Best Practice – Backing Up Hard Drive and How To Save Cost

Backing up hard drive is the only sure way to protect your computer files against hard drive crashes. Backing up you entire [gs computer] hard drive needs time and money, two things that most people do not like to throw it away anyway. Here are some suggestions that can simplify your task of backing up while saving costs.

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Backing up your entire hard drive – [gs operating system], applications has some advantages. With all the files stored, you can easily replace a crashed hard drive and immediately repair Windows and all your applications and data without having to re-install it. In some cases, overwriting a flawed Windows installation with a newer and cleaner copy will save your time identifying incompatible software or damaged program files.

If you have relatively small data files to backup, choosing an appropriate storage media to keep your hard drive files is a piece of cake. You can back up your data using up using a floppy disk or a flash disk. Of course the more data you backup, the greater the cost and time you need. Backing up the entire hard drives requires large storage media. Backing up hard drive containing several gigabytes of data using a 100MB Zip drive is not an easy task to do. Bigger storage media drive with greater capacity such as a CD-RW drive or a Jaz can cost you a bunch.

To save cost you can buy a second hard drive. Today almost every CMOS program has an auto detection feature hard disk yet unlike some removable storage media , EIDE hard drives have few compatibility problems with Windows or driver issue. One advantage of an EIDE hard drive is very fast, making it an ideal choice for backing up or restoring data.
Another downside of an EIDE hard drive is since the hard drive can not be moved, you can not store your backups in a separate location. And to avoid an emergency, you should keep a backup of any important data in different locations

Several Methods of Backing Up Hard Drive

Backing up hard drive can also be done with the help of an ATA RAID hard drive controller that  lets you store an exact copy of your hard drive on a breeze, especially if your system has a good hard drive controller. A Disk-based PCI hard disk Controller will automatically replicate any changes you make to the original hard drive to your [gs backup] drive, hence maintaining an exact duplicate at any time.

After a hard disk controller is installed, the backups take place automatically and you do not need to intervene during the process. Keep in mind that backing up hard drive using An ATA RAID hard drive controller has also a downside. Any data changes or omissions – such as accidentally deleted or overwritten important files – will be transferred to the backup drive as well.
One alternative to using An ATA RAID hard drive controller is use a second hard drive installed conventionally to backup the primary drive. This sometimes requires manual data backup, but when executed properly, it offer greater flexibility.

Windows also has a useful backup utility called Backup; you can find it in Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools Backup. Backup is able to move throughout the primary drive or certain parts to your second drive. And you can arrange the next backup to copy the files new or changed course – a huge time-saver if you want to backup the entire hard drive, Windows and others.

Backing Up Hard Drive Before It’s Too Late

Windows Backup utility is very good at backing up data files, yet if the hard disk crashes, you can no longer get a copy of your Windows version. It occurs because the backup may not have a hidden file copy or system files that Windows needs to work properly and because you may need replace the MSDOS.SYS file. Similarly, the damaged files may get into your Windows backups long before you see the result – which can vary from a strange [gs mouse] behavior to the system crashes.
You can avoid the above disaster by creating images of your hard drives. You can do it with a backup software such as Acronis True Image and other back up utility softwareA backup software is a very useful utility that is able to copy and compress the entire drive – the system files, hidden files, file allocation [gs table] of your disk into a single file that can be stored on your second hard drive and restored if necessary.

It is highly recommended that you have at least three partitions on your hard drive. You can use a third party application such as Partition Magic to do the job or if you have a Windows 7 installed on your computer you can create partition using Windows 7 partition tool.

After partitioning your hard drive, you need to install Windows/Operating System on partition C:, your application on D:, and your data on E and create mirror images of each [gs partition]. Just in case your Windows / Operating system is damaged and can not be restored you can restore your original Windows configuration. You need to update the image if you add new hardware or software and make sure your system functions correctly before backing up hard drive.

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