Hands on: Backup needn't be hard to do

Everyone understands the importance of backup, but few of us implement a strategy that offers sufficient protection should the worst happen.

As is customary for any article on backup, let’s first look at what you stand to lose. Personal and business documents that could represent years of work, emails and contact lists that may be the only means of getting in touch with key people, irreplaceable photos from memory cards long since wiped, and media collections that took an age to encode.

Concerned? You should be. That data is invaluable. Now we’ve got that out of the way, we can get down to business. A successful backup strategy consists of two elements.

The first involves performing backups with sufficient regularity to cover for the amount of work you’re willing to lose. If you can’t stand the idea of losing more than a day’s work, then back up every day. If you’re backing up photo or media collections, you need to do so each time you add new files.

The second aspect of successful backup is equally crucial but often neglected. Once you’ve made your backup, keep it in a physically different location from the original. Fires, floods and thieves are rarely considerate enough to leave a backup intact and unharmed.

There are many ways to store copies of your data elsewhere. One involves transferring it over the internet to another location, be it an official off-site backup service, space on a friend’s remote system or a hefty online email inbox.

While the online option can be neat, it takes time to upload the data and download it back again, so it is impractical for large amounts of information or quick access. If you have lots of data to back up and want immediate access should the worst happen, you can’t beat copying the files onto portable media and physically taking it to a different location.

We’ll look at five practical options for carrying your data with you in person. They vary in size, weight, robustness, price, capacity, speed and convenience, so it’s all about weighing up which combination works best for your requirements.

Optical media
Optical discs offer some of the cheapest portable backup options on the market and are compact and light. Blu-ray packs the greatest capacity onto a humble 5in disc with 25GB per layer, but drives to read and write the media are pricey and not in widespread use.

For affordability and broad compatibility, most people are better served by rewritable DVDs. On the upside they’re relatively small, light and are readable by most modern PCs. They’re also great value at as little as 30p each when bought in spindles.

On the downside, writing times can be slow and the capacity of rewritable DVD media is 4.7GB, which is insufficient for most digital media collections. Carrying multiple discs becomes inconvenient and you have to be careful to avoid scratches and ensure the discs are stored safely.

However, 4.7GB is enough for most document folders or emails, allowing many people to back up their crucial business data on a single, cheap and light disc.

USB key
As the capacities of USB keys have increased, they have become a viable option for smaller backups. Budget 4GB USB models from the likes of Crucial start at about £25 and have the advantage of being small and light, with quick read and write speeds. They can also be connected to most PCs, whereupon they’ll be treated as a removable drive for simple drag-and-drop transfer of files.

On the downside, cost per GB is the highest of all the storage options here, and their maximum capacity remains low, at only 8GB. But once again, if your backup consists of little more than documents and emails, a USB key could be sufficient for the job, while also providing a highly portable and convenient solution.

Some USB keys are toughened. Corsair’s Survivor series employs a cylindrical aluminium case that screws around the USB key, and waterproof seals allow it to be submerged up to 200m. The faster GT version is available with an 8GB capacity for about £85.

Like this story? Spread the news by clicking below:

 del.icio.us     Digg this     reddit!