Protecting Digital Data - Part 2

In my previous post we looked at the explosion of digital data coming onto our computers.  Photos, videos, movies, and games are all getting bigger and going digital.  What was a small part of our hard drive before has grown, and so have our needs for backup.  In this post we'll look at cloud based options, easy to use and share network options, and cheaper solutions for small data libraries.  With all the options before us, it shouldn't be hard to get a good backup system in place so you can avoid digital loss.

Online Cloud Backup

With services like Dropbox being around for years and everyone else getting into the game, cloud based backup is getting easier to find.  Microsoft launched Skydrive with Windows 8, Apple has iCloud, Google has Google Drive, not to mention several other companies offering similar services.  These services allow you to upload files to 'the cloud' and share them between your computers for easy access so you can always have your current project at your fingertips.  The ability to share with friends also makes these services a great tool.  Most services offer anywhere between 2-5GB for free and space upgrade plans with a monthly fee.  Dropbox will upgrade your space as you share the service with friends, both giving you more space and  bring them more users.  A few other achievements in the Dropbox list will net you a bit more extra space, the total free space you get get for friend referrals stands at 16GB now I believe, an incredible amount of space for a free service.  I've used Dropbox for a few years now and it has been invaluable for sharing video work between my partner and I.  If you are interested, you can try Dropbox here.

Protecting Digital Data - Part 1

I've enjoyed years of watching the digital camera grow from a VGA capable camera that was bulky and wrote to floppy disks to my current (and almost antique in terms of cameras now) Sony A700.  As an amateur photographer, I've appreciated the ability to take nearly unlimited photos to practice getting the perfect shot.  I'm sure I have many thousands of photos left to continue to hone my skills.  Along the way, I've been lucky to get many great photos, and collected many not as great photos of rare nature sightings and special family moments that you just don't want to give up.  Eventually, a collection can grow very large, especially after years of shooting.  Add to this collection digital video and you've got a very large media library.  Sure, my dad's old video camera taped directly to VCR tape.  My old SD camera taped to mini tapes.  But now my HD camera is adding digital footage to my hard drive at an alarming rate, and much of it I need to keep around for potential video clips in different works. Newer DSLR cameras also allow taking video or photos with the same device, making the switch between photo and video while 'catching the moment' easy and convenient.

All this can lead to a rather large pile of precious data.  As cameras take higher quality photos, file sizes increase and the problem becomes one that must be faced by even casual photographers.  In my computer repair hobby business, I've seen a lot of issues, from dying or dead hard drives, to one of the more common issues in our area - lightning strikes coming in through phone lines and causing damage to one or more components.  Viruses used to be a big issue, but now most computers ship with antivirus and users, of Windows systems at least, are used to using antivirus to protect themselves.  Remember to keep your antivirus up to date! Even with this protection, things can go wrong.  How can we protect against data loss due to unforeseen software or hardware issues?