This is your inner voice talking...

[levelbest]

When is the last time you have backed up your data?

Failure of your hard drive WILL HAPPEN sooner or later. All hard drives die eventually. Are you prepared? What would you do if you lost ALL of your data today?

Ok, enough of the scary talk. The IT guy in me felt compelled to post this message today because BEST BUY currently has on sale a Maxtor OneTouch 4 External Storage Solution complete with backup software on sale for $119.

The best part, it's 500 Gigs.

So, think to yourself as you are working today. Is $119 in equipment worth it to back up years of the business you have worked so hard to build?

I think so.

You have been warned! (cue creepy music)

[Aaron]

Its cool John, I just backed up in 2001 and I have only done a few new designs since then [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Steve]

Overall Rating
2.4 stars out of 5...Thats not good

I have a DVD burner on my computer which holds 7gb's of data on a DVD. Embroidery files are very small and a DVD can hold tens of thousands of designs.

[levelbest]

Uh steve... not sure who slammed it as it works just fine and as an IT Professional I never (repeat never) recommend dvd as a daily or weekly back up method.

You need something that runs unattended and requires little to no thought. Your method is great if you remember to do it. Most people don't. thats a fact.

My point... for 100 bucks and a five year warranty... how can you go wrong.

[ October 19, 2007, 02:48 PM: Message edited by: levelbest ]

[Steve]

John,
It was from Bestbuy.com.

[levelbest]

CNET doesn't have a review of the 500 but the 250 which is the exact same specs, same case, same software, same box except smaller in size gets a 7.8 out of 10

http://reviews.cnet.com/hard-drives/...-32624409.html

The good: Fast write speeds; includes backup and restore utilities; generous warranty.

The bad: The backup utility is a bit limited; restore utility doesn't work for Mac users.

The bottom line: The Maxtor OneTouch 4 Plus is a good choice for the average home user who wants a fast and simple-to-use external hard drive for backup and storage. Mac users will want to find a different restore utility to use with it.

My recommendation stands.

[signman]

I have a second hard drive in the 'shell' of the computer we use for the amaya and nothing else...so all my 'customer' files and artwork are on that hard drive. Nothing is stored on the 'main' hard drive except the operating programs.
I know, you computer nerds probably call them something else so go ahead and flap your pocket protectors at me...:-p
but this way if the 'program' hard drive goes sour, the data is always on another hard drive my son can pop out and put into another computer to retrieve or use....but so far, 3 years...that computer is not on the web, not on a printer, not linked to anything...and never had a single cold, sniffle, flu, or virus...LOL...
yes, sometimes it's a pain not having a printer connected to it, but it does have floppy, zip, and CD drive built in so I can take files (saved as eps or whatever) over to my Mac and email or print from that.
My MAC's on the other hand, don't have second hard drive capacity (mini macs') so I have a 200G DiskGo Edge drive on one of them-about $159.00....and all the artwork files, font files, CD files of clipart-all stored on that one.

[levelbest]

What happens rolland when the data drive goes south (as it will eventually). The second hard drive is a good idea for quick operating system restore... but it doesn't make your secondary drive any more secure - other than the possiblity that it spins less and therefore will probably last longer. But it still will crap out... guaranteed.

Please tell me you back up your files somehow?

[signman]

yeah, eventually everything dies...my backup used to be ZIP drives...but after 15 years, some of THOSE are dying...I lost 10 years of accumulated Boy Scout logos-every single one available and all the troop work I had done...one zip died.
CD's scratch, break, DVD's...same deal.
So it's back up the back up...and back that up.
I do have zip drive so once a year I take the customer files and copy them off to that and set the zip drive away. Don't have CD burner on that computer...but since I don't use the zips, they won't go bad. My problem with the scout one-it got used constantly and with 3 total computer replacements in 10 years-I had lost the originals on the computers! too late...I learned.
I suppose I should burn a CD with the customer files off the storage hard drive on my mac-but I'm slowly cleaning them out first. I have 3 ,4, even 5 copies of some things in there from moving them from one hard drive to another as we upgraded and never cleaned up. Too late I learned I just had to get a tower and move the hard drive itself!
But I'm looking into getting a G4 tower and redoing the whole system-then it will get all cleaned out and condensed. About 150G worth of files to go through!

Roland

[Maria's Little Stitches]

Although costly, try using a magneto optical disk. It's container is in a hard plastic case, no dust, no motor cars, not a single luxury. The spinning disk is inside, and is almost infallible. Of course there's always a Firewire Drive, but make sure you don't drop it!!!

[Mr. Sew & Sew]

Hi folks - I know the backup issue was on the boards about 6 weeks ago. Today I saw an ad for the same Maxtor 500GB backup drive at Staples for $80 after rebate. I've got a small embroidery business compared to many of you, but I once had a drive go kaput and the pain and agony in trying to get my data left me saying it would never happen again. I have 5 computers in my house/business and have 2 of these already and am going to buy a third today. Sometimes I backup my backup. Yes it may be paranoid, but if you lose your business data, you have a BIG problem.

The url is below and if you can't open it drop me a note and I'll send it to you directly.

Recovering from the post-turkey gorging....
Tom

http://www.staples.com/webapp/wcs/st...0t0&PID=404255

[signman]

The price is great-took awhile for the link to open but the internet must be bogged down with christmas shoppers today...LOL
There is definitely a difference in hard drives, whether internal or external-we tear them apart before sending to the recycle shop just for the magnets-for my sign table-and boy, there are 'stock' magnets and 'super strong' magnets-the super ones can cause extreme pain if you put one on each side of your finger. Yup, we tried-the 'stock' ones don't bother you-the 'super' ones if we put them directly on galanized steel-my wife cannot get them off!
Next ones we tear down I'm going to note the manufacturer's name and start buying that brand for backup hard drives.
As for storage and longevity-doesn't matter whether you use an internal secondary drive or external storage drive-they are going to run the same amount of time and last the same time (comparable brand to brand) because of the same moving parts. So I'll probably take some time once a year and move the contents of my Amaya backup to a CD. Then if the hard drive craps out, I can just reload the Cd and have everything except current files. Doesn't matter how many redundant backup devices you have-at some point something is going to die-but the chances of your main drive AND secondary dying at the same time is minimal at the most.

[susan]

Your inner voice and my inner voice have been telling me that I need a backup system for my embroidery computer. My hubby always goes out into Black Friday and I stay home with the kids. This year we didn't end up with any Christmas presents but we got backup drives for two of our computers and several back up power supplies. Oh & Hubby did get himself a DVD projector.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. We are recovering from my family's Thanksgiving before we do his family's Thanksgiving tomorrow.

Susan