the Portal

Christine Noble, with Marnoble Computer Sales and Service here in Houston, was educating me today about why a full system backup plan is even more important in the present environment. “Think about it,” she said. “If you’re running a small shop and business is down, you really can’t afford tech support or recovery services if something happens to your network or one of your computers.”

“Not a problem,” I replied, “I back up all my data weekly.” But do I back up my software and all the configurations, she wondered. And the answer is no.

An even larger question is am I backing up my backups? Am I protecting my system by keeping backup data somewhere offsite, or is it in a desk drawer next to my computer? Offsite file storage never was a concern for me until Hurricane Ike. We didn’t lose any of our computers to a falling tree or even a power surge. But we could have, and tons of other people lost plenty.

So now I’m exploring alternatives, for myself and all of you.

Outfits like MarNoble offer regular, recurring data backups to their server for as little as $20 a month for residential customers, $50 a month for larger company systems. The alternative to a professional computer firm is an Internet-based service of some sort.

There are lots of issues around these choices. What is your available bandwidth and file transfer speed? Do you deal in proprietary or confidential information that requires encrypted transfers?

Below are some places to go for additional information if you think this might be one of your own company’s vulnerabilities. And in a few weeks, I’ll file a quick update as to what solution I came to for my own PC, laptops, and sundry mobile devices.

• Data Storage Solutions for Your Business, an article by Peter Alexander, Entrepreneur Magazine, 20 Dec 2006 provides a good overview introduction to the issues.
• PC Magazine (PCMag.com) offers reviews for both paid and free online file storage here, along with some suggestions for on-site external file storage.
• About.com’s Linda Roeder offers Top 8 File Sharing and Online Storage options — and from that page are links to a great collection of information for people beginning a personal Web site or new to social media.
• Wikipedia.org also offers a lengthy discussion of file hosting services and data storage, with links to various service providers.

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