Backing up your data using FreeFileSync

Those of you who work for larger companies will probably never have to worry about backing up your data. But if you are working for yourself, you may not have good systems in place.

There was a fire where I live at least twenty years ago, and two of the three businesses affected could have, had they had access to stock, been in business again the next day. One firm undertook back-ups of their daily trading and files to their head office's servers each night before they closed; another other firm had done their own data back-up and the manager had put it in the boot of their car when they left. The third firm lost everything, and were completely wiped out.

It is not that hard to back up your data, and you don't have to spend lots of cash to do it. In fact, you can set up a system for less than $500.

Buy three harddrives (I use Seagate HDDs, as I have found these to be exceptionally reliable), and rotate them weekly (see how in this post here).

Keep at least two of your backups off-site, so that if anything happens to your office, you still have your data stored safely (I use my PO Box, and put my HDD back-up in a self-addressed jiffy bag, so it is protected, and if for any reason I ever lost one, it would be sent back to my PO Box).


In addition, I use a piece of freeware to back-up my files. It is called FreeFileSync, and can be downloaded here.

How you use it is as follows:


Sam