It is important to make a backup copy of the critical information stored on your computers. Backups enable you to restore data that is lost or corrupted due to malicious attacks, hard-disk failure, or natural disaster.
Key point: Along with performing regular backups, you should periodically practice restoring your backups to a computer.
Backing up data simply means making a copy of it on a CD-ROM or DVD-ROM disc, a second hard drive, online storage service, or other storage medium. There are two basic kinds of backups: a full backup and an incremental backup. A full backup makes a complete copy of the selected data onto another medium. An incremental backup just backs up data that has been added or changed since the last full backup.
A full backup augmented by incremental backups is generally quicker and takes less storage space. You might consider a policy of running a full backup on a weekly basis, followed by daily incremental backups. It's a good idea to test your backups frequently by actually restoring data to a test location.
Before you start the backup process, consider the following:
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What files to back up. Documents, databases, e-mail, financial and bank records, calendars and favourite Internet sites are commonly selected for backup. Beware of backing up your entire computer. This could require a huge amount of storage space and take a long time.
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What medium to use. You can create and store backups on a variety of mediums. External hard drives, CD-RW discs, DVD-RW discs, and flash drives are often used. If possible, back up your files to a portable medium that you can store offsite where it is safe from a fire, flood or other workplace disasters.
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What backup tool to use. Software makers sell a variety of programs that make it easier to back up and restore your files. However, the Windows Vista and Windows XP operating systems both come with built-in backup and recovery utilities. Windows Live OneCare, a comprehensive maintenance service you can subscribe to, also includes a backup tool you can run anytime or schedule to run automatically.
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Who is responsible for backups. To ensure that backups are performed consistently and not skipped, select an employee to take charge of the task.
The Backup and Restore Centre in Windows Vista (Figure 1) provides access to two options for carrying out system backups.
Figure 1: Windows Vista Backup and Restore Centre
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The Back Up Files wizard. The wizard is designed to back up documents and personal files whenever you want or on an automated schedule. You can choose to back up to local media such as a DVD, CD, internal hard drive, or attached external hard drive — or on a network server or storage device. For ease of use and to prevent confusion, programs and system files are not included in the file backup.
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Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore. With this option, you create a complete system image backup of all your computer content, including files, programs, and settings. Unlike the Back Up Files wizard, Complete PC Backup takes a "picture" of all content on your hard disks rather than your individual files. It then copies that entire image to the location you specify.
Windows XP also comes with a Back Up or Restore Wizard that can perform many of the backup operations. However, it does not include the Complete PC Backup and Restore technology.
Some editions of Windows Vista - including Vista Business - have a useful feature to help protect your data. It's called Shadow Copy. This feature is automatically turned on and creates point-in-time copies of files as you work, so you can quickly and easily retrieve versions of a document you may have accidentally deleted.
To use Shadow Copy, right-click a file or folder and select Restore previous versions. This enables you to go back in time and access your files and folders as they were on previous dates.
