The purpose of this section is to provide students with some general
advice on maintaining backups of their personal information, and to understand
the importance of this practice.
Remember, hard disks can fail. If you have a large collection of personal
photos, movies or music on your computer you would be well-advised to back it up
regularly. Backing up such information is as simple as burning it to a CD or DVD
and setting the disc aside in a safe place. You should probably do this about once
a month, or whenever you make a large addition to your collection.
For smaller files that you edit more frequently, such as word documents, you
may prefer a quicker method of storage, as burning a file to a disc every time you
change it can get tedious. It used to be that 3½ inch "floppy" disks were the most
popular method for passing information between computers. However, floppies are
notoriously unreliable and there are much better methods available now.
Flash drives (also known as "thumb drives"; "pen drives"; "jump drives";
etc...) are far more durable and less prone to failure. Similarly, a lot of popular
"mp3" music players can double as media storage devices. You can also backup files
to your "Home" drive and access it from any computer with internet access (visit the
"FalconFile Support" section of this website for more details).
Some general points to remember
- A backup is only effective if it is on a completely separate media from the original.
Having two copies of the same file on one hard disk does you no good if that hard disk
fails.
- When working on an important file (such a term paper), make sure that whenever
you modify the original file you copy over your backups as well, so that they are also
up-to-date.
- You don't need to back up every single thing on your hard disk, just the things that
are important to you. Windows system files and other programs can always be reinstalled
from their original installation discs or downloadable installers. As long as you have
your computer documentation and recovery discs, you shouldn't have to worry.
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Hopefully this information will save you from the fate of losing your personal
data to a hard disk failure, virus, or other serious system error. Remember hard
disks and circuit boards can be replaced, but your hard work and memories are one of
a kind.
