Lost Data Problems – What Should You Do.

We would all like to think that we are immune to a system failure and that our trusty computers will just keep on going without a hint of a problem. Sadly regardless of whether you’re are a home or business user, systems are prone to boot up failures and these often result in unexpected data loss of varying degrees.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing and if you have ever experienced a data loss in the past you will at least have at the very least a modicum of experience to guide you. But that said there are many signs of impending system failure so what symptoms should you be on your guard against?

Your computer appears to be starting normally but fails to present the log in window: Typically this can be put down to a number of different causes that could be either hardware or software centric. What this means is that it may be a mechanical problem such as a hard drive failing, or could be one of your drivers failing or a corrupt system file. Starting in safe mode may help but not always.

Your computer loses its zing and starts to feel very jaded and slow: This could be the result of hard drive fragmentation which can be rectified, or could be a more serious operating system problem. The potential for data loss is possible in both scenarios and the most serious operating system problems are best dealt with by doing a totally clean OS install.

Virus or Malware infection: Computer viruses and other Malware applications, if not properly handled from the start, will inevitably lead to situations whereby a full reinstall is the only option to truly remove all trace of the malicious software from the system.

So what are the options here once the problem has arrived, and how can we avoid any form of data loss when in a lot of circumstances the only answer is to wipe our system and start from fresh?

The Key, wherever possible, and where there is no hard disk drive fault requiring professional data recovery services is simple: Backup! Sounds simple enough if the drive is working fine, but not enough people do it.

External hard drives can be purchased in most computer shops now days and a quick search online for online backup will also give you a number of remote back up options.

So what’s the answer when the data loss monster has knocked at your door? Well if you truly cannot afford to lose data, take out the hard drive from the machine and replace it with a new device for the reinstall. This leaves you the option of professional help if all else fails.

You can find more great advice on data recovery and in particular for businesses raid data recovery here.

You Just Can't know when a Computer Crash is Going to Happen

Backing up your business data files is important.

Anyone who isn't making their living from their computer should also find it important to backup their personal files, photos, and music.It wouldn't be a good time losing everything from family photos to your personal finances due to a PC virus or piece of spyware.Since we have started storing our entire lives on our computer it really is a must that we start backing up that data.

Haven't Had the Luxury of having a Computer Crash? You're one of the Lucky Ones.

While sometimes a computer crash will still allow you to recover files, others can totally blind side you wiping all of your data that was once there.Corrupt Files Can Cause Problems Also Backing up your files actually prevents you from loosing information due to many computer issues.

Any computer user would be wise to have a full Windows backup on hand.

You can make a full backup using a piece of Windows backup software. You can restore everything in your computer if you have a full system backup file. Even wiser still is to store your backup offsite to protect your precious PC world from being destroyed from other disasters. Some Windows backup software services like Acronis have both the tools you need and the space to store your data files.

A product like Acronis True Image is worth its weight in gold.

For making complete backups of your files and OS (Windows) you want to ensure you've got secure storage space online some where as well as the ability to get at that space when ever you might need it. Systems crash without warning and immediate access to your Windows backup software can solve your entire nightmare quickly and completely.

A backup made using Acronis is like having a mirror image of every inch of your PC Hard drive.

Games, movies and music files take up a lot of storage space and Acronis is prepared to allow you to restore even these precious files. Read our Acronis True Image review and learn all the important tools and gadgets it can offer you. Being prepared for an emergency is always wise and your computer is no exception.

Bad Things Can Happen in Threes

Imagine if your computer system was one of them! Perhaps it would be best to make sure you don’t have to go through that catastrophe too. Get Acronis and maybe you’ll only have to fix a crumpled fender after you stop that flood in the basement and rush the dog to the vet because she ate another tennis ball whole. Some days it might be best to stay in bed.

Crucial Info about Paying for a Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) Recorder

Do you want DVD superiority; yet miss your old video recorders ability to save your much-loved drama TV episodes? If so, you are capable to get the best of both with a Digital Versatile Disc (more normally known as a DVD) recorder, as to its clever taping features as well as its DVD outstanding audio and image.

There are presently many types of Digital Versatile Disc recorders on the market, each with different specifications and features. This means that whatever your requirements, there is a brand of Digital Versatile Disc recorders available in stores to suit you.

Digital Versatile Disc Recorders have never been so easy on the wallet. In actual fact, costs are dipping so hastily that ditching that old Video Cassette Recorder (more frequently known as a VCR) and swapping to Digital Versatile Disc or Hard Disk Drive recording makes better sense. Despite this, it is a consumer industry affected by technology and innovation & therefore means DVD recorder features are progressing every month. Find top brand DVD recorders at Digital Direct!

If you are baffled by the diversity between DVD-R, DVD-RAM and DVD+RW, we also supply you with a basic breakdown of the configurations available to buy - which makes are supporting them and what the most modern developments are.

Pioneer creates a series of DVD recorders, a few of which have HDD capability; letting you to tape several hours of telly before transferring them on to DVD when needed. Pioneer also creates a number of excellent Digital Versatile Disc players and Digital Versatile Disc home cinema systems including HDMI compatible makes.

Pioneer is a world famous TV and hi-fi business catering for the home, car, multimedia and DJ equipment industries. Pioneer was created as Fukuin Shokai Denki in Tokyo in 1938. The company firstly began life building speakers and later changed its name to Pioneer in 1961. It has since launched a selection of firsts onto the market, including the world’s first Global Positioning System car navigation device in nineteen-ninety and the first ever Digital Versatile Disc recorder nine years later.

Remote Online Backup to Protect Your Vital Data

Data disasters happen. It's all too tempting to think that it won't happen to you, until it does. Data protection is essential - could your company survive a cataclysmic systems crash, causing your data to be compromised or lost? Hint: probably not.

So what to do? The days of the floppy disc are dead and buried, and backing onto another hard drive kept on the same premises as the original data will not protect against fire or theft.

One of the most comprehensive solutions available is to copy your data to an offsite location using a remote online backup solution. But just searching on Google reveals hundreds, if not thousands of potential services to choose from. So how do you know which one is right for you? Consider the following points to help your decision...


Space

Space is the first thing to consider when choosing an online backup service. How much space are you currently using across your network? Is that likely to increase? If so, at what rate? You'll want to "hire" sufficient space from the online backup service you wish to use for your current and future needs, so work out how much space you require and check out the best prices.


Security

Companies advertising more than one data center offer simultaneous duplicate backups of your data. Look for warnings from companies about your passkey. They will tell you if you lose your passkey, you cannot access your data backup account. This is a good thing! It lets you know that no one can randomly access your backup account without your permission or passkey.


Frequency

More is better. You want to get multiple copies of your data, automatically uploaded on a frequent and regular basis. The more often your data is backed up, the more protection you have in the event of a virus or irreparable corruption. Ensure your remote backup solution allows updates as frequently as you'll need them.


Price

As the old adage goes, “You get what you pay for.” Typically low-cost services take longer to complete the initial backup. They reduce their bandwidth costs by slowing your upload speed, which limits the amount of data that can be backed up, therefore limiting you when all you want to get done with maintenance and backup and get on with your work! Equally, there's no point in wasting your budget on an expensive yet fast backup solution if you're unlikely to regularly require fast backup of large files.

The best online backup service is the one that fits your needs and pocketbook, so do your homework before you buy to make sure you make the most out of every penny spent on online backup.

The Importance of Data Backups

All PCs and their parts are subject to failure. Essentially imminently each business will be faced with some kind of PC failure. The biggest threat to companies in a failure will be some form of info loss or info corruption. While the reasons for information loss and info corruption change, not all are simply fixed.

When an information loss or info corruption happens, plenty of times the sole option is to revive the info from a formerly made backup of the influenced info. Plenty of companies today over look the significance of information backups till they suffer the sudden loss or corruption of valuable information. Once this happens it'd be too late, unless the business is fortunate enough to revive the information by physically recreating all the influenced files from the start. This naturally is only probable if they've a hard copy or another source from which to recreate the information. It'll also cost the business a valuable amount of man hours in recreating the information too. That is if they are lucky enough to be in a position to even recreate the information in the 1st place. If your business has made backups of all info stored on the hard drives, restoring that data will go much quicker and require a load less effort. It'll also need a ton less man hours and tears shed over the loss which has took place. Today there are tons of options available to companies for storing and backing up their information. Some of the options available are tape drives and tape libraries, CD-R's and CD-RW's to DVD technologies. There's also the option to use NAS ( Network Area Storage ) and SAN ( Storage Area Networks ) and even remote backups over the Net. Even Windows XP / Server 2003 offers a revive point in case your system becomes corrupted. Naturally just having these tools available to you isn't enough.

They have to be used correctly and on a successive basis to be effective. Imminently all systems will face some form of failure that may need a revive from backup. The point is to perform those backups so they are there when you want them. It is advised that you sit down with your systems director to make a backup plan for your business right away if you've not done so already. Also suggested, is that you review your backup plan annual too. When discussing your backup plan there are certain options to think about. Like how frequently to perform the backups and what sort of backup media is most fitted for your business. Depending on your sort of business and how much your data changes from day by day you may wish to perform backups weekly, daily, or many times each day. For most little to mid-sized companies I might suggest a full backup once per week with incremental backups at the end of each work day. You can also desire to think about if to keep some of your backups off site in the case your business is influenced by some kind of natural or man made disaster. In addition you could also require software to monitor your backup process to make sure that your backups are no longer corrupted too. This could be a common experience with some kinds of backup media too. Ultimately you can also wish to perform a system revive on an occasional basis so you can check the usefulness of the restoration process that you have set in place and to practice it so it is going as smoothly as feasible. Following these steps might be crucial to your business continuity should your systems fail and you suffer a loss or corruption of info. Setting up a backup plan as well as a restoration plan will also go a good way in making sure your business operations if you run into a system failure. This would help build a "who is to do what" list if your systems should fail. Failing to backup your business information, particularly mission urgent info is nothing short of a recipe for disaster. Nothing is as crucial to your business as the information that sits on the hard drives of your systems.

Backing up to the Cloud

We all know we have to backup our computers, but those backups files can get huge. Add that to your existing files and your computers disk will seem to have shrunk overnight. No matter what size hard drive you have, space is a premium. Besides, it's not exactly a good idea to store your backups on the same disk since you can't retrieve it when the disk fails.  So what are your options?

The quickest and easiest to understand option is to buy an external hard disk. You can often get a removable drive that is large enough to do the job.If your on the road, you need your backup with you just in case.  And where is it when your notebook get's stolen?And if you said "with my stolen laptop?" You win the prize.  And, they are still hard disks and at some point they will fail. You may find the external backup fails before your notebook computer does.

Online backup is actually a good idea because dedicated hardware is in the same place as your computer.  Have a fire?  flood?  theft?At the worst time, it's destroyed. And when that happens, a Cloud Backup online will always have a copy in a place for you. This is why businesses usually have one backup in the premises and one (or more) off premises. The best thing about online backup is the cloud is available with any internet connection. This gives you the convenience of having a backup available both locally (via Cloud Backup's "mounted volume" option), and is stored remotely.  So when bad things happen to your computers, you can still get your data. Cloud Backup is easy to use, inexpensive, and lets you recover lost data fast.

Network attached storage can make sense if you have several computers. They let you backup all your data and let you share selected folders or retrieve files from the shared space. Remember though, dedicated hardware adds complexity, maintenance, and alot of up front money.And if a fire, flood or theft... All that work was wasted.Besides, CloudBackup can backup your computer, or your whole office full of computers with one account.

CD's and DVD's are also an inexpensive solution.But backing up to disks every day is a easily forgotton and thankless chore. It becomes even more hard work when you have a lot of files and your backup spans several disks. The other problem with this method is, backup utilities that come with your computer usually cannot backup to a CD or DVD drive. So you'll have to fork out extra money to buy a third party backup software that will. And then you have to worry about where to keep piles of these CD/DVD's where they won't be scratched, exposed to high temperatures, or suffer the risk of fire, flood, and theft. 

No backup solution is one hundred percent and what you choose of course will depend on how you work. If your data is really important to you, use an online backup like OPENRSM CloudBackup.  That way your data is always available, secure, and you don't have to worry.  CloudBackup has you covered.

Backup Data Properly

Computer data can be very important to us, especially those of us who make a living on the computer. Over the last several years, the computer has grown on all of us, making our lives so much easier. For that very reason, it’s easy to tell that if we lost our computer data, it would completely destroy a majority of us.

Losing data can be an overwhelming thought to say the least. Computers store data, although machines have been known to fail. Even though the computer has become a lot more reliable over the years, it is virtually impossible to prevent computers from losing data.

You don’t need to take this lying down through, as you can indeed fight back. The ideal way to ensure that you never lose your precious data, is to back it up and keep backing it up. You should back up your computer data at least once a week, with once per day being the recommended way to do it.

In the past, and even some today, the floppy disc is the main method used to back up computer data. Even though they store a small amount of data, they are easy to access, easy to use, and nearly every computer has one.

Those of you who are looking to take things to the next level should look into backing up your entire hard drive. Backing up your entire hard drive is something that everyone should do, as it is indeed one of the best and most reliable ways to backup your computer.

When you create a backup of your entire hard drive, it will copy all of your information, so if something happens you’ll always have your data. Doing a full backup of your hard drive is great, although it can be very time consuming. To make matters worse, it is recommended that you create a backup at least once a week. On the other hand, if what you have on your computer is very important, you’ll find it more than worth the effort and time needed to back things up.

Another way you can back up your data, programs, and files, is to burn them directly to a data CD or DVD. This way, you can select which files or folders you want to keep. If you use CD/RW or DVD/RW disks, you can continue to add information to them when you create a backup. If you don’t use the RW (re-writable) media, then you won’t be able to go back and add more information to the disc.

Burning data directly to discs are the method of backup that most people are using these days, although backing up the entire hard drive is the preferred way of backing up your data. If you plan to use discs, you’ll need either a CD or DVD burner, which you can get for a great price these days. The discs are cheap as well, which only makes this method of backing things up that much better.

Whether it’s for your business or for personal reasons, you can’t go wrong backing up your data. You should always strive to back things up properly, as this will ensure that the data will always be there when you need it. This way, if you computer happens to crash or you lose everything on your hard drive, you’ll always have your backup files to go back to. This in itself can save you a lot of time, effort, and quite possibly even money - just for the simple fact that the files are all but a copy away to restore.

Backup Data On Your Laptop

If you were to look at past statistics regarding the information that has been lost in regards to laptop computers, you would find yourself amazed. Even though this information can be astounding, many of us still don’t take the time to back up the information on our laptops.

To put it in simple terms, nothing in the computer industry is fool proof. Hard drives can crash, the laptop can get stolen, or it can even be dropped and rendered useless. To ensure that we are never left without our precious data, we should always create a backup of our information.

There is no mistaken the fact that over a million laptops have been stolen over the years in the United States alone. Anytime a laptop is stolen, chances are that it won’t be recovered. If the information wasn’t backed up, then the owner will be left with no laptop - but more importantly - no backed up data either.

Just like you can with desktop computers, you can also create a backup of the data on your laptop as well. You can use online services, back it up remotely, or use several other methods to ensure that you keep all of your data. Preserving your data is something you should really look into, especially if you have business material on your laptop.

The best way to go about backing up your data and files is to burn them to a data CD. Data CDs can hold up to 700 MB (Mega Bytes) of data, which means a lot of files. To back things up this way, all you need is a CD/RW burner in your laptop, which most of the newer ones come with.

The only drawback to laptops is the fact that they don’t offer near as much storage or security measures as a desktop PC. Desktop computers have a lot more power, and they can also do things (including backups) in a fraction of the time.

The laptop computer was designed for on the go use, which is the main reason why people don’t really think about backing up their data. When the thought finally does come to mind, it is normally too late to do anything about it.

As mentioned above, the easiest and quickest way to backup your laptop data is to use an online backup service. Depending on your connection to the Internet, it can take anywhere from several minutes to several hours. Although it may take you a little bit of time, you’ll have the satisfaction in knowing that your data is there if something should happen.

Whether it’s for your business or personal use, you can’t go wrong backing up your data. You should always create a backup of your data at least once a month, even more than that if you have a lot of important information that you add to your laptop on a frequent basis.

All About Data Recovery

At some point in time, everyone who owns a computer will experience the trials and tribulations of hard drive failure. The reasons behind it vary, and could include everything from a human error to damages resulting from flood or water. Viruses can play a role as well, along with many other factors. For many years, the need to recover data that has been lost or destroyed has made data recovery such a very valuable asset.

Almost all hard drives can be recovered. Normally, if the drive is making a ticking or a scratching noise, you can use certain software programs to recover the data. Sometimes, due to age or bad parts, the aperture arm in the hard drive can fail, or the platters can become damaged and lose the data that they hold. If you can’t recover the information with software, you’ll need to send the hard drive off and have it either rebuilt or have technicians recover your data.

Data recovery is always an option, from hard drives that are 2 GB in size to the largest of over 300  GB or more of data. No matter what size hard drive you have, the data can generally be recovered. Keep in mind that if you’ve had a computer crash, you’ll need to send the hard drive off to have the data recovered by technicians.

One of the key benefits of data recovery is the fact that information can also be retrieved from the recycle bin as well. Partition recovery, and even information that has been lost somewhere on the disk can be retrieved as well. Even though it may seem like your data is gone forever - the technicians that specialize in data recovery can retrieve it.

From Windows to Mac, everything can be recovered. There are different filing structures and formats, including NTFS and FAT32. These are common Windows filing structures, and hold all of the information for your hard. 

Those of you who have multiple hard drives in your computer, can rest assured that RAID configurations can also be recovered. If a single hard drive on the RAID configuration fails, the RAID setup will absorb the blow and there won’t be a loss of data. On the other hand, if the entire RAID configuration crashes, it will crash big time. Whenever this happens, you’ll need to send it off and have technicians restore both the RAID hardware and software

Anytime your hard drive happens to crash or malfunction, data recovery is there to help you get back your files. Whether they are personally files or very important files that are need for business - you can put your trust in data recovery and know that you’ll get everything the back the way it was.

Computer Diagnostics

The diagnostics that are associated with computers can help to identify any problem or failure that computers show when they are having problems. Diagnostics are used to test out the computer system, which includes both the BIOS and memory, software, and even the hardware that is attached to the computer.

The most common types of problems will occur when your computer is down to very low resources, which can either be a low amount of RAM, or a low disk space. These conditions are very common, and generally result in your computer running very slow. This can easily be fixed, all you have to do is defrag your hard drive, and get rid of some programs and files that you no longer use or need.

Almost all types of computer diagnostic software can find and fix just about any problem that you are having. It normally starts off with a BIOS examination, and goes on from there. PC diagnostics software can determine a lot from the BIOS, from the common settings to those that have a major impact on both boot up and performance.

No matter what you do, you should never modify or tamper with the BIOS settings, as it can lead to serious problems. If you do plan to modify or mess with your BIOS, you should always create a backup first, just in case something goes wrong. The BIOS settings can be very tricky, although they are responsible for a lot to do with your computer. If you have never been in the BIOS before, you really shouldn’t be modifying anything inside of it.

Depending on the diagnostics program that you are using, there will be several different features available. Right now, two of the most popular are Norton Systemworks and PC Doctor. Both of these programs offer full diagnostics software, good for fixing just about any software related computer program you can imagine.  

Once you run the program, you’ll be able to select the diagnostic test that you are planning to run. Some offer you a full system scan, which will scan your entire computer and then display any problems that you having. After displaying any problems, the software will normally give you an option to go ahead and fix it. As long as the problem is nothing serious, the diagnostic software can generally fix it.

The more complicated problems, such as hardware failures or hard drive crashes, are a totally different story. They will require a technician who is very experienced, that can rebuild the hardware. Diagnostic software can report hardware problems to you, although most of the time it is unable to fix it.

There are other computer diagnostic software that you run after starting the computer or rebooting, that will check everything from BIOS. These types are great, although the types such as Norton and PC Doctor are by far superior. They offer far more features, including defragment, cache cleaner, and the option to delete your temporary Internet files. These features are great to have, especially if you aren’t the technical type.

For more reasons than one, computer diagnostic software is the ideal way to find and prevent problems with your computer. Norton Systemworks offers you Ghost as well, which is the perfect way to back up your data. You can back up certain files, or just go ahead and back up your entire hard drive. Systemworks and Ghost are very easy to use, even if you are completely new to computers. For everything they offer you - computer diagnostic programs are the ideal way to prevent problems before they happen.

Online Backup - Top 5 Backup Solutions

Finding the best backup solution can be rather difficult but very important. We are all storing more and more information on our computers and now it is even possible to get all your regular mail online instead of receiving it by post. This includes tax papers and other important documents. Still, backup is only thought of when things actually go wrong instead of securing your data on a regular basis. A few people take a backup of their files once in a while when they get around to it, which simply isn't enough anymore, but most never think of it.

The purpose of this article is to get you, the pc user, thinking of how you would like windows backup running and by covering your needs, find the application that fits your requirements.

Identifying your backup requirements
Below is a list of requirements I have used myself. You can use this list to get started and hopefully end up with a windows backup solution which will make sure you never loose a file again.

Online backup: it is all about security and one of the requirements is offsite backup, meaning your files will be stored on a server far away from the originals. This also saves your data in case of theft and nature disasters, like flooding or house fire.

• Scheduled backup: once the backup has been configured, I never want to think about it again. The backup must be scheduled to fit my requirements, which could be once per day.
• Notifications: I don't want to think about my backup and therefore I need a daily status of the backup situation. Could be successful, unsuccessful, not run, out of space and so on.
• Unlimited space: I will need a lot of space, almost unlimited, if this is to run for many years.
• Data availability: It is critical that I can recover and access my data at all times. I don't want to be stuck waiting for other people to manually give me access to retrieve my files.
• Security: Since this is everything from pictures of my children to tax papers, the backup solution must be secure. All data transmitted by the internet must be encrypted and a antivirus program must be running on the targeted location.
• Guarantee: My backup provider must guarantee my data safety. The solution must be running on proven hardware.

This is some of my own requirements but there could be many more than or even not as strict as mine. If you take a quick look at the requirements list, it easy to already now out rule some solutions. I need backup as a service, not by using a secondary hard drive. I am willing to pay for this service, as long as the price is fair. I would say around $5 a month.

Success
I found, that with my rather strict requirements, I could actually get a free backup solution for personal use and my company only has to pay $9.95 a month for a complete enterprise backup.

When you are thinking about your price, the only question you should ask yourself is: How much is my data worth?

A Guide to Online Backup - Introduction

Why change my existing backup solution?

Your current windows backup software may very well be running with problems and you may even have bought an external hard drive or even have a server running at home to keep your backup secure. Online backup solution are by many considered an expensive solution if you only need to take a small backup now and then, while others think online backup is too risky and therefore buy their own home backup solution with mirrored hard drives and what not. I would like to demystify all these statements.

Why use Online Backup?

Online backup is much more than just windows backup software, but provides you with a highly reliable backup solution, which can run in the background like we not it from antivirus software, that is guaranteed to keep your data stored on a reliable medium and additionally provides you with remote access to all your backup files like is was a online storage for files. If needed you can access all your files or create a new backup while sitting in the train on your way to work or bring your laptop with you on your vacation and immediately store your photos on a reliable backup until you get home. Imagine your laptop being stole or broke on your way home and all your family photos were lost. Internet backup services will solve all these issues for you. One last thing to mention is the storage capacity. While your normal windows backup software relies on your medium to have enough free space to store all your backups, online backup is unlimited. Some online backup services even provide free usage for private users as long as the data doesn't exceed 2 GB. If you need more than 2 GB, you pay a monthly fee, which usually is around $5 and then you have unlimited space.

Online Backup Requirements

Requirements for running online backup are very few. You computer has to be running on Microsoft windows for using any windows backup software and you need to have an internet connection for using the internet backup services. Many of the online backup sites require you to do a test of your internet connection speed and if it is not sufficient, they will tell you not to use their services. In my experience, there is not such thing as a too slow internet connection. It all depends on what you want to back up. If you only have a couple of thousand word documents, you can do it with a very slow connection, though the initial backup will take quite some time. If you intend to back up your whole hard drive with all programs, images and word documents, you probably need a 512 kilobit connection or better.

Wrapping up

Using internet backup services provides you with better accessibility, unlimited space and very low costs compared to a power consuming backup server. This small article is the first in a series of articles about the subject and advantages, or disadvantages, by using an online backup solution.

Windows Backup Software - Where to Start

When starting to take backup of your data by using windows backup software, it is very important to know your needs and what to backup. If you are taking backup of everything, you could add unnecessary cost to yourself or if you are taking backup of the wrong files, you could end up with a data disaster. This small article will help you set up a backup solution that fits your needs.

How much is your data worth?
What would your family say if all your digital photos suddenly disappeared or all your private budget files accidentally were deleted? What about your own small company loosing all invoices and customer registrations? What about you loosing all your outlook contacts?

These are all questions you have to ask yourself before determining what much your data is worth and why to have to ensure a backup copy is always secure

Important files
Here is a list of the most common files to add to your backup set. These examples may not cover all your requirements but they are important to most people.

• The folder(s) containing all your office documents
• The folder(s) containing all your digital photos
• The folder(s) containing all your projects
• Your internet bank security key
• E-mail messages
• E-mail contacts and calendar from outlook or similar
• Website bookmarks - maybe not critical but easily added
• Software or music purchased from the internet

Besides these files, you must also be sure to add any work related program data to the windows backup software configuration.

Determine your needs
Once you have selected all these files and folders, you should have a better overview of your backup needs. When thinking of your backup needs, you must decide how often you expect this backup to run, how big your backup will be and so on.

Choose your Windows backup software solution
Windows Backup Software can either be an offline solution or an online solution. Offline backup solutions will maybe be adequate if you are only backing up a few files and that these files do not changes very often. Examples of this could be your security key for your internet bank and maybe this year's budget. If this is the case, you can just add an event in your calendar to remind you to copy the files to a USB stick every 6 months.

If you are using windows backup software for taking a full backup of all the examples mentioned above, you are better off selecting an internet backup service. These online backup solutions are easily configured, very cheap (free if the backup size is below 2 GB) and a very secure way of storing your data.

This option also gives you the possibility of accessing your data from everywhere as long as you have an internet connection.

Online backup solutions are by far the best option available to the normal user looking for windows backup software.

Using Free Data Backup Program Trials

There are a couple of ways to find the best free data backup program for you.  The first is to limit yourself to finding free data backup programs.  There are a lot of them and many are safe and easy to use.  However, they don’t have many of the advantages of a paid back up service, which is why they are free to begin with.  In order to get the service, many people use free trial periods of paid backup software.

For Only A Couple Of Computers

Free data backup programs are only recommended for personal use or for very small businesses that have up to three computers.  They aren’t equipped to handle the great volume of data storage needed for businesses or organizations.  If you are running a non-profit, then let the makers of a paid data backup service know.  Oftentimes, you can get a discounted rate for that or you can at least get some tax credit.

Determining Computer Time

Many free data backup programs offer a thirty day trail run.  However, that doesn’t mean you can use the program as often as you like for a month.  Computer programs judge days differently than people do.  We are used to a day being twenty-four hours.  For a computer program, a "day" is the time you log on and log off of the program.  You may sign up for a free data backup program thirty day trial to discover that it only works for two weeks.

Disadvantages

For the most part, hopping from one thirty trial to another winds up not being a bargain.  You have to pay close attention to where the data is actually being stored.  Is it being stored on your computer for you to make storage discs or is the data being stored on a website?  If it's being stored on a website, then you're out of luck when the trial is up.  Yo will have to take all of your data with you when you go for another free data backup program trail offer.

Advantages

The advantages are in free data backup programs that move your files to discs or store the data on your computer.  This way, you get to use technical support.  You can also see how well their customer service works without having to pay for it.  In this way you don’t have to marry any particular program.  But often, it's much easier to just pay for such a program rather than having to learn another program every two weeks.

How to backup computer Files Directories and More

The majority of us know that we should be backing up our data.If you've been lucky enough to never have a computer crash on you then realize that you're a lucky fella and there's never been a better time then right now to start backing up your important data.

There's a few tips and items you should familiarize yourself with before you select a backup method to use.Having an idea of the files you want to backup, keeping the process easy, and doing some research on the popular products before you buy are the main items you should keep in mind.

Know what Files and Data to Backup

Before you rush out to buy an expensive piece of software to backup your system you need to know what it is you want backed up.Some of the backup programs are designed to create complete system backups, how ever this is often more then the average computer user needs.

The majority of home PC users need their photos, videos, and Documents backed up but can skip all the system stuff. This is just a bit to technical to get into for the average computer user.

Go for Simple not Feature Rich

More features in a piece of backup software or online service doesn't automatically make that service or program better.Trust me when I tell you to avoid buying a service or program that is very feature rich. Get the features you need but to many features slows down the backup process, this will in turn make it difficult for you to stick to a regular backup routine.

Instead opt for a simple program, more specifically one that backups up your files all on it's own and only requires a one time setup.Two online backup services that meet these criteria are Carbonite Backup and Mozy Backup.

Do your Homework

Before you rush out not to purchase a program or subscribe to a service take a bit of time to read the latest online backup reviews, and ensure you're getting a good product. This just confirms that the software or service you've chosen is every bit as good as it claims to be.

A few minutes doing some research can save you a big headache later on if a service isn't easy to restore files that are backed up, or worse doesn't backup data correctly.

How To Retrieve A Deleted File

Your first reaction if you've just accidentally deleted a file on your computer is probably to go to the recycle bin. Depending on where you deleted the file from, there's a reasonable probability that your file will be showing there and you can just right click your mouse and select "Restore".

But what can you do if the file doesn't show up in your recycle bin? Does that mean that it's been lost forever? Murphy's Law says that files deleted by accident are usually ones that you haven't got a backup of. What a pain!

Forunately it's almost always, it's perfectly possible to get back a deleted file. Even if your recycle bin thinks otherwise. This is because the Windows filing system doesn't delete the file but rather it flags the space occupied as something it can use again when it needs to.

The bad news is that the more you do on your computer, the higher the risk that Windows will overwrite some or all of the lost file, which will make recovering it expensive or maybe not even possible.

So you need to stop what you're doing on your computer. That means stop everything. Including browsing the internet, scanning your iTunes library, and so on. The more time you take to stop, the higher the chance that Windows will think it can re-use the space you've created by deleting the file.

If you can use a different PC, use that to download a file undelete utility like this one. If you can't get hold of a different computer then you may get away with using your current PC (the chance increases if there is a large amount of disk space left unused) but this is definitely not the best way.

Once you've got your copy of a program to undelete files, it's just a matter of pressing "next" most of the time and there's an exceptionally big probability that the software will recover the file you accidentally deleted.

You can download a file undelete program here. It's even got a free trial, so you'll know that it works for you.

Speaking About Data Recovery

At some point in time, everyone who owns a computer will experience the trials and tribulations of hard drive failure. The reasons behind it vary, and could include everything from a human error to damages resulting from flood or water. Viruses can play a role as well, along with many other factors. For many years, the need to recover data that has been lost or destroyed has made data recovery such a very valuable asset.

Almost all hard drives can be recovered. Normally, if the drive is making a ticking or a scratching noise, you can use certain software programs to recover the data. Sometimes, due to age or bad parts, the aperture arm in the hard drive can fail, or the platters can become damaged and lose the data that they hold. If you can’t recover the information with software, you’ll need to send the hard drive off and have it either rebuilt or have technicians recover your data.

Data recovery is always an option, from hard drives that are 2 GB in size to the largest of over 300 GB or more of data. No matter what size hard drive you have, the data can generally be recovered. Keep in mind that if you’ve had a computer crash, you’ll need to send the hard drive off to have the data recovered by technicians.

One of the key benefits of data recovery is the fact that information can also be retrieved from the recycle bin as well. Partition recovery, and even information that has been lost somewhere on the disk can be retrieved as well. Even though it may seem like your data is gone forever - the technicians that specialize in data recovery can retrieve it.

From Windows to Mac, everything can be recovered. There are different filing structures and formats, including NTFS and FAT32. These are common Windows filing structures, and hold all of the information for your hard.

Those of you who have multiple hard drives in your computer, can rest assured that RAID configurations can also be recovered. If a single hard drive on the RAID configuration fails, the RAID setup will absorb the blow and there won’t be a loss of data. On the other hand, if the entire RAID configuration crashes, it will crash big time. Whenever this happens, you’ll need to send it off and have technicians restore both the RAID hardware and software.

Anytime your hard drive happens to crash or malfunction, data recovery is there to help you get back your files. Whether they are personally files or very important files that are need for business - you can put your trust in data recovery and know that you’ll get everything the back the way it was.