Back Up Your Files All the Time

mustache_1821

A while ago I learned that backing up your files is important. I learned it the hard way.

While working on my old desktop computer I had come to the conclusion that the best way of proceeding would be to format and re install Windows 2000. I figured that it would make things on my old computer better, and besides, I had copied all my photos onto my laptop anyway.

Well, a few days later, my brother-in-law Dan called to ask for a copy of the pictures I took of his lizards. I looked for them on my laptop and what did I find? A big hole occupying the space of what I thought was supposed to be 2003, 2004, and the first half of 2005. Oh crap! I was pretty sad about this but resigned myself to the error.

Learn from your mistakes. I backed up the rest of my photos over the next few days.

Then yesterday, I was telling Jeff, my brother, that I had lost all those particular photos and he asked me if I had checked my parents computer because I had copied all my photos onto their new computer before I went to Australia in 2005. Apparently, I was worried about the state of my desktop computer for a while and wasn't sure if the hard drive would live.

Jeff was right I had copied all my photos onto their computer. I was sure that they had had several hard drive issues on their computer but they never did. Talk about a pleasant surprise. I copied them back onto my desktop computer (it has a new 200gig hd) over the network, just because it is a good idea to back up your files.

It took about an hour over our network, which surprised me but I guess over those two and a half years I had accumulated 10 gigs or so of photos. I'm sending them all to flickr now, but I don't think I will get through them all before I go to Australia.

-Gary