Backing up question...
 

With all the organization talk, I have to ask about backing up! I have the hardest time with this! I haven't backed up in a loooooong time. (Which is BAD I know!) I have some stuff backed up but then once I get new stuff, it is all mixed in with the backed up stuff so when I go to back up again I don't know what has been backed up already so I put off backing anything else up. My photos aren't a big deal because I keep them organized by month. Sooo how do you deal with this? Do you just back everything up again and get rid of other discs? Do you keep everything new separate until you back it up? Or.... :blink: :)

oooh good question - i have no idea so I'll be watching this thread....I sometimes try to sort them by date and then I have to check to see what's already on the DVD and find where I left off - a total pain.

I wish there was some way to color code the folders or something to show they've been backed up??

When I make backup DVDs I burn everything. I don't mind having dup disks b/c I've gone back to disks only to find that for some reason they no longer work but b/c I make redundant backups I found what I needed on another disk. Probably kind of overkill but it makes me feel better.

I don't know, maybe some sort of sync software would work for this? In Acdsee I was tagging stuff as backed up but I soon gave up on doing that.

There was a good thread about this at DST. I can't find the one I'm thinking of but I've thought about backing up my system on an online service for a fee every month/year. That way if god forbid there's a disaster and I lose the computer and EHD then I'll have my system backed up online and I can access it from anywhere.

Here's the DST thread about online back up.

Hm, I haven't backed at all yet.
I think I'll make a copy of my zipped kits and xcf layouts in another server or something. My burner is broke anyway haha.

Thanks for that thread mikkel. I'm thinking I'm going to use Mozy. For $5 a month it seems well worth it.
________
Avandia settlements

That's all it is!?! I just might do that too!! Definitely seems worth it. The peace of mind alone is worth a million bucks!

I need to convince Jordan that leaving hte internet on at night is not that big a deal (he's the electricity nazi). Then I'm going to go with Mozy.

Yeah, I'm going to do online backups too, once I have high speed and am ABLE to do it, lol!

I only back up to my EHD right now, because I'm a FREAK when it comes to organizing and it's never "just right" for me, lol! I literally have panic attacks when I think about backing up to CD/DVD because I can't figure out what to burn and when, and where...ahhhh!! LOL!

I actually unzip kits directly to my EHD, and take pics from my card directly to my EHD. I do my layouts on the computer and keep them there, same with designing - and move them to my EHD about once a month, then delete them from my computer.

I have a master list of all my files and what CD/DVD they are on. I backup every Saturday, and I add to my list as I backup. My list is alphabetized by designer, then it was the name of the kit/element/paper pack and the the CD/DVD # it is on.

I was inspired by Paula about 4 months ago to start backing up to DVDs. I do it every month. I don't shop enough to do it every week. So it all stays on my computer in a "New" folder and then once it is backed up to DVDs, then I move it to my EHD to the proper designer folder. It makes me feel better:) hee, hee

Hahahah that is exactly how I feel!!

I have plenty of space with my own site, so I have started putting photos and my full-size jpg layouts on there. It just seems to take FOREVER to get it uploaded!

I am thinking that the way you are doing it Kyla would be the best for me to keep everything straight, by putting things in a "new" folder until it is backed up.

Another question- those of you that do it every week/month, are you not finalizing the disc and just adding to the disc a little at a time? Seems I heard somewhere that wasn't that good for the disc. Have you noticed if it works just fine?

Here's what I've been doing. Once I organized everything the other day, I backed it all up to Tony's EHD (for which he is eternally grateful LOL). Any time I've bought anything since, I unzipped it, and put it in it's folder on my harddrive, as well as the EHD. I'm hoping this is a habit I can keep up LOL!

I'm doing my big backup today/tomorrow. I figure that since it's the new year that I will just back everything up and have a fresh new copy of it all. Then for the future, I will download everything into a file with the month's name. Everything for January will be in the january file until February when I burn them all to DVD/CD and then I will sort them into their correct designer files.

In addition, I am going to be using Mozy. I signed up a while back for their free trial and it seems very very easy. One thing I liked about Mozy is that for all the people that were effected by the California fires that Mozy is willing to burn all their stored info onto DVDs and ship it to them for free. One of my biggest worries is that due to fire or theft that I will lose all my computer, EHD, and backups. So, Mozy is a solution to that worry. I just need to take the time to do the change from the free version to the pay version.

I received a free copy of Retrospect with our Western Digital EHD. I (DH actually) set it up to run each night at 1 am. My burner is broken so I don't have a second back-up.

I back up to DVD once a month. I drop my zipped downloaded files into a 'burn' folder after unzipping them to my 'untagged' file or wherever they may belong in the case of music or program stuff. My photos are sorted by month rather than subject.
At the end of the month I sort through My Documents, My Received & My Music folders by date & burn a DVD with everything in those folders for that month, everything in the 'burn' folder, and everything in that months My Pictures subfolder. If there is still space on the DVD, and there usually is a decent amount unless I buy a lot of audiobooks that month, I put the previous months photos & music on the DVD as well until it is full. Once a quarter I wipe my backup EHD and back up onto it my HD and my main EHD (which holds my digi & audio stuff). Then I go through & delete 3 months of zips & other things I no longer need to keep.

Occasionally I make a copy of my photos, starting from most recent & back to as far as I can get on one DVD and send that to my folks. Everything else I am, to a certain extent, willing to deal with the loss of due to fire, theft, etc. But I do try to keep a copy of the photos in another physical location.

Paula...I wish I had thought of doing a Master list as to what is where on the backup DVD's....I may have to set aside a day or two to do that...thats a great idea!

For scrap stuff..On my EHD, I have my designer folders set up, but also have a "New Stuff Folder"...all new stuff goes in that folder until theres enough for a full disc. After I burn it I move it all to their proper folders. That seemed to be the best way for me to keep up with stuff.

My pictures...they need backed up badly...I am way behind there, I pretty much use the same type system with them, I just don't burn them as often as I should.

I"ve been using Mozy for a year now. LOVE IT. Super easy to back up AND to restore files that you may need. I've got 2 EHDs. I use one for things that I'm actively working with (kits and stuff). And I back THAT up to my big EHD (that I only get out once in a while). But everything on my laptop and little EHD gets backed up to Mozy. Seriously, I can highly recommend them if you're looking for a good online back up site.

I basically do what Paula does.

Every new kit I have goes to the NEW folder and then gets burned to DVD once it reaches 4GB. I back up to DVD twice labelled A-Z. Each label has its own list which types of kits are in that DVD. (I have a masterlist as well). (What I forgot to do is to have a masterlist of designer and their kits and to which DVD it was backed up to!).

I did this system when I read KSharonK's Back Up procedure in her blog.

I plan to get an EHD for main back up as well. But as of the moment, this works out perfectly for me.

I have never backed anything up on DVD/CDs before so I guess with the new Year being here I better do that before I regret NOT doing it.

I've got a question for those who use Mozy. If I move my ehd to a different computer (ie from my desktop to my laptop) will it read it as a different ehd?

Well, I believe that Mozy only works on one computer unless you buy more Mozy subscriptions. If you need to move the EHD to another computer, then you'd turn off the automatic mozy backup on the computer, or mozy will think that you've erased the EHD and it will erase your backup too. But as long as you've stopped the backups while the EHD is away from it's normal computer, then all should be fine. Hope that helps! Do the trial version of mozy with a small file and you should see what I mean.

I have a second internal hard drive for backup. I also use carbonite for online backup because I'd hate to loose all the digital photos in a fire.

I don't leave my EHD on all the time, so I don't know what to do about that with Mozy. I have too much stuff to even fit on my internal drive, lol!

It's on MOST of the time, but sometimes I turn it off to let it cool down.

I haven't read all the response so I am sure I am repeating someone but I keep all new scrap items (as soon as I unzip them) in a seprate folder called "NEED BACKED UP". Then when that folder reaches a certain size (usually between 500 to 800MB) I will burn all those things to a DVD. Then I will move them to their appropratie folder (whether they are paper, an element or a certain designer I buy from a lot).

This way I always know what needs back up and if heaven forbid I have a crash or somthing i am really only likely to lose a small amount!!!

Hope that helps!!

Ok I gotcha. What about with like Bree said? Turning the computer/ehd off?

Now that I read some of the comments. I only "burn" to a DVD once. I have also heard that it's not good to keep adding to it and keep adding to it.

I also don't wait till I have 4GB of stuff to burn...DVD are cheap enough that I don't mind not filling them up. I usually watch Staples and they will have awesome sales on 50 packs and I usually buy a couple.

I also keep all my LO's seperated that need back up and I back them up when I reacj 2 or 3 GB, since they are so big and that usually doesen't take as long to accumulate.

I also keep my pictures in "month folders" and usually back them up when ever my CF card get to full. I do upload to my computer often, but I don't delet them off my CF card until they are burned to DVD.

If you turn off your EHD, turn off the automatic backup with Mozy. It is just a click of your mouse, their controls seem easy to me. If you forget to turn Mozy back on after 5 days, then it will do a pop up screen and remind you. So having your EHD off isn't a problem as long as Mozy doesn't do a backup and suddenly think you've erased your EHD because it's now off.

Having your whole computer off isn't a problem because Mozy won't be able to online connect to it and nothing will happen.

Awesome, thanks Julie. That's what I thought but I wanted to make sure :o) I'm gonna sign up tonight I think.

Can I ask a dumb question...that will totally out me? HOW do you back-up? Could I just buy an EHD and backup to it? Or is it better to do it to disc? I just KNOW how unorganized I am and the thought of keeping track of a million DVD/CDs is more stressful than thinking of a crash, lol.

You could just put copies of everything on your EHD, definitely. But EHD's crash. Which is why I want to backup another way just in case. Better to be safe than sorry right? Mozy seems easy to use based on everyone's comments. I'm going to try it out this weekend and see how it goes.

All my stuff is on EHD and I also burn to DVD. I have folders on my EHD for each designer and my photos are all by month.

Then, I have a folder of "To Be Burned to DVD" where all new kits go after I've used them. When it's got 4GB, I burn to DVD. The only problem is? If I ever need to find a kit, I won't know where to look unless I have an idea of when that kit was released or when I used it. :blink: :confused:

So, not the best system, but at least it IS backed up. I guess I need to have a printed list of what is on each DVD. That would help. :p

I would go with whatever method would be easiest for you because if it's too difficult or time consuming, you're probably not going to stick with it.

I currently have 2 EHDs that I back up to. On one I back up my entire laptop using Acronis True Image, which keeps track of everything that's changed since the last backup for me and puts it all into a backup archive. On the other EHD is an exact copy of all my photos and digiscrap stuff which I copy using Karen's Replicator. I also backup everything online using Mozy.

I'm getting Mozy, everyone has finally sold me on it. DH has so many photos for his photography side business, I really think I would feel better if there was just one more place where it could all be stored.

I'm with Libby, I'm loving Mozy. I've only been subscribed for a month or so now and I'm still on my initial backup.. but for pictures, scrap stuff and finished layouts I had over 101 gigs.

I took joined mozy and signed up for the year and it gives you a slight discount...
(I'm still on my initial back up..... taking forever LOL) but getting there!

so I'll be honest I read thru the site, but didn't read everything...

if you delete off your computer it deletes out of their mozy back up?

for photos I uplaod everything to my smugmug account (in need of a major over-haul in desing LOL)

so they are backed up pretty good their. I am pretty current w/ the last 6 months, just need to work on stuff on my computer that is older than that...
but then I hope to order monthly or quarterly DVD's from them

All my flattened layouts are also uplaoded there (I can resave to my computer if I need to) (just wish they also could store the psd and the kits =)
oh well that is what mozy is for!

backing up kits... haven't done in a super long time!!! scary

My EHD is only 2 years old, but I realized if it went I'd lose EVERYTHING! Plus Jordan was a jerk about burning DVD's for me today, so I'm signing up for Mozy this weekend when I can leave the comp on all day to start backing up. Plus I have a friend with a laptop who's going to let me use their drive to burn as many dvd's as I want. My best buy gift card will really come in handy now, lol.

Yup... it is just a mirror of what you have on the harddrive. If you delete it, Mozy will delete the backup. Of course, you have to set up which files you want it to back up, so it's not a complete mirror. Your program files aren't backed up, just the files and drives that you have selected.