PaperDemon Art RPG

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BACK UP YOUR FILES NOW!

  1. Posted on Jan 21, 2016, 10:42:12 PM UTC
    ID: 28473 | #1
    ArkillianDragon
    Level 273 BETA ADMIN
    XP

    Seriously guys- this is a PSA.

    I installed Office 365 last night, and there was some error in the installation. I had to reset my computer, and suddenly my "My Documents" folder was gone. TOTALLY GONE. not dis-associated, it totally tore the files out of the hard drive and crashed the whole folder. I reinstated the My Documents folder and it stopped coming up with errors, but the files were all gone. 

    Anyways, System Restore doesn't back up files- just system folders. This is something I didn't realise till I looked, and what I was backing up was my art only. I scoured all my old hard drives, thumb drives, everything to find a copy of all my old stories dating back till I was a young teenager. They're crap stories, but I still want them to read my old ideas.I couldn't find any of them. I thought I had backed up my old stories- turns out I took that for granted. They were all gone. I checked the Cloud system Office uses hoping it uploaded my documents to the cloud without my permission- nothing. I checked the recycling bin. Nothing. 

    Now, I need to chat with Office still incase they need to update the program. Maybe they can still recover my files, but I was SUPER lucky that my old obselete hard drives for my old computer is still in my possession, and work has an old IDE compatible PC I could hook them up to, cause one of them had an old version of the files (which is fine cause any new stories are uploaded to the net), but I may not have been so lucky.

    Please- Take some time out of your day today and back up all your files you care about on at least one separate source. You don't want to go through what I went through this last 12 hours. I'm only just starting to recover from the shock hours after finding the files safe. 

    And please- feel free to share stories about losing or refinding files / errors that your computer couldn't easily recover from or what ever. We all need the wake up call- technology isn't forever, and keeping several back ups is a really good idea for longevity, and it doesn't take long :)

    :pd:

    Last edited by ArkillianDragon on Jan 21, 2016, 10:44:00 PM UTC. 1 total edits.

  2. Posted on Jan 21, 2016, 11:26:52 PM UTC
    ID: 28474 | #2
    Harlequaint
    Level 9
    XP

    Glad you got your files back, I know how that is. I didn't back up any of my school work and lost it all Now I'm back up happy. I use CD's mostly but found out I can use my external hard drive for more than on computer and have done that. I had to but a new CD case for all my music back up CD's.

  3. Posted on Jan 21, 2016, 11:41:04 PM UTC
    ID: 28475 | #3
    ArkillianDragon
    Level 273 BETA ADMIN
    XP

    Oh man- I feel for you- CDs are pretty old tech now for back ups but if it's your only option D: If you're stuck, Gmail has online storage of like 15GB or something for free, and Google Drive nad stuff for online hosting of stuff. You could upload it there for free rather than burning it to CD if that's the stuff you've got. CDs get damaged really easy, but OK for a few years. 

    Man- I'm so happy I have the files. I have a 2TB hard drive I have all my art on. I'm going to slam my documents in there. I just got so panicked about losign my art and deleting doubles that it never occurred to me to check if the writing was still there :( I feel that giving an active reminder to people is the best way to keep all our data safe. Having our lives in data is still a thing that's less than 20 years old. It's a new thing for society. We need to get ourselves into a habit of protecting it :) Hopefully cloud systems will make that better, but it's good to have another back up besides that incase the cloud dies. 

    And man, Office 365 is super different. This is gonna take a while to get use to O.o

  4. Posted on Jan 23, 2016, 8:49:04 AM UTC
    ID: 28476 | #4
    Harlequaint
    Level 9
    XP

    I don't use cloud and I rather burn my stuff to CD's since I can't lose it. I do use google documents, started after spending 4 hours writing a paper for class and didn't save it so I closed it and lost all the work. Did my papers on google doc after that since it has an automatic save option. I wish I cold afford a TB drive of something but can't save the money up when I have my babies that need food and I can't let them starve. 

  5. Posted on Jan 30, 2016, 4:33:37 AM UTC
    ID: 28477 | #5
    BogusRed
    Level 279 ADMIN
    XP

    I use Dropbox. All of my artwork and animation work I save into the Dropbox folder and it automatically gets uploaded to Dropbox servers. So I don't even have to think about it. In addition, I have automatic backups setup on my windows desktop. every day it backsup files to a separate hard drive.

    If you have to remember to backup your files, it's subject to human error of forgetting to backup. If you can setup something automated, you're more likely to have the most up to date backups.

  6. Posted on Mar 28, 2018, 2:59:39 AM UTC
    ID: 29010 | #7
    DragonAceSg7
    Level 6
    XP

    I used to use Dropbox but I didn't like some of the security issues.  I use Google Drive and BackBlaze.  Backblaze is amazing.  It is pricey if you don't have tons of stuff to back up but $50/year it out backups everything.  No limit.  You can't use it like Google Drive like store things just there, but I've got a lot of video files that I can't put on Drive of the size.  I do pay the $2/month for the 100GB google drive, love it.

  7. Posted on Mar 29, 2018, 10:43:47 AM UTC
    ID: 29012 | #8
    BogusRed
    Level 279 ADMIN
    XP

    What security issues did you have with Dropbox? That's my backup tool of choice. It works so well.

    I had issues with Google drive's synching app. After years and years it never worked right and was super slow when you were trying to choose folders for selective sync. I have it at work and I think they recently fixed it for mac but I'm not sure if it's still awful for windows.

  8. Posted on Mar 29, 2018, 5:26:10 PM UTC
    ID: 29013 | #9
    DragonAceSg7
    Level 6
    XP

    I honestly cannot remember, it was years ago when some sort of update made it hole in Dropbox that let it access too much of your computer so it made it easier to steal data.  I THINK  It's been years since I stopped using it.

    I found Google Drive easier to work with once I figured out how to get the desktop "app" to function, but I know many still have problems with it.

    The only problem I've had with Backblaze was it having access to my main Steam folder.  The "updates" games do when they 'resync' when you play them confused the hell out of it so it was stuck unable to finish the initial backup until I excluded that folder.  (And thankfully they have instructions on how to get the Google Drive (Now Cloud because... because) to backup too since I save very little JUST on my hard drive other than games.

    I like using Backblaze as a second thing since I have files (old AMVs from AMV.org and my Let's Play vids) that I can't fit on the Google Drive so it gets those too.

  9. Posted on Apr 5, 2018, 1:50:14 AM UTC
    ID: 29017 | #10
    hushicho
    Level 33
    XP

    Dropbox has had a few problems like, on Macs, grabbing more disk space than needed and just...keeping going with that. Fortunately the bug was addressed, as far as I heard, but I rarely use it now because of that. Which isn't reasonable, so I should use it again!

    I usually tend to backup my files to an external drive. I get them when I see them on sale, so I have a few pretty spacious ones. Since some of what I'm backing up is the same files, I tend to just make dated archives.

    I should use Time Machine more, but it seems like I always forget. :( I love Macs and Time Machine is one of the best features of them.

    A few years ago, my main work machine had some sort of critical hardware error and I thought I would lose everything. I was so devastated -- because I hadn't, at that time, been taking as regular backups as I do now -- and was just about ready to give up altogether if I lost my hard work of two months. Fortunately, the people at the Apple Store were able to save all of my data and put it on an external drive. Ever since then, I've tried to remember to take backups regularly and in some cases, even do redundant backing up with flash drives and files on my other system.

    But I do think that people should definitely backup regularly! I still don't think I do it regularly enough, but I really don't want to lose files that are irreplaceable, like my as-of-yet unpublished creative work. That can't just be found and downloaded again online! It's important to think about how you'd feel if you lost, say, two months worth of work on something that you intended to show to the world but hadn't yet. It's a devastating feeling.

     

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