Wah, my external hard drive is on the fritz

[teresascrapsalot]

I guess I need back up for my back up! The sad thing is in the past 3 months I've had both my computers die and now my external hard drive. Thankfully I've gotten quite obsessive about backing things up, but now I'm wanting to have two external hard drives so I don't have to worry. I got a new one today, but boy is it a pain in the butt copying this many files over to it. I've got quite a bit of stuff on my old external hard drive and I got a few files not wanting to open so I want to get everything moved ASAP. I'm so glad I copied all my new kits back onto my computer and didn't just leave them only on my external hard drive. So, if you aren't backing things up make sure you do it because you just never know when something gonna die on you.

[KimR.]

Thank you for the reminder, it's been awhile since I backed everything up!

[lindseylou]

Oh, so sad!!!! I just backed up my entire laptop and, yes, it is a pain. But, thank you for the reminder of why to keep it up to date!

[Lucie B]

Ouch! You're the third person I've heard of this week who's had a drive die on them, hopefully it's not catching! The last two have pushed me to finally sign up for an online backup site, and my first backup is running now. Should be done in a few weeks lol, I have way too much stuff.

[teresascrapsalot]

Ouch! You're the third person I've heard of this week who's had a drive die on them, hopefully it's not catching! The last two have pushed me to finally sign up for an online backup site, and my first backup is running now. Should be done in a few weeks lol, I have way too much stuff.

Curious where this online backup site is? I'm interested.

[Lucie B]

I'm using carbonite.com, but another is mozy.com. They're the two most popular ones I know.

[Digi Deborah]

Mozy looked like a good deal to me... it was less than $45 a year or less than $85 for two years (with a coupon code) for UNLIMITED space... I'm thinking hard about going with them... I've also heard good stuff about Mozy.

I saw this on their home page and it reminds me of ME...

Alternatives to MozyHome:
Do nothing and don't worry about backup. (We suggest closing your eyes, plugging your ears and repeating "I'm in my happy place, I'm in my happy place.")

[Andrea]

I do the "Mozy"..... It took about 7 weeks to complete the initial backup of everything you tell it to do. You set what you want to back up. After the inital backup, mine backups daily. So far so good!!!:)

[Digi Deborah]

That's great news... I think I'm gonna go for it!! Really... seven weeks... WOW!! How much did you start out with to back up?

[Andrea]

That's great news... I think I'm gonna go for it!! Really... seven weeks... WOW!! How much did you start out with to back up?

107.7 GB... or maybe a bit bigger, can't remember the exact figure.... Remember your puter won't back up unless it is on.....What I did to make it back up faster... on my days off...I left my puter on. When I work, my puter is off, and I shut down at night....As a rule... I am up early in the AM...So I would restart the back up......:)

[Andrea]

Another thing I did to make it go smoother...anything like zip drives, last years LO's, and stuff I don't use alot. I backed up to DVD's and removed them from my hard drive.....:):)

[Digi Deborah]

All good to know... thanks!! I have about the same but since I'm home over the summer, I leave my system on all the time. Can you tell it's backing up if you're working on something (I use CS4) and can it back up an EHD? Sorry for all the questions.

[Andrea]

It works in the background, doesn't interfere with anything. When it is complete it will let you know in the bottom tool bar...No problems with the questions....Glad I could help!

[breeze80]

Deb, my hubby works for Mozy. Initial backup can take a LOT of time. But it's totally worth it! :) mozyformoms.com and you'll get a free shirt ;) lol


Let me know if you have any questions with it. He used to run support :)

[punkinsmom]

Girls, just a little tip about those USB external hard drives. Before you shut down your puter, make sure you use the "safely remove hardware" icon on your task bar. The reason: this will insure all files are written and closed on the disk properly. My techie son who works for a major computer company told me this so and I've never had a failure (knock on wood)!:)

[teresascrapsalot]

Girls, just a little tip about those USB external hard drives. Before you shut down your puter, make sure you use the "safely remove hardware" icon on your task bar. The reason: this will insure all files are written and closed on the disk properly. My techie son who works for a major computer company told me this so and I've never had a failure (knock on wood)!:)

Thanks for the tip. I am going to sign up for a file back up site (not sure which one) once I get my shop set up and I have a tiny bit of time to do it.

[Digi-Scrap Princess]

O-U-C-H... I feel your pain! About 18 mos. ago I lost over 80 GB of kits (all the layered files so I can never recreate them) AND 90% of my family photos. I had saved everything on my local HD & copied to an EHD. My EHD died first, but I wasn't concerned. Then a few weeks later a virus wiped out my PC HD.

Now I have Mozy running in the background & I have 3 LaCie EHDs. They're the only brand that has been dependable for me. I've had one of them for 3 yrs, 1 for 18 mos. & a brand new one.

Back it up indeed!!