April-May - Volume 1, Issue 3

Hardware To Back Up Your Data

What would you do if a fire broke out in your home or at your office? Chances are you probably have an evacuation plan that includes more than one way to safely exit the premises. After all, relying on only one exit could put your family or colleagues in danger.

Just as you shouldn't rely on one emergency exit, you shouldn't rely on your hard drive as the only means of saving your data. Fires, floods, computer viruses, human error, and theft can destroy your hard drive and computer, but if you back up your data on a regular basis, you can recover your losses quickly. We'll walk you through the safety drill and demonstrate the merits of various hardware products that may save you from having to re-create your important information from scratch.

Ignorance Isn't Bliss

Before we start, think about how important your files are to you or your business. How long did it take to create them? How long would it take to redo them if they were lost? If your files are important enough that you'd be devastated if anything happened to them, they're important enough to save to more than one location. Let's face it - we all know we should back up our files, but we often don't think about actually doing so until we've learned the hard way. So just because you may not have had a computer disaster yet doesn't mean you should put off preparing for one.

Diskettes. Let's start with the least inexpensive backup media: floppy diskettes. You probably already have these thin, 3.5-inch, hard-plastic items stashed in your desk. Floppies are available in 720KB low-density formats, but their 1.44MB high-density formats are more popular. You've likely used floppies to store word processing documents, spreadsheets, and other data so you can transport them to and from work.
Floppies are useful because almost every PC on the market comes with a floppy drive. You can find floppies at computer stores and stationeries.

The downside is that of at 1.44MB, you will quickly reach a floppy's storage capacity. This means you'll either have to keep buying more floppies, in which case a tray will come in handy, or you'll need to find another storage method. Floppies are OK if you're archiving one or two small documents, but if your documents and files are bigger than 1.44MB, that's not so good. You might want to look into storage options with greater capacity, such as magnetic and optical media.

Magnetic drives. Magnetic disks, such as Iomega's Zip and Jaz disks, are physically a little bigger and thicker than the 3.5-inch floppies. Magnetic disks cost more than floppies, but they have a much greater storage capacity. Zip disks are available in 100MB and 250MB capacities and work well for storing digital photos and graphics files. If you have a lot of video files to back up or archive, you may want to check out Jaz disks, which come in 1GB or 2GB configurations.

You can find these disks in computer and electronic retail stores. Jaz disks are substantially more expensive than Zip disks, but they also have far greater storage capacities. You many find it more cost effective to buy the Zip or Jaz disks in multipacks.
Keep in mind that Zip and Jaz disks are not compatible with floppy drives, and you can't use a floppy in a Zip or Jaz drive. Some higher-end PCs may have a Zip drive installed, but more than likely, you'll have to buy an internal or external Zip or Jaz drive for your PC.

Zip and Jaz disks are not compatible. You can't use a Jaz disk in a Zip drive. However, drives are backward compatible with their own media. For instance, if you have a 100MB Zip drive and upgrade to a 250MB Zip drive, your 250MB drive can read and write to your 100MB Zip disks, but a 100MB drive can't read or write to 250MB disks.

Before you buy, make sure your PC can support the drive. Some drives and most disks can be formatted for either PCs or Macs, but double-check to make sure what you're buying is compatible with what you have. For example, external drives come in different interfaces. Don't buy a SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) drive if you're planning to back up data from two PCs, one of which doesn't have an external SCSI port. Also check to see if the external drive's adapter cord is included or if that will be an additional purchase.

Optical drives. A magnetic drive writes digital information onto its disks by magnetically altering the disks, but an optical drive burns the information onto CDs or DVDs with laser beams. A CD-R (CD-recordable) drive and most CD-RW (CD-rewriteable) drives can read and write to CD-Rs, but you'll need a CD-RW drive to read and rewrite to a CD-RW. You can record, or burn, data to a CD-R once, but you can record data, erase it, and rewrite to a CD-RW, as its name suggests. These CDs vary in their storage capacities; a CD-RW can store up to 650MB, and a CD-R can store up to 700MB. It would take about 451 floppies to store the same amount of information.

Tape. If you have a lot of information to store, a tape backup may be more practical. Unlike floppies or CDs, tape is often used to back up networks because its storage capacity is so much greater. Travan tape drives store up to 20GB of compressed data per cartridge, and its DDS (Digital Data Storage) stores up to 40GB of compressed data per cartridge. Seagate's latest, the TapeStor Travan Portable USB (Universal Serial Bus) stores either 8GB or 20GB of compressed data. These options should be enough for most SOHO (small office/home office) users, but if you think you need more space, the LTO (Linear Tape-Open) Ultrium stores up to 200GB per data cartridge. Of course, the higher the storage capacity, the higher the price, so if you don't need that much storage space, you'd probably be better off with something smaller and less expensive than a tape drive.

Second hard drive. Second hard drives are a good option, especially if they're removable. You can back up data onto the second hard drive, which you can then remove and store in another location. That way, in case of a disaster, your data and hard drive are safe. If the secondary, or slave, drive were still attached to your damaged primary, or master, drive, both hard drives could potentially be damaged.

Maxtor's Personal Storage 3000LE-40GB is USB 2.0 compatible and stores up to 40GB of storage. The good news is that it's easy to install. The bad news is that if your PC has a USB 1.1 port, you'll be stuck at the version 1.1 speeds to transfer data. It's a reasonable option as far as your wallet goes, but the time you spend waiting might not be worth it. And if you don't have a lot of gigabytes to store, you might be better off using something faster, such as a CD-R, to store your data.

An Ounce Of Prevention . . .
Regardless of your preference, some backup is better than none. Unless you add a lot of new data every day, weekly scheduled backups should be enough. With careful planning, you can safeguard your data against potential natural and human disasters without breaking your piggy bank. Besides, can you put a price on your peace of mind?