Thursday, December 10, 2009

Backing up your data

I have been preaching data backup forever, it seems. Still,  I have customers who do not back up their data and risk losing some or all of it.

Yesterday a customer asked me about a subscription service which, for a modest annual fee, will automaticaly back up all of your data on an ongoing basis. When you start with them, they will take a day or week or longer, whatever it takes, to backup all of your data over your high speed internet connection. They will do it gradually if you permit them, so that your system will not be down or extra slow while they do this backup. Thereafter they will do incremental backups, meaning they will back up your data that has been updated or added since the last backup. They will store your data in an encrypted format at some remote location of theirs. As far as I am concerned, this is all goodness. Having your data backed up and stored elsewhere at a reasonable cost is a good thing.

If you elect to go this route, you must also take the responsibility to make sure that all of your data is backed up. The emphasis there is on the word ALL. I had one customer who subscribed to a service like this, thought all of their data was being backed up, and when the you know what hit the fan, they found out that all of their 2008 business financial data had not been backed up. They were able to manually recreate the files by entering all of the data from paper back into the computer. They were lucky. At least they could recreate the data. You may not be so lucky, so be sure if you go this route that you are completely covered.

I do not recommend one of these backup services over another because I have no experience with any of them. Conceptually this sounds like a good deal.

My preference is to be in control and not spend money if I don't have to. You can read more about how I manage my backups at this earlier blog post: http://pcdocsblog.blogspot.com/2009/06/backing-up-your-data.html

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT)

I am a member of AAA. I believe it is inexpensive smart insurance for my wife and me. In October I had a flat tire on my truck and it took a cell phone call and a 45 minute wait to get my flat tire removed and my spare tire installed and I was ready to go. That one call was financial justification enough for me to renew my membership.

When it comes to our computers, I feel the same way. I don't like paying for software, and rarely do I need to do that. A case in point of affordable insurance is Microsoft's MSRT. The price is right. It's free! Microsoft updates this program every month in an effort to keep its customers' PCs running trouble-free. It is distributed with your Automatic Updates. So why do I write about it here?

The answer is this. I just downloaded all of this Tuesday's updates and noticed that the December version of MSRT was included. However, I do not believe that the MSRT, when downloaded thru Automatic Updates does a full scan. I say this because every month I also download MSRT manually and run a Full Scan, and it takes several hours to run! So I suspect, but am really not sure, that the automatic download and install of MSRT  runs only a Quick Scan.

I like to download the tool monthly and let it run a Full Scan. I start this when I can let it run the full scan, maybe at bedtime or when I am headed out the door for a few hours. To me this is high quality and cheap insurance, and it makes sense to me to do this.


You can click on that image above to enlarge it.

The MSRT can be downloaded at http://www.microsoft.com/security/malwareremove/default.aspx. Go to this site and click on "Skip the details and download the tool". 

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Monday, December 7, 2009

Mixed Bag

I am sitting here working on 3 different laptops, two of them mine! One is running good old Windows XP, a second is running Windows Vista (a customer machine), and the third is running Windows 7.

I still am not a Vista fan, and again I encourage those of you who run Vista to download and run the Microsoft Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor. It's a free utility, and you can get it here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/get/upgrade-advisor.aspx. See how compatible your computer would be with Windows 7. If you pass the test, then I strongly urge you to watch for sales on Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade. My experience in doing that upgrade is that I shall not look back, and I really like Windows 7 a lot. Oh, and if possible, add 2GB of RAM to your machine first, although mine is running very well (better than it did when it was Vista) in just 2GB of RAM total.

I am not quite ready to upgrade my Windows XP machines, as I did my Vista laptop. I have a lot invested in my XP machines, in terms of applications installed and XP performance. In short, I see no need to upgrade my XP machines, although someday I probably will.

If you have questions about any of this, please comment on this post (click on Comments below) or write me.