Those who use computers for their station operations are well aware of the possibility of malfunctions which at best temporarily disrupt operations and at worst result in data loss. Having recently recovered from a huge data loss incident I now am looking at what I did right and what I did wrong and want to share some lessons learned.
This is not a tutorial on tools rather it is an overview of some ideas which could be helpful. My system is configured with the operating system on a small disc C: with data stored on a 2 TB drive reserved for data only. The thought for this is that it makes backups of the operating system quick and easy (less than 6 minutes) and allows migration of the data to another system if needed in case of failure or upgrades. Periodically backing up large data folders can be daunting but is not too bad if done with an external hard drive. Keeping backups on disconnected external drives shields it from possible system failures which can wipe the internal data disc.
This scheme has served me well until a recent event which exposed some negligence on my part. At the time of the failure there was a data logging program running in the background with the accumulated data being stored in memory. Unknown to me the program has a bug which causes a "memory leak" and this appears to have happened and caused a problem while data from the data disc was being read. The data disc became unreadable and was no longer recognized by the system.
Attempts to recover the data from the failed disc using two different recovery tools failed and it was evident that the data needed to be restored from a backup disc. The problem was that I had not done a data backup for three months so three month's work was lost. Lesson learned: Backup everything frequently.
The 2 TB data disc was relatively new so I decided to format it and if it checked out to use it for a backup disc. I purchased an inexpensive external drive enclosure, installed the drive, and was ready to format but I noticed that the drive was now recognized by the system. For some reason, not explained, the disc which was not seen when connected directly to the motherboard or an external USB adapter was now recognized with the new USB enclosure. I was able to recover almost all of my lost work with only a few files damaged and not readable.
The major lesson here is to back up the system and the data frequently. The other lesson is to keep the backup discs physically separate from the system and not connect them until it is certain that the system is operating properly.
The aggravating thing about this experience is that I knew better than to wait so long between backups but got lazy. I lucked out that the disc became readable so I lost little but I am reminded that the longer one waits between backups the longer one will spend restoring the system if it can be done at all.
Neil
To avoid needing to remember to do system backups, I use Macrium Reflect that I configured to make scheduled drive image and file backups to an external USB drive. The auto backup plan works well, and fortunately I have not needed to restore the whole image, so far (not looking forward to that, either).
For protection of hard/impossible-to-replace files such as self-authored software and Excel files, pics, financial data, contact info etc I use off-site storage in "The Cloud," which also is automated.
Just exactly where is "The Cloud" located?
If you look up in the sky due north, you will see it, the 2nd cloud from the left.
Johny has disclosed the location of The Cloud, but how does data get up there?
It's the chem-trails, the vapor tails taken up and spread around by Google Drones.
Meanwhile, down here on the surface of Terra (watch out for terra-rists) I had an out of bing experience.
I was waiting for a redlight at an intersection when a Bing Car went rolling by with a long white pole on top holding up a rectangular camera with lenses on all four sides.
Didn't Google get in trouble for driving around doing something? Oh, I remember, they were scooping data from wi-fi hotspots.
Do you know anything about Bing's cam car?
Bing has been dead for some time. So I doubt it was his car. Possibly Jack Benny?
The internetworks are so crammed with activity including bugs and maleware, it's amazing that it works at all.
Last week I had a plague of browser, C drive, and e-mail problems, from which I have only partially recovered.
Then this morning a pop-up virus started taking control (adnxs.com).
We could so quickly loose contact, that every minute might be goodbye.
Am I still On?
What about now?
Bing, the Microsoft search engine, has teams driving around taking immersive 360-degree views, and I have reason to believe my car will appear in one of them, as the Bing cam car passed in front of me yesterday as previously reported.
https://www.microsoft.com/maps/en-GB/streetside.aspx
My truck appeared twice in Google Maps. So take that!