Biggz Design & Consulting

Now that computers are such a big part of our life it’s not uncommon to have more than one in our home. A major hurdle we must overcome when there are multiple computers in our lives is how to sharing documents. There is nothing worse than realizing that you need access to the family budget when you are at work but the only copy you have is on your home computer. A solution for this problem that I have been using is Windows Live FolderShare.

Screen Shot from FolderShare web site.

I have been using FolderShare for a few months and I can’t image life without it now. This is a great solution for a couple reasons. I now use my “Shared folder” for all my important documents and I can now access them from any computer I have FolderShare installed on. FolderShare downloads all documents in your “Shared folder” to you local computer so FolderShare acts like a backup as well, because you have a current copy of your important documents on more than one computer. FolderShare also works on Mac’s so even if you have a mixed computer environment (Apple and PC) you will always have access to your important data. To learn more about FolderShare check out the website at: https://www.foldershare.com/ and sign up for a free account (yes this service is even free!).

Walt Mossberg from the Wall Street Journal created a video which reviews the powers of CrossLoop, check it out! Remember I am more than happy to remotely help you with your computer needs using CrossLoop. You can find my profile at http://www.crossloop.com/GregGottfried

Today I want to talk about backing up your data. Over the weekend I had a client bring in their “broken” computer. This person runs a small business from home and has all their business related data on their computer along with all their family pictures, home video’s, and other important documents. It turns out that the hard drive on the computer failed. When I asked if they had a backup of their data, they told me that they had done some backing up to CD’s about six months ago, so when I told them it could cost them several hundred to thousands of dollars to recover the data off the damaged hard drive they were very disappointed.

So how do you avoid loosing your precious memories and documents or avoid spending lots of money trying to recovering them a damaged hard drive? There are a lot of different solutions out there and I will tell you about a few but mainly I want to talk about good backup process.

Doing nothing is not a solution.

There are several factors that go into how long your hard drive will last such as hours used, heat, and quality of the drive, but for the most part you can’t expect it to last for more than 4-5 years. It is a mechanical device to to be honest it could fail at any time, so expecting it to live forever and not doing any back up IS NOT A SOLUTION!

At least get your personal data.

At the very minimum you need to be backing up your personal data (pictures, videos, documents, emails, etc…) to CD, DVD, or external hard drive. This should be something everyone does, there is no reason that you should not have at least one back up of your documents, pictures, videos, and other personal information. I recommend doing this at least once every month.

Offsite backup is better.

Not only is backing up your data important but putting your data in a safe place is key. What good does a copy of your data do if it is sitting right next to your computer during a fire, flood, or any other disaster? There is no need to spend a ton of money on a service that stores your information in a facility that makes Fort Knox look like a wet paper bag, I would suggest that you simply ask a family member if you can keep a copy of your data at their home or simply take your backup to work and keep it in a desk drawer, just as long as you feel your storage place is safe and secure you should be fine.

Get all of your data it could save a lot of time.

Backing up your personal data is vital but if you want to save a load of time and make life easy for yourself I would recommend that you find a software such as Norton Ghost which makes a bit for bit copy of your hard drive. Back ups like this are great because all you have to do is plug in your back up hard drive (which is an exact copy of the original) and every thing is back to normal. No need to install your software again, no hassle of finding your recovery disk or spending hours on the Internet looking for drivers for your hardware.

Make it easy.

You will be more likely to get consistent and frequent backups of you find a system that automates the back up process for you. This could be as simple as using the included windows backup utility or using a third party back up software. Whatever it is if you don’t have to think about it you are more likely to get good backups.

Multiple backups is best.

If you are really worried about loosing your data or you want to lose as little time as possible when a disaster does occur you should adopt more than one of these methods of backup. The best way to loose the least amount of data would to keep daily back ups onsite, have an offsite copy of your data, and keep them in different forms such as DVD and hard drive. Taking an approach like this will ensure you have a copy close to you in case of hardware failure and a copy offsite in case of a disaster that destroys your computer all together such as flood, fire, or earthquake. If you have the ability, make sure to get nightly back ups to a second hard drive that stays onsite, take a monthly back up offsite, and make annual DVD/CD’s copies of your pictures, videos, emails, and documents. This might seem a bit much but trust me, you will thank me the first time you have a virus destroy your system or have a hard drive fail unexpectedly.

What do I do?

I do my best to practice what I preach. At home I run Windows Home Server which does a complete nightly back up of all my computers. I keep a monthly backup on an external hard drive off site and finally I burn a copy of my pictures, videos, and documents to DVD’s once a year and that is kept in a fire safe. If you have any questions about backing up your data or need some setting up a back up solution please feel free to contact me.

I just opened an account with CrossLoop to make it easier for me to offer computer support to anyone who may need it. Please check out my profile at: www.crossloop.com/GregGottfried
and if you need any help with web design, desktop support, networking photoshop, video editing or anything else that deals with technology, you now know who to call!

The last two and a half years have gone by fast, and so much has happened in my life. Today I was looking through my archives and found an older version of the BiggzDESIGN web site and thought I would it share it.

This is the first version of the site.

http://www.biggzdesign.com/Bird/print.html

From now on this is the new link to the Birds Eye View printing page. I am very sorry for the delay. more of the site will be up very soon.

I am very sorry about the delay in getting the Birds Eye View page up and live.  I have got lots of feed back and concern that it was not going to be posted.  Do not worry, over the weekend I plan to post everything from the old site including the Birds Eye View.

Over the last month I have had so much consulting work I rarely even get the chance to check my emails.

Again, this weekend I vow to post the goods! SORRY it took so long!

The time has come for me to re-design the BiggzDESIGN.com website. As you can see things have already changed. Over the next couple days all the content from the old site will be up on this new site and many design changes will take place on the site. Be sure to check back soon!