Think about this. What would happen if your hard drive stops working tomorrow? No data is readable, and you have a deadline approaching in a week, for a project you've spent the last month finishing.

Your reputation is at stake, not to mention your paycheck and your entire portfolio! What's the value of that data? $100? $1,000? If you're like me, even if no deadline were approaching, that value is far above $10,000.

What, me worry?

Fortunately that probably didn't happen to you today. As artists and designers, we thrive on right-brained activities, and while we're aware of the possibility of equipment failure, we can rationalize it as something that is unlikely, and a problem that we will deal with only if it happens. If you've been ambitious enough to research backup plans on the Internet, you might have found the information overwhelmingly technical, and it's hard to know what you really need--RAID arrays, one-touch backup drives, online services, third-party software--yikes! Unless you're an IT geek, you don't want to put any unnecessary time and money in this task. After all, you have work to produce and deadlines to meet.

I'm the same way, even after suffering a hard disk crash a couple years ago. I said to myself, "That sucked. I never want to go through that again," and I bought a one-touch backup drive, thinking it was the easy answer. Problem is, I never put a solid plan into place, the drive got hogged up by a data-hungry project, and the backups never happened.

The reality is that drive failures absolutely do happen. If you work with computers long enough, the law of averages is going to catch up with you, and you will suffer one. The more critical data you have on that drive, the more pain you're going to feel when it happens. Well-managed IT departments know this, and they invest in multiple levels of data protection because it pays back big (although invisible) dividends.

So what's an artist to do? Take it from someone who has been there. If you dedicate two or three days and $200-500 to preparing for a drive failure, you're going to save boatloads of time and money down the road. You also have the advantage of being able to work around your schedule, which won't be an option in the case of a failure. When it's all done, it will be mostly self-maintaining, and you can sleep easier at night :)

This is not a comprehensive guide for everyone under the sun. It's a simple solution that will get your home studio or office backed up on a regular basis with no unnecessary fuss or expense.

Take Inventory

Okay, first things first. To get a backup system in place, you need to get your files organized. This is unnatural for some artists, but don't worry--you won't have to get too precise about it, broad categories will do.

Start by sitting down and thinking about the contents of your computer. In your mind or on paper, think in terms of three categories:

1. Replaceable Files -- Your operating system, program files, software install files, and anything else that is not specific to you. If you suffer a major hard disk failure, you can buy a drive or a new PC and be back in business in about a day. I would also put raw video in this category, as it can always be restored from the original tapes.
2. Valuable Files -- These are all the files that fall in that $10K+ price range I mentioned before. All your projects and documents will make of the bulk of this category. Application resources like brushes and stock photos might belong here too. If you're using an email client like Outlook (not a web-based email reader) and you conduct business via email, your mail archives are also highly valuable.
3. Priceless Files -- No, this is not a MasterCard commercial :) The priceless category is something I'll address at the end of the article, and it's a small subset of only your most valuable files. For me, priceless files are my favorite family photos, and hi-res flattened versions of my portfolio pieces. Try to keep these files at or under a total of 4GB if possible.

Go ahead, take your time. Better to get this figured out before you start moving files around.

Organize Your Files

Now you've identified what data has to be backed up religiously. To keep it simple, you need to take those files and separate them from the replaceable files. If your work files are scattered over several different drives, it's time to consolidate. You need a single drive that's big enough to hold everything. Choose from one of the following options:

• The best scenario is to have an internal physical drive that's completely dedicated to your projects. If your computer will support it and if you know what you're doing, buy a nice beefy 320 or 500GB drive and install it. This will be your recoverable directory.

• Another option is to use an external drive for your main recoverable directory. This has pros and cons. Some obvious pros are portability and easy installation. You can take your entire body of work with you wherever you go, and it's very quick to set up. However, an external drive is more likely to get knocked down or accidentally turned off. And transfer speeds from an external drive are usually slower than an internal drive. If you take this route, get a Firewire or ESATA drive (instead of USB 2.0) if at all possible.

• As a last resort, you can create a folder on the root of your drive and call it "Work" or "Recoverable" or whatever you want. This folder will be your recoverable directory.

When you have your recoverable directory selected and established, start the process of copying all your valuable/pricess files in there. If you're moving to a new drive, copy the files, and don't delete the old ones yet. You'll need to copy application resources too, and in the future, when you download or create new resources, you should save them to the resources folder in your recoverable directory before copying into the application. For email (if applicable), you need to locate and move mail archives into the work directory. After moving them, be sure to tell your mail client where to find the archives. If you're using Outlook, see this article for detailed instructions on moving your mail data (http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/HA011124801033.aspx).

Once everything is copied, take some time to verify that it's all working correctly. Open project files, send and receive emails, do a visual comparison---whatever it takes to convince yourself that it's all good. Now go back and delete the old copies (if they're still there). Get used to the idea that, from this point forward, you're going to put ALL your important files somewhere in this recoverable directory.

Buy Backup Hardware

Now that you've consolidated all your recoverable files, check the size of all these files. If you're in Windows, right-click the drive or folder and select "Properties." Take a look at how much space is used and how much is available. Your backup drive will require an amount of space that's at least equal to all available space in that recoverable directory.

So get out to the store and buy an external drive of the correct size. Why external? Well, the idea is that if there's some catastrophe such as massive overheating in your case, your backup will be safe. And transfer speeds aren't critical.

As you bring the drive home, promise yourself that you will never use it for anything besides backups. I know, that stinks, but just think about how you're going to admire your own foresight if you ever need to restore. It should be a piece of cake to hook the drive up to your PC, so get it connected, and then move on to the next step.

Automate It

For a backup plan to work, it needs to run by itself , without you worrying about it or manually starting anything. I recommend setting up software that will make a complete backup of all your recoverable directory on a weekly basis, and incremental backups daily. It's a little easier on your backup drive than doing a full backup every day, and you have very up-to-date backups at your fingertips. Hold on to your shorts, this is the tough part. The good news is that once you get it set up, it will be hands-off, and you can get back to work.

Exactly how you set this up is going to vary depending on your operating system. You should be aware that there are lots of companies selling backup software that do this sort of thing, but there's a good chance that the software you need is already installed on your PC.

At this point, Mac users should look here:
www.mac.com/1/solutions/backup.html

Windows users can use Microsoft's built-in backup utility.

Maintenance

Whew! Now you can rest easy knowing that you have a backup system in place. As you sit back and relax, it's worth thinking about ways to prevent ever needing to restore from your backups. The enemy is hard drive wear and tear, so how can you minimize it? One option is to cool your hard drive, but you have to be a serious geek like me to do that. Something easier is just to turn your drive off when it's not needed--but make sure that it's left on when backups run. If your backups run every Sunday night, then turn the PC off Monday through Saturday nights. You can also use the Power Management options in Windows to stop spinning disks after periods of inactivity.

But regardless of how well their lifespans are optimized, all disks will eventually fail. The age of failure varies--anywhere from 3 to 10 years in my experience. If you can afford it (and think about the value of the data again), put all your drives on a three-year replacement plan. Once a drive reaches 3 years of age, swap it out for a new model and destroy the old one. This dramatically reduces your chances of suffering a drive failure.

Simple Disaster Recovery

One final lesson you can take from corporate IT is the need for Disaster Recovery (or DR). A disaster means that your house burns down, or all your computer equipment is stolen, something catastrophic that takes out both your main computer and your backup drive. Unlike backups, you're probably never going to need your DR files, but it's still worth thinking about, so I'm going to outline a very inexpensive DR plan for a home studio/office. There are plenty of other DR approaches. This one is the easiest that I've seen.

This is where those "Priceless" files come in. Within your recoverable directory, make a "DR" directory. In this directory, set up an archive of your most important files, and keep it small--4GB or less. As time goes on, you'll want to keep it updated, adding meaningful files as you create them.

Now go back to the store and get a good-quality 4GB SanDisk USB Flash drive. Make a copy of your DR directory on this drive. When done, you need to store the drive in a place that's more secure than your desk. That could be a fireproof locked box, your office at work, a safe deposit box at the bank, a relative's house, whatever. Each month, plan a day to bring the drive home and make a new DR backup. Put it on your calendar so you won't forget. If you ever suffer a catastrophe, you'll now have a point to begin rebuilding your digital life.

In Conclusion

I don't really have a great conclusion here, but I wanted to end on a more upbeat note than that last paragraph ;) There are really a lot of ways to get an organized backup system going, so don't feel like this is the definitive guide. The most important thing is just to do it, and then get back to doing what you do best--creating art.

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