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Our Blogs Core Dump Has backup moved past removable media?
Our Blogs Core Dump Has backup moved past removable media? | Has backup moved past removable media? |
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| by Stephen Withers | |
| Monday, 12 May 2008 | |
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Page 2 of 3 If you don't have a huge amount of data that changes every day, backing up to DVD is about as cheap as it comes - around 11c per gigabyte using brand-name discs. Depending on your needs and strategy, you may be able to achieve an even lower cost with a mix of regular and rewritable DVD media. The latter costs a little over $A1 per disc, but can be reused many times. (I always tell my backup software to verify the files written to DVD, and I've always been able to recover files from DVD-RW when I've needed to.)Featured Whitepaper
5 Best Practices for Smartphone Support
But back to the survey. It was carried out by Galaxy Research for Gizmo, a company that provides technology support to Australian homes - including the installation of backup systems. The report draws on 514 interviews, but there's no indication of how respondents were selected. Significantly, the most common type of information that respondents feared losing was digital photos. The majority of other types mentioned were replaceable, though replacement would incur a cost in terms of money or time (eg music tracks may have to be repurchased, while recreating a work or study document takes time), but most photos are simply irreplaceable. The survey also suggests the old saw that I quoted at the beginning of this article isn't true after all: while only 15 percent of respondents said they back up at least once a week, 30 percent of them reported accidentally losing or deleting important files. So what's with the other 15 percent? More than one person in seven has lost an important file, but still doesn't back up regularly? I suppose some of them may back up regularly but less frequently. If you go on a photographic 'expedition' once a month, there's no need to back up your photos every week. But that still leads a surprising number that are leaving themselves vulnerable to a repeat performance. And there's another problem. |
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