OT - Curious what you do to backup your PC files

[csterns]

I just had a 80GB external HD crash with all my backup files on it I never expected which leaves me wondering what to do as a replacement. So I am curious as to what others do for backup files. Do you use an online service or external hardware?

[pheral]

Ugh, that's worrying. I was researching external hard-drives yesterday (settled on a Western Digital 60GB Passport External USB 2.0 2.5" Hard Drive) and this morning my computer broke. Remains to be seen whether my hard-drive is recoverable, but it's rather hilarious timing!

Kinda makes you want to have a backup backup. Also interested to see what everyone else does, i don't think i'd be happy with online backup at all.

[csterns]

Yeah. What's really weird is that it was working fine. All I did was unplug it, reformat my PC and then plug it back in and the PC did not recoginze the drive. I tried it on my other PC which is has been hooked up to before and samething - did not recoginze the drive. Took it into CompUSA and they said HD was crashed. Only solution is to send it out to CA or some place where the want hundreds of dollars to pull info off.

So now I am thinking like you, a backup of the backup. Someone suggested tapes? Fortunately I had a lot of the stuff on the external HD on my other PC (my backup PC, ha, ha). But still leaves me in a quandry. If I do 2 external HD's can they be hooked up together or do I have to use two USB ports?

[isajoo]

my method... which is slow but works... have a partition on c drive... save all important files there and i backup anything important to dvdr's... hopefully when hd dvd burners get cheaper then that will be the best method to backup.

32 cents for 4.6gbs is priceless.
that only 6.95 for 100gbs of data...saved permanenty. put it in a safety deposit box and open after 40 years... stilll in tack.

[Edgar_]

I have a drive F - 80Gb Sata drive as a primary copy point, then I use DVD-R beyond that.

I just setup a batch to run a copy - a bit manual and time intensive though.

I also was lookign at gettign one of the usb externals with the backup button & scheduling - I'll have to investigate other forums and CNet to research first I guess. I dumped my old 4mm tape drive years ago.

HA! Jason just put this subject up as a front page article

http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/articles.php?action=expand,48954

[pheral]

Only solution is to send it out to CA or some place where the want hundreds of dollars to pull info off.

Although, when my hard-drive crashed a couple of years ago i was able to find a local computer expert who extracted and transferred all my stuff back to my PC for a really minimal cost. Were talking about 100 dollars, which i would pay quite happily for all my hard-drive contents. Might be worth phoning some private PC repair people, to see if you can find cheaper.
I'm having to do that tonight, for my PC. :(

And lol, yeah, i saw the front page blog a few minutes after this one and did a bit of a double take.

[Pocketjumper]

I use a simple RAID 5 setup: A couple of Seagate 200GB hard drives provide full data backup, plus a minor performance boost.