Backing up your data

[Tiger]

Aren't there compatibility issues at play when you buy new hardware? How do I know I'm getting the right one?

You should be able to get flashdrives to work on all computers as far as I know. Mac has went to Intel, so they are more compatible than ever before.

[GaryK]

Aren't there compatibility issues at play when you buy new hardware? How do I know I'm getting the right one?

If you mean external USB hard drives then there are no compatibility problems. There are some issues that could severely slow the flow of data to and from the drive. Like if your computer doesn't support USB 2.0 then data transfer will be painfully slow. Newer computers all support USB 2.0 and higher and the data transfer rate is much faster.

[steph]

whenever I create anything on the computer, I go by the motto, "save early, save often!" but I guess that doesn't help if your drive gets wiped

[Gabriel Morgan]

Well, this was an easy one for me. My partner is a computer guy (not too geeky...) - programmer, trouble-shooter, gamer - and he beat it into me in the early years of our relationship that with all the devices available, I better not ever come whining to him that I lost some data. And I never have.

 

I use two 2G thumb (flash) drives, plus my laptop, which I use at home on the couch and in cafes, a la Duncan. My main storage is on one of the thumbs, so that I can write at work but never have it be on their system. Each time I write anything (ANYTHING!), I copy it onto the other thumb that I haul around with me, and I copy the whole shebang onto my laptop about once a week. One of the thumbs is hooked onto my car keys, the other on my cell case. Since I'm rarely without one or the other, I always know where my stuff is. I also have a desktop puter at home, but for some reason I hardly use it anymore.

 

I totally can not understand why someone wouldn't do this. It takes just a few seconds - what is that worth in terms of losing a scene you worked on for hours or days?

[rec]

If you have two computers--say, a desktop and a laptop--I highly recommend a program called FolderShare, which is now owned by Microsoft and is free. FolderShare syncs the files on all your computers through the internet, so you have an automatic backup, usually within a few seconds of a file/save command. So, if one of your drives crashes, the same files are on your other computers.

 

There are other, similar programs that sync your files, and some have full system backup.