There are so many ways to safely keep copies of your documents, photographs and digital music or video files, that it can be overwhelming trying to to keep up with them all. I have a tiny home office and as I was moving things around to make room for a new computer desk, I came across an assortment of media with backup files on them. I found floppy disks, zip drives, DVDs, and flash drives. What I really need is to check out the newest data storage systems and convert all the old files off the old media. After all, new computers do not even have a floppy drive anymore. How am I ever going to access the files on those old floppy disks now?
I’m sure the guys in our IT department at work are laughing at me. They have a lot bigger fish to fry, with protecting the data bass for our entire company. They have to worry about archiving years worth of business records, daily backups for every computer in every office, and data recovery in case of a natural disaster.
Their worries are huge compared to mine. Even so, I would be very upset if something happened and I lost all my years and years of photographs and special documents. I spent days scanning all my old files and organizing them. I was surprised to find how many papers I had saved over the years. Everything from medical records to high school report cards and souvenirs from all the concerts, trade shows and special events that I’ve attended over the years.
I remember when I worked at the law firm and had to keep track of the daily disk backup. Every morning I would come to work and rotate the disks from the servers to the storage area. And each night I would give the latest backup disk to the senior partner for him to put in his briefcase and take home with him so we had secure offsite storage. Now there are much faster and easier ways to accomplish the same thing. I do love progress!
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