Dumb question re laptop vs. desktop computers

[Anonymous]

O.k., so it's come to my attention that I am the last dinosaur on the planet with a desktop computer. I am willing (and want) to switch to a laptop, but I have a question. How do you save all your data so it's secure if you lose your laptop? Do you store it "in the cloud" somewhere? Or do you transfer the data to an external hard drive at home? Thoughts? TIA.

[Anonymous]

I have a desktop, so you are not alone.
You can do either. There are also cords/chains you can buy to lock your laptop to your desk

[Anonymous]

I have a portable external hard drive that cost me about $100, and I do backups every so often. store the hard drive separately from the laptop at all times. I also back up important files on my network at work, just in case.

[Anonymous]

ibackup.com

I hate laptops.

[Anonymous]

External drives: Flood, fire, then what?

[Anonymous]

Important archives get backed up various other places, both physical drives and optical media in my house and cloud storage.
Important files that get worked on all the time (current work) live on a folder of my hard drive that is continually backed up via DropBox.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:External drives: Flood, fire, then what?

I keep my external hard drive in a fireproof, waterproof safe along with important documents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:External drives: Flood, fire, then what?

I keep my external hard drive in a fireproof, waterproof safe along with important documents.

Do you take it out when need to do a backup? Is it wireless?

[Anonymous]

Btw, your desktop can crash just as easily as a laptop. You should be backing that up too.

I have an external hard drive for my laptop. I don't back it up that often, but I don't have much on it besides music and photos. I usually just back it up when I upload a bunch of photos.

[Anonymous]

21:24 Serious? You back up every day?

[Anonymous]

I am not 21:24 but I do backups to an external drive on my network hourly because I use OS X Time Machine. Then I make copies of those to store offsite from time to time.

I have considered using a cloud storage solution, but I am not sure who I trust with my life's data.

There are backup solutions that will run automatically, and they back up only new/ changed documents. Time Machine lets you see exactly how your computer looked at any point in time. So even if you mess up a file, you can go back in time and find the version that is still good.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Thanks for all the advice. Here's a second dumb question -- if it takes weeks or months to back up the data for the first time using one of these "cloud" services, can you use the computer during that time?

[Anonymous]

It wouldn't take weeks or months to back up your data the first time. It would take a few minutes, depending on how you were transferring the data and the speed of your internet if you are transferring to a cloud-based backup service.

If you buy a Mac, the backup process is included in the software that's loaded on the machine and is easy; it runs in the background at predetermined intervals. You can backup to an external hard drive that you connect to with a cable, or get one of their wireless backup drives (can't remember what it's called but easy to find on the Apple website).

If you are this unfamiliar with computers, I would strongly suggest a Mac -- there's nothing to it, very easy to use.

[Anonymous]

Related question: Does anyone use some sort of central server, to support multiple networked laptops? (Not sure if "server" is the right word.)

At our house, we have 3-4 different laptops plus a desktop. As our kids get older, I suspect they will start using laptops as well. The desktop is meant to be the main storage device for all digital photos and key documents, because it has all sorts of backup software and external drives. But we hardly ever use the desktop, and use laptops almost exclusively. When it comes time to replace the desktop, I've been thinking it would make more sense to create some sort of central server that would link wirelessly to all the laptops. The server could be set up to backup the laptop data wirelessly, and also could function as a centralized location for all digital photos and other materials, so that each laptop could access the data. In essence, the server would operate as a central "cloud" repository where our family's data would reside. That's what happens at my office, so it should work at home.

Does this make sense? Does anyone have something similar at home? Hard to set up? Any advice appreciated.

[Anonymous]

Good stuff. Thanks, P6.