Hard drives, like all technology, will eventually fail. It's not a question of if, it's a question of when, and how bad the data loss will be. Think for a moment about all the data you have on your computer. Family photos, financial information, personal documents. How upset would you be, if you turned on your computer one day, and all that data was gone. That very thing happened to me just a few months ago. One minute I sitting in a class typing notes when my computer froze. I restarted my computer, and nothing happened. For whatever reason, my hard drive picked that very moment, to have a catastrophic failure. Everything was gone. Most of the time, there's no way to detect or prevent a hard drive failure. The only thing you can do is to make sure that you have a backup of all your important files so you can recover once a failure has occurred. My MacPeople friends have lovingly called me the "Backup Queen" and thankfully when my hard drive failed, I had complete backups in place and only lost about an hours worth of information. While I admit my backup plan borders on the edge of obsessive compulsive, perhaps you can modify it to suit your needs.

1. Once a Week- Create a bootable clone of my entire computer.
Every Sunday evening, I use a program called "SuperDuper!" to create a bootable clone of my entire computer. Essentially, this program copies every block of data from my computer's drive onto an external drive. It also makes the external drive bootable, meaning that even if my internal drive has failed, I can still startup my computer and operate off the external drive. It's not a good idea to run off an external drive long-term, but in a pinch it can get you through until you can have the internal drive replaced and restore your data.

I store my backup in a fireproof, waterproof safe in my home although my preference would be that you store your backup off-site. If a catastrophic event, such as a fire, natural disaster, or even a break-in were to occur, you could not only loose your computer, but your backup as well. Here's an example that's a little less far fetched. One of my good friends was traveling with her iBook at the airport. As she passed through the security checkpoint she had to place her laptop back on the conveyer belt to run it through X-ray machine at the security checkpoint. Unfortunately, whether it was a setup or just an unfortunate fluke, she was held up as she was going through the metal detector. When she finally made it through a minute or two later, her laptop bag was gone. Her only comfort was knowing that she made a full backup of her computer before departing on her trip. THen she realized, her external hard drive containing her backup, was also in the laptop bag.


2. Once a Week- Backup my home folder to my iPod.
iPods are great. They not only serve as digital music players, portable video players and a place to store your contacts and calendars, but they also can be used as an external hard drive. I use Apple's Backup program (part of the .Mac membership) to backup my home folder every week to my iPod. Backing up the home folder is sure to get all of my personal data and settings. Although it will not copy everything on my computer, including applications and the system, it generally backups all my essential files and takes a fraction of the time of the clone. I usually have my iPod with me so if I need to access files when I'm on the go, I just plug my iPod into another computer and can access my files. For security purposes, I backup into an encrypted disk image. This means if my iPod was stolen, no one would be able to access my backup without first entering a password.

3. Every Evening- Backup all essential documents
We all have files that we use every day. In my case this includes all of my school-related files, my QuickBooks financial software, and information in my address book and calendar. These are the documents that I need to be up to date and loosing even a days worth of work would be detrimental. Using Apple's Backup utility, I created a custom backup plan that backs up these files every day to my iDisk (.mac membership required). This way, these important documents are never more than a day out of date.

4. Every Afternoon- Backup all school-related files.
It's not uncommon for me to take several pages worth of notes each hour I'm in class. If I were to loose my notes it would almost be like loosing a day of class. Every afternoon during my lunch break my mac automatically backup all of my school-related files using Apple's Backup software. This backup combined with my daily backup (described in step 3 above) is why I only lost an hours worth of work when my catastrophic hard drive failure occurred. My disk crashed at about 2:15 in the afternoon, my backup for my school files had just automatically occurred a few hours earlier.

5. Every Day- Sync iCal and Address Book with .Mac
Finally, I have iSync set to automatically sync my Address Book, iCal, Safari Bookmarks, and Mail Rules to .Mac. This isn't simply for backup purposes, but also ensures that if I'm away from my computer, the information on my .Mac account is fairly current and I can access all of my email addresses and calendars when I'm away from my computer.