Have you backed up your data?

You probably get this all the time, but backing up your data is only crucial about a minute before your computer crashes.  If you know when your computer is going to crash, then fantastic, you can back up your data just before it does and not have a worry.  If however you are like the rest of us and the computer just crashes at seemingly the worst point in time, rest easy knowing you have backed up your data recently. 

The Blue Screen of DEATH!

Last Fall my laptop gave me the blue screen of death.  This isn’t a normal occurance, it was much more prevalent but much less significant a decade ago.  Back then if you saw the screen, you could normally just reboot and you were golden.  Now a days though, the blue screen of death is a major warning that there is something significantly wrong with your machine and you may or may not be able to continue using it.  My issue was with some power surge.  I had my laptop plugged into a cheap power surge protector that failed.  Due to the heavy processor applications I was running, that power cycle just turned the computer off.  No warning, in the middle of drawing some rocking T-Shirt designs (check out my custom designs on www.HaHaShirtShop.com).  The computer came back with the blue screen of death.  Luckily I was able to start it in Safe Mode, transfer all of my files to my desktop and then reimage the laptop and it has been working fairly well ever since. 

After that episode though, I did 2 things. 

First:

I bought a laptop cooler device.  BestBuy.com – Laptop Cooling Mat
This thin set of USB powered fans sits under the laptop and provides much needed cooling to the internals.  Heat is not the friend of computers.  If you don’t have one of these, and have a laptop that you use frequently and heavily, I would highly recommend it.  Anytime I have Fireworks or Dreamweaver open, I have these fans running.  When I only have a browser and maybe Excel open, then I don’t usually turn it on. Do you have Fireworks or Dreamweaver? If not, check it out. I use Fireworks all the time.   In fact, we used Fireworks to create a submission for LogoMyWay for John Chow’s logo.  If you don’t have a USB powered fan for your laptop, head on over to Best Buy and pick one up.  They usually run in the $20 – $40 range.  I think I got mine for around $20.

Second:

I installed free software from Microsoft.  Yes, Microsoft does have some free software.  The software I installed is called SyncToy.  Since my computers are on my home network and can talk to each other, periodically I click the SyncToy application and it syncs the files on my laptop to a folder on my desktop.  Any file I have changed or created gets copied over.  If I am working on the desktop and have saved a file in that folder, it will also get copied to my laptop next time I sync.  It is a pretty easy to use application and well worth the 15 minutes you will spend trying to find it on Microsofts site and then the 5 minutes to download, install and set up. 

Do you backup your systems?  If so, how, what do you use?  Have you tried SyncToy before?

Johnny Optimist
The other 1/2 is full of opportunity!

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