Quote of the Month:
Backup protects against security failures, ransomware, accidental deletion, hardware failure and more.
Even if you are careful about vulnerabilities, you have risks. Not only can some illicit computer devotees lock down or ruin your data with ransomware, but sometimes you can run into hardware problems: Bad drives, heat waves and bad weather, wear and tear on older machines, or a laptop that gets lost or dropped. When that happens, you are going to want to be able restore your valuable data.
What happens when things go wrong? How do you ensure that you can recover?
Conclusion
You can never have too much backup. Grundig IT recommends a combination of local and online backup using the tools outlined below. Regardless of the option(s) that you choose, please make sure to periodically perform test restores to make sure that your backup solutions are always functioning smoothly. Or have us do that for you.
There are a lot of backup options out there, for both businesses and personal computers. For business, your data stores and servers / online services are probably managed by your IT provider, so I recommend talking to them (or us) about that.
Here, we are looking at backup options for the end-user client: Your home office computer, your remote worker’s device or your laptop-based mobile employee who moves from location to location.
Grundig IT recommends considering the following for backup in these situations: Acronis True Image, Carbonite and Cloudberry (or a combination of these solutions).
Acronis True Image (local backup)
Acronis has two backup options and is relatively easy to set up. It offers a local disk option, as well as a cloud-based backup option. The disk options are very powerful, not only because the backups are much faster to a local drive than the cloud, but because Acronis can configure the backup disk itself as a bootable restore drive – called a ‘Survival Kit’. You can select the schedule for backups to occur, and can set multiple schedules.
Acronis backs up to an external drive, so you will want to keep that drive connected to your device all the time or at least frequently so that backups can be performed. Unfortunately, if your backup drive fails or gets unplugged, the backup will fail. So, make sure the backup drive is plugged in when the backups are scheduled.
Acronis backs up the entire image of your computer and performs incremental backups once the initial backup is complete. Restore options are for the entire computer or for individual files and folders that are selected upon initiating the restore.
Pricing: Acronis sells for $50. Grundig IT purchase licenses and we always have some available, so you can easily get them through us. Acronis comes out with a new version every year. However, older versions of the program work the same way as new ones, so it is not necessary to purchase a new version if you already have an older one.
Carbonite (online backup)
Carbonite has been a popular backup option for several years. Carbonite offers a cloud-based backup service, which includes remote file recovery. You don’t need to worry about a local backup drive that might become unplugged, breaks or gets lost. Any files or folders within Windows can be selected for backup by Carbonite. Carbonite will keep track of what files have been backed up and will back only new files or ones that have been modified on each subsequent back
Carbonite backs up only when you are connected to the Internet. Though backups are relatively fast since only new / changed files are backed up each time, restoring all your data at once can take much longer and depends on the speed of the Internet connection. Online backups like this rarely have any issues and are highly recommended for anyone with a laptop or who risks not consistently attaching a backup drive for a local backup.
Pricing: Carbonite’s service is a subscription, starting at $6 per month.
Cloudberry (online backup)
Cloudberry backup is something that Grundig IT can provide you with and manage for you, if you prefer. It’s an online backup and is an alternative to Carbonite. The difference is that Cloudberry separates the backup client from the storage and offers more options.
Pricing: The Cloudberry client for a single device is $50/yr. Storage is inexpensive. Ask us about the Cloudberry option. We can explain it in more detail and help you decide if it is the right option for you.
Please contact us with any questions. We want to make sure that you are taken care of and never lose anything important.
Tom Grundig – 925.528.9081
