Recently I was going through my movie collection and I came across a copy of Terminator, Special Edition, which I have never even played. I thought I would get it out and play it, only to discover that something strange had happened to the disks.

They are totally unusable and I would not put them into any dvd drive

Here are a few pictures, as you can see there is an odd coating to the disks. It seems that the plastic of the disk has degraded and gone sticky. It feels similar to an old elastic band that has been in the sun too long.

This got me thinking and so I started going through some of the disks I burned going back over the last 10 years. I didn’t find any others affected in a similar way but many of the disks would not play or the files would not open. Of the disks older than 3 years about 80% were damaged or unreadable. This just reinforces my belief that CDs and DVDs are not a medium for backups of data.

Online backup and storage offers the best solution as you are not reliant a single disk and because the data is stored on servers that are powered up the data will never degrade.

The definition from Wiki is

In information technology, a backup or the process of backing up refers to making copies of data so that these additional copies may be used to restore the original after a data loss event. The verb is back up in two words, whereas the noun is backup (often used like an adjective in compound nouns).

Backups are useful primarily for two purposes. The first is to restore a state following a disaster (called disaster recovery). The second is to restore small numbers of files after they have been accidentally deleted or corrupted. Data loss is also very common. 66% of internet users have suffered from serious data loss.

Since a backup system contains at least one copy of all data worth saving, the data storage requirements are considerable. Organizing this storage space and managing the backup process is a complicated undertaking. A data repository model can be used to provide structure to the storage. In the modern era of computing there are many different types of data storage devices that are useful for making backups. There are also many different ways in which these devices can be arranged to provide geographic redundancy, data security, and portability.

The key points

devices can be arranged to provide geographic redundancy, data security, and portability

Often meet people who say, oh I back up to a USB drive or DVDs. Well a backup is better than none BUT your backups should be arranged to provide geographic redundancy (off site), Secure (Encrypted) and Portable (Accessible from anywhere).

A backup to DVD or USB drive is none of these, true you could, post you drive to someone, and you could also encrypt your drive then carry it around so you can access your files from anywhere. Sounds like hard work!

1)     The second you disconnect that USB drive it is effectively out of date.

2)     Encrypting a drive is not simple for the average user.

3)     If you carry the drive with you, what happens if you leave it or have you bag stolen.

Simply put if you are serious about protecting your files, then you better back up properly using remote, encrypted storage that gives you access when you need it.

If you are not technical then email or call and we can install the trial for you for free! It costs less than 1 USB drive!

Many small businesses use Microsoft outlook for their emails backing up your emails are critical.

Outlook stores emails, contacts, and appointments in single files called personal storage folders, *.pst. The location of these files is a bit obscure and means they are often missed from backups of your PC. Also as the files are often locked they can be skipped when you do a backup!

So where are these files? Well it depends on your operating system and version of office. But you can find the locations easily;

1. Close any messaging programs such as Outlook, Microsoft Exchange, or Microsoft Windows Messaging.
2. Click Start, and then click Run. Copy and paste (or type) the following command in the Open box, and then press ENTER:
3. control panel
4. Control Panel opens.

   Note If you see the Pick a category screen, click User Accounts, and then go to step 3.

5. Double-click the Mail icon.
   
6. Click Show Profiles.
   
7. Click the appropriate profile, and then click Properties.
8. Click Data Files.
   
9. Under Name, click the Personal Folders Service that you want to back up. By default, this service is called Personal Folders. However, it may be named something else.

   Note If you have more than one Personal Folders Service in your profile, you must back up each set of .pst files separately.

   If there are no entries called Personal Folders and you have not yet stored any information such as messages, contacts, or appointments in Outlook, you probably have not yet enabled the Personal Folders Service.

10.  Click Settings, and then note the path and file name that appears.

Select the filename and copy it “Ctrl + C”

“Automation it the key to any successful backup solution! “

The simple option is to create a little script to do this; this is very simple to do.

1. Open notepad
2. And paste in your filename and path from step 10
3. Delete the filename at the end of the path, most probably anything the final \Outlook\xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.pst
4. Paste the following at the front of the line copy
5. The add this to the end of the line (where you removed the filename previously) *.pst
6. Then add a space and put the location where the backup will go, for example if you are using the Pro version of ER backup so we can backup directly to our virtual drive ”L:\backup\mail\“
7. You could also do this to a USB drive or a network drive.
8. Add “” around the paths so that you have a line of text like below, (remember it depends on the versions you are using so it might look slightly different
   copy “C:\Users\richard.ESSENTIAL\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook\*.pst” “L:\backup\mail\”

Now go to save as

Change the save as type to All files *.*

Enter the file name PSTBACKUP.BAT and select the c: drive or a folder to keep the script in.

Quickly test this works browse to the location you saved the file and run it.

Now check in the backup destination folder and you should see the files are all there.

How to Automate further

Windows 7 and Windows XP (see below)

WIndows 7

If you would like to automate it further then windows XP, windows vista and windows 7 all have a program called “Task Scheduler” to do this.

From the control panel select , Administrative Tools then Task Scheduler

Click “Create Task”

Enter a Name for the task and Description for the job

Set how often you want to run the backup, remember that outlook must be closed when you run the backup, Lunchtime is a good time to do this.

Select “Start a program”

Then enter the path of the pstbackup.bat file

Click Finish

In the main window you should now see your job, always check the “Last Run Time” to make sure it has run.

It is very important to check your backup has completed regularly, look at the last time the pst files were modified as a guide. If you are not sure then speak to an IT profesional or contact ER Backup and we can advise.

In XP

Open Control Panel

Select Scheduled Task

Click Add Scheduled Task

Click Next

Select Browse

Locate your batch file and select it. (PSTBACKUP.BAT)

Give the job a name and select how often it runs

Set how often you want to run the backup, remember that outlook must be closed when you run the backup, Lunchtime is a good time to do this.

Enter the username and password either yours or an account with administrator rights

In the main window you should now see your job, always check the “Last Run Time” to make sure it has run.

It is very important to check your backup has completed regularly, look at the last time the pst files were modified as a guide. If you are not sure then speak to an IT profesional or contact ER Backup and we can advise.

Disclaimer

ER Backup take no responsibility for the monitoring and maintaining of this process, the user must ensure that it is working correctly or verify with their IT support company.

To preform an integrity check  right click on the icon at the bottom of the screen, select settings

Click Advanced