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Always Have a Back up Plan

by | Dec 3, 2012 | Articles, Freelancing, Web Design | 6 comments

Back Up Your Work!

As artists, designers, photographers, developers, and anyone who simply likes to keep their files and documents, we have all experienced the pain and anguish of data loss. We have all had that moment where we have lost something that we simply cannot get back. It could be a photo, so a perfectly worded document, or even the perfect of most interesting design, and then it happens. For me, the experience was what I have deemed “The spinning beach ball of doom” where all of a sudden on an Apple machine, for no reason, your hard drive dies. That is the worst feeling ever. You computer never boots up again and there is no getting your info back. All you can do is toss the hard drive and replace it with a new one.

back up

After that happened, which it doesn’t happen that often, especially on an Apple machine( I have owned many), I realized that I needed a solid back-up plan, that is really a no-brainer in helping you to back up your precious files. What I have been doing for a couple of years now, is that I carry a portable 2-Terabyte Western Digital Hard Drive, where I can back up my files with ease. I am on a simple macbook, and I use Time Machine to automatically back up my files. If I personally forget, I have it set for the program to remind me every Sunday if I haven’t backed up in at least seven days. I am a very busy person, so I am always forgetting small details like backing up my files, so I needed something like Time Machine that is foolproof. I am not sure what PC users use, but the great thing about Time Machine is that if I switch to a new computer, or the hard drive does fail, I can load my computer back up front where I left off, with all of my settings exactly how they were before the incident ever happened. You are looking at a 2 hour turn around where you are back up and running, (that is if you know how to install your own hard drive, which I do), and your life goes back to normal. All of my custom brushes, font’s files, photos, plug-ins, settings, and any custom features are saved and  restored automatically.

Dropbox, Oh How I Love Thee

I also use an online service for storage called Dropbox. I love drop box, because it puts a shortcut in your applications bar where you can just drag and drop files. This makes it easy to sync files across multiple computers. Another great aspect to Dropbox is that if you want to host a downloadable file, you can get a public link to it from Dropbox. You post that link on your site and anyone can download your files quickly and easily. For the cost of roughly $8 per month, I upgraded my account to 100GB of space. That is a 100GB mobile hard drive that I always have access to via the web. If something goes wrong, I can access it in a pinch and retrieve all of my important files. I can’t tell you how many times this has gotten me out of a jam! It doesn’t matter what kind of chaos goes on behind the scenes. As long as your clients get their projects completed on time, the $8 per month is worth it to me!

You Can Never Be Too Safe

On top of this, I also occasionally go through my computer, and compile all of my old files and things that no longer need to be kept on my drive into a folder.  I back them up to a burnable DVD, which I store in a safe place in case I need it. If that wasn’t enough, I also use an 8Gig Cruzer Flash Drive and back up all of my important working files on it as well. That gives me 3 solid places to keep my files in case something goes wrong, and it will. I am sorry, I know it would be nice to say that you could just work and work and play and do whatever you like and you will never lose your data. If you live like that then you will definitely be sorry when you lose files that you cannot recover. I had to learn the hard way, but I want to share this with you all so that you will think about this, and hopefully save you a lot of time, unhappy client and heartbreak. Some people keep their whole lives on the computers, and I want those lives to be safe and intact. I want to hear what ways, other than the ones that I mentioned, that you can back up your files. PC users would definitely like to hear the was and the alternatives that are available for file handling.

What method do you use to back up your files? Feel free to share your tips in the comments section below.

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