Question for you computer techno wizards

[SusanJillParker]

I'm not very computer literate. I know how to return e-mails and write my stories on Word for Windows and that's about it, other than being able to work with accounting packages.

Anyway, my question has to do with backups. Presently, I have a 1 Teradyne hard drive with 8 gigs of ram. I backup my stories, the only thing I really care about, on a Scandisk 64 gig ultra flash drive and do weekly back ups using an Iomega 500 gig eGo Ruby.

My question is this. Other than using Norton anti-virus protection, am I doing enough to protect and backup my files?

I'd be thankful for any information and advice.

 

[TxRad]

Sounds good Freddie. What operating system are you using? And what browser?

 

[SusanJillParker]

Sounds good Freddie. What operating system are you using? And what browser?

Windows 7 and the latest Explorer. I have Google Chrome, if that makes a difference.

Forget about having a Facebook account, you're talking to someone, who has never played a video game, other than Atari ping pong, who only recently got a cell phone, doesn't have an ATM or debit card, and has never texted or Tweeted (lol).

I did get rid of my bell bottom pants, recently.

 

[lance gt]

I write on a Samsung laptop, but everything gets stored on an external HD w/2 TB of space. If the laptop crashes, I still have all my stories and info.

 

[SusanJillParker]

I write on a Samsung laptop, but everything gets stored on an external HD w/2 TB of space. If the laptop crashes, I still have all my stories and info.

Two TB of space? Gees, with one average novel equalling half a meg, you must have a lot of stories (lol).

 

[oggbashan]

I copy my stories to CDs, or DVDs, and keep a copy away from my house in case of a destructive fire.

I do that for family photos as well. I have left a set of those on DVDs with each of my daughters.

 

[TxRad]

Windows 7 and the latest Explorer. I have Google Chrome, if that makes a difference.

Forget about having a Facebook account, you're talking to someone, who has never played a video game, other than Atari ping pong, who only recently got a cell phone, doesn't have an ATM or debit card, and has never texted or Tweeted (lol).

I did get rid of my bell bottom pants, recently.

Winblows 7 is better than ME2 better known as Vista.

Keep Internet Explorer for doing updates. That's all it is good for and download FireFox. FireFox is Linux based so most of the shit that gets through IE finds itself lost when it wakes up in FireFox.

Also add Spybot, Search and Destroy. Update it and then run the Immunize program. That will block thousands of known bad websites.

I work off a thumbdrive which backs up every five minutes to the hard drive and an external hard drive. I've lost stories and work on stories by losing a laptop or a thumbdrive. Now I take no chances.

 

[Harry Leg]

Data doesnt exist unless it exists in 2 places. As long as you have a copy outside your PC, you should be ok.

Tx is right. Spybot is very good. A firewall is nice to have as well. You can download both for free at downloads.com

 

[Harry Leg]

Never heard spam described as a thing of beauty.

 

[TxRad]

Data doesnt exist unless it exists in 2 places. As long as you have a copy outside your PC, you should be ok.

Tx is right. Spybot is very good. A firewall is nice to have as well. You can download both for free at downloads.com

I thought about a firewall but I haven't found one that i like to go with 7.

The windows one is more like Swiss cheese.

 

[Harry Leg]

I thought about a firewall but I haven't found one that i like to go with 7.

The windows one is more like Swiss cheese.

Yeah the windows one is shite.
I use zonealarm but not sure how it works with W7.

 

[SusanJillParker]

Winblows 7 is better than ME2 better known as Vista.

Keep Internet Explorer for doing updates. That's all it is good for and download FireFox. FireFox is Linux based so most of the shit that gets through IE finds itself lost when it wakes up in FireFox.

Also add Spybot, Search and Destroy. Update it and then run the Immunize program. That will block thousands of known bad websites.

I work off a thumbdrive which backs up every five minutes to the hard drive and an external hard drive. I've lost stories and work on stories by losing a laptop or a thumbdrive. Now I take no chances.

Thanks for the info. Duh, I just realized that I have Google Chrome. I can use that instead of FireFox, can't I?

Any time I think of FireFox, I thnk of that old Clint Eastwood movie, where he plays a Russian pilot.

 

[R. Richard]

You have a good basic plan. Try reloading (after renaming the original) a file now and again, just to check that everything is going well.

 

[TxRad]

Yeah the windows one is shite.
I use zonealarm but not sure how it works with W7.

Zonealarm is good but it has gotten to commercial. It has more popups than it blocks. Plus windows tries to screw with it. Uncle Bill tried to buy them and they refused. You know what that means.

Thanks for the info. Duh, I just realized that I have Google Chrome. I can use that instead of FireFox, can't I?

Any time I think of FireFox, I thnk of that old Clint Eastwood movie, where he plays a Russian pilot.

Uh, Google Chrome is Google so they log everything you do on there.

Go with Firefox, you'll be miles ahead.

He was an American pilot sent to steal a Russian plane that flew by brainwaves.

 

[RodenAddison]

Winblows 7 is better than ME2 better known as Vista.

Keep Internet Explorer for doing updates. That's all it is good for and download FireFox. FireFox is Linux based so most of the shit that gets through IE finds itself lost when it wakes up in FireFox.

Also add Spybot, Search and Destroy. Update it and then run the Immunize program. That will block thousands of known bad websites.

I work off a thumbdrive which backs up every five minutes to the hard drive and an external hard drive. I've lost stories and work on stories by losing a laptop or a thumbdrive. Now I take no chances.

I'm with TX on stuff on this. I have a backup drive that I dump to every week, a second hard drive in the pc that I dump to every night. An external disk drive that I dump to once a month that goes into a safety deposit box.

Too much? Saved me once before. I lost about $10000 worth of work once. It won't happen again.

 

[mcguinness]

I would recommend getting a Dropbox account or some other offsite / cloud storage. All the backup drives in the world won't save your data if there's a house fire and all your drives are in the house.