'm not kidding, when I plugged it into my
computer and installed the software, set a few settings, it worked
like a charm!
I'm now backing up the
full system – that's my whole hard drive – once a month and my
critical documents every day. I've never backed up every day
before. The reason I am now is because Seagate has made it so is
easy.
The downside to this,
of course, is that the backup is not being stored off site. But I
believe my hard drive on my PC is more likely to die than my
office burning down. So I'll take my chances.
I love my little hard
drive sitting next to me with it's comforting blue light always
telling me it's doing its work.
A great gift for
yourself!
Kathy Sparks, Professional Virtual
Assistant and Online Business Manager, has partnered with clients
nationwide in a multitude of professions and is a past editor and
contributor for "The Virtual Advantage, " an online newsletter for
VAs and their clients. Publications include, "Internet Business
Management, How to Find and Work with a Virtual Assistant, " found
at www.vasecrets.com, "The
Virtual Assistant: A Guide to Creating, Filling & Sustaining Your
Virtual Assistant Practice, " "Connected Virtually, an E-memo."
Visit: Your Virtual Resource
www.yourvirtualresource.com
