Today we are going to discuss the top reasons why you might loose your data and ways to prevent it. Data loss is probably the most feared scenario when it comes to operating your computer. This is especially true if you have a small or large business and all your important files are located on the computer. If you do not have a full backup somewhere in a separate location, you are asking for trouble.
Of all the ways that you can loose your data, a hard drive failure is probably the most dreaded. When a hard drive fails, you not only loose your data but you loose the ability to get your data back. There are a number of other ways that hardware can affect your data including the failure of a motherboard or even a failure of the processor. Failure of these components can scramble the data on the hard rive and might cause portions of it to become corrupted even if the drive is still spinning. These type of failures are the hardest to predict and can often come with no prior warning signs.
I think I speak for all of us on this one. Human error is probably ranked high on the charts as one way that data loss can occur. Often times without thinking, we try to do well by cleaning out the computer and then accidentally delete an important file that we really needed. What could make things worse is that you already cleaned the recycle bin. In this case if the file was located on the desktop, you might be able to get the file back by way of system restore. If the file was located almost anywhere else, you are probably out of luck if you did not have a backup. There are free programs that can help you to retrieve lost files but they are iffy at best and there is no guarantee the file will actually be useable even if you do locate it. Again we can see that backup is king.
A very common way of loosing data through data corruption is the computer virus. These nasty bugs can delete or scramble data on your hard drive to the point where you can no longer boot the system. Some situations like this are recoverable while others are not. I know from experience how bad some of these Trojans can be and often times a computer is never 100% again after an infection.
Yet another way that data can be lost is through the installation of software. Sometimes when we try to do an install of a program, things go very wrong and when you try to restart your computer, the system will not boot. Sometimes you can recover from this by booting into safe mode and removing the offending software but in other cases, you will have to a complete reinstall of Windows. When a re install is the only option you will loose all the data that is on the computer and if you don’t have a backup, you risk loosing a lot.
There are other miscellaneous ways that data can be lost including floods, hurricanes, tornadoes and fire. In cases such as this, having a backup in a remote location would be the best way to preserve your valuable information.
In a nutshell, you need to do regular backups on your computer and it is best to have at least 2 separate backups especially for critically important data.
Author: Joe Zelenak, Staff Writer
I back mine up with usb hard drive!