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2:11 pm
Sat 12-Aug-06
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Just setting up a new thread for this.
Does anybody know of a neat and simple way for non-techie people to backup their stuff?
Never knowingly underfed
2:39 pm
Supreme Being
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Sun 30-Jan-11
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Yes.....get your lovely very computer techie-minded best mate to do it 
learning to love veg…..except celery :-O
2:41 pm
Knowledegable
Wed 23-Sep-09
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One word: Dropbox. It's so easy, and you don't need to think about it. Just save stuff in the dropbox folder on your computer, and it automatically gets replicated to your online dropbox account, and to any other computer linked to your account – so it's useful if you have a desktop and a laptop, for example.
It won't deal with a catastrophic system failure where you need to restore the operating system from scratch, but it is an excellent way of safeguarding all your important documents, photos etc., and being able to get at them from anywhere with an internet connection. It saves previous versions too, including files you deleted when you didn't mean to. Not that I would do that of course, oh no.
Works on Windows, Mac and Linux. You get 2 Gb free, but if you use my dropbox link to sign up, you get 250 Mb extra (and so do I).
4:12 pm
Sat 12-Aug-06
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That sounds like the answer. Thanks Veronica.
Now to set it up for F.
Never knowingly underfed
4:13 pm
Moderators
Tue 22-Sep-09
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When you are next passing...
I'll try that again!
4:54 pm
Supreme Being
Mon 21-Sep-09
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My hubby uses dropbox too. I forget about it. I use Google docs for some stuff and just make sure the documents are set to private.
12:08 pm
Expert
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Sat 21-Aug-10
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I save to an external drive using fbackup. I use the free version. It saves my files in the same structure as my main hard drive, nice and simple.
Never assume anything - except an occasional air of intelligence.
1:55 pm
Supreme Being
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Mon 3-Oct-11
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Of course once you save to an external drive/online storage you are faced with the dilema "what if the external drive/online storage goes wrong"? do you back up the back up to another external drive/online storage. Then what happens if they both go wrong? etc. etc. As most pieces of computer kit work on the MTBF principle (Mean Time Before Failure - i.e. the average time before they go wrong) it will eventually happen. Aargh!
Are we having fun yet? I am!
12:48 pm
Supreme Being
Thu 24-Sep-09
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JoannaS said:
My hubby uses dropbox too. I forget about it. I use Google docs for some stuff and just make sure the documents are set to private.
I use dropbox too. Now I don't worry about important things on my computer.
Old teachers never die, they just lose their class
3:51 pm
Knowledegable
Wed 23-Sep-09
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The Liquineer said:
Of course once you save to an external drive/online storage you are faced with the dilema "what if the external drive/online storage goes wrong"? do you back up the back up to another external drive/online storage. Then what happens if they both go wrong? etc. etc. As most pieces of computer kit work on the MTBF principle (Mean Time Before Failure - i.e. the average time before they go wrong) it will eventually happen. Aargh!
Well, you'd be quite unlucky if both your external drive and your hard disk failed at the same time. Strictly speaking you should test your backups from time to time, i.e. just verify that you can get a file back from them. If the external drive turns out to be dodgy, you can replace it and do a fresh backup, before your hard disk fails.
In the paranoid corner, we have two external USB drives and rotate them every other day, so we have two backups plus the original. Plus Dropbox, plus all the stuff we have on websites, plus the separate backups of those. But we need all this stuff to earn a living, so better safe than sorry!
6:44 pm
Supreme Being
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Mon 3-Oct-11
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It was meant to be tongue in cheek Veronica.
Are we having fun yet? I am!
7:16 pm
Knowledegable
Wed 23-Sep-09
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oh, OK. Just call me paranoid – comes of working in IT too long. (slinks away) 
7:27 pm
Sat 12-Aug-06
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Oops - I missed the "tongue in cheek" bit too, Martin.
Please forgive me for thinking that you were a totally paranoid Dr Who fan! 
Never knowingly underfed
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