How to Backup Email and Other Data

Just about everybody has important data on their hard drive, from digital pictures to important documents, emails, earmarked websites the list goes on and on. In my experience people are pretty lax about backing up their PCs, and I think this really is an area that deserves attention. With a good back up set you can bounce back from a fatal hard drive crash and be up and running with all of your pictures, documents, downloads, email and favorites before you know it. Having important files stored on removable media is also a good safety precaution in case you get a virus or trojan horse.

There are a couple of different ways to back up important data, from the casual copy and paste to running complicated scheduled backups. There is no wrong way, as long as you have a copy of everything you need.

You can save the data on a couple of different types of media (floppy, ZIP, CD-R/RW, DVD+R/RW, Flash memory, even DAT drives) but for home use I really recommend either CDs or DVDs, floppies are just too small, zips, although bigger than floppies are still small (100-200MB), and they're old and kind of expensive. Flash memory can store data, but it's not really something you want to save data to and store away unless there is no other option. DAT tapes are more for the corporate end of things and are overkill in most homes. CDs are cheap, hold a lot of data, work on any PC and are easy to store.

If you use CD-RW, or DVD-RW you can actually save money by setting up a "round robin" with your backups. To do this, you need at least 3-4 of the same backup set, take the oldest and erase it. Now use the blank disk for the new backup, the next time you do a backup use the oldest disk in the set and so on and so forth.

As for the methods of backing up, I find it's easiest when all my intended files and folders are organized in structured manners and not scattered all over my hard drive. This is a good way to insure that you don't forget anything important by hunting for a bunch of individual files. An easy way to stay organized is to create a descriptively labeled folder structure and try to be diligent about saving your data to it's designed folder.

Another good practice is to test your backups. Don't just take the burning software's word for it. After a backup, explore the disk and randomly go through files and open them up to make sure that they're complete and not corrupt. Learn from my experience; waiting for a complete system failure is not a good time to check the validity of your backups! This is a good way to get yourself in a lot of trouble. I know if I didn't back up the pictures or movies of my kids, I wouldn't be able to live with myself.

Once you have all your ducks in a row, it's time to back up. There are also a number of ways to do this. The easiest is to open your burning program, select data CD, and go through the folder, then explorer, and grab the folders you want to back up. When you select a folder, you should see it in the "burn" selection window. When you're done with your backup selection, choose "burn".

If you have Windows XP, you have the luxury of being able to open up the blank CD or DVD in Windows Explorer and copying and pasting the desired folders right onto the disk and tab over to "Write files to CD". Windows will do the rest for you. This is nice, but I personally still like to use my third-party software.

Most burning software has its own backup service, and there are a number of third-party backup titles out there. The nice thing about these types of software is the options, like compression, backup jobs, and incremental backups. These are nice features especially when you have some backups that you want to insure are up to date. For instance, you can create a "Back up Set" which is basically a saved and named list of folders and files that you want backed up. This makes the whole process so easy, you can create a backup set and run it to create a new back up or save just the changes to the backup. These are two options that are usually found in backup programs. If you use "backup sets", it's important to keep the files organized, and in all the correct folders. You can also schedule Backup Jobs, which are basically backup sets that are scheduled to run at predetermined times, and intervals (i.e. once a week Friday at 6:00).

Backup Email in Outlook Express

There are a few ways to back up your email messages, some being harder than others. You may have tried to use the export feature or maybe you just tried dragging all your messages to another area so you could save them there. Well, if you've had no luck with either of those options, there might just be an easier way.

This process requires you to burn a backup CD, so you need to make sure your computer already has a burner or that you have an external one to use. You'll also need the appropriate software. Go ahead and insert the blank CD into your computer. A window will pop up on your screen asking what you want to do next. You're going to want to select "Open writeable CD folder using Windows Explorer" and press OK. (If your computer doesn't do anything when you put in the CD, you can just double click on your My Computer icon and open up your CD drive; usually drive E or F).

Now, we're gonna get into the backup fun. Open Outlook Express and go to Tools, Options and click on the Maintenance tab. Next, click the Store Folder button. Go ahead and copy the folder location that pops up on your screen (in the edit box for you screen reader users). Your folder name may be rather long, so make sure you get the whole thing copied (part of it may be hidden, so double check it). Yours will probably look something like the picture below.

Now, click Cancel twice to get out of the screens and then close down Outlook Express. Go to Start, Run and paste your folder name into the run command box. Click OK or press enter.

When the new window comes up, go to Edit, Select All (or use Ctrl + A). All of the items in that folder will then be highlighted. Next, look under the File and Folder Tasks area and click on Move the selected items. You're going to want to move them to your CD drive folder that we talked about above. (It's usually the E: or F: drive). Click to highlight the CD drive and then press the Move button. You will then be prompted to burn your CD. You will use your burner software just like you would any other time you were burning a CD.

Once your CD is done, all of your e-mails will be backed up. You can then go back into the original folder and delete all of the e-mails in there. This will save you some space on your computer. You can then accumulate more e-mails and when you think it's time, make another CD to back those up as well!

Free Email Backup Programs

StaticBackup, Inc has free individual backup programs for Windows Mail, Windows Live Mail, Outlook, Outlook Express, IncrediMail, Thunderbird, Becky, and Eudora. (scroll down the page to find the free versions)

Click this link to find the FREE email backup programs on the StaticBackup website: http://www.staticbackup.com/downloads.htm.

It's a very good idea to keep your email messages updated and backed up. You never know when you might want to view an e-mail for the second or fifteenth time and with your backup CD, it's easy as pie!

As PCs become a bigger part of peoples' lives the information being stored is becoming more important. Performing backups is essential for protecting your data.