Backup Your file

First Choose what device you will use to back up your data. The most common devices to back up data have been tape drives, zip drives and flash drives. More recently, CDRW drives (CD read/write drives) are being used for backups. Your decision will be based on how much data you need to back up, what devices you already have that could be used for backups, and whether or not you can purchase a new backup device.

The least expensive devices are Iomega zip drives and disks. Zip disks come in 250MB and 100MB sizes. You must buy a zip drive designed for 250MB disks to use 250MB disks. All zip drives can work with 100MB zip disks. Zip drives come with software for backing up data to zip disks or you can copy the folder that all your data is under ("My Documents" or "Documents and Settings" to a zip disk if it will all fit.

CDRW drives can be used like a 650MB floppy disk when using CDRW disks and packet writing software that comes with the drive. The disks you create will be readable only on other CDRW drives or CDR/DVD drives that support the multi-thread standard. All drives capable of reading CDRW disks require software to be installed that supports reading CDRW disks. You should use software that supports the UDF standard (most current CDRW packet writing software does) when writing files on your CDRW drive and install UDF reader software on computers with multithread CD or DVD drives that you want to read CDRW disks. Drives with early implementations of multithread may not be able to read CDRW disks even with UDF reader software installed. Free UDF readers are available from Ahead Software and Roxio. CDRW drives may come with backup or disaster recovery software but you should look carefully at the software bundled with a CDRW drive before purchasing it.

Unlike the previous devices, tape drives are designed specifically for backing up data. They hold more data, 4GB to more than 40GB, and require running a backup program both to backup or restore files. A tape drive cannot be used like a large floppy disk. Windows 95/98/ME does not come with backup software so you must use the software, if any, that comes with the tape drive, or purchase backup software. Windows NT has a backup program that works with most SCSI tape drives. Windows 2000/XP has a backup program that works with any removable media that can be written to from within Windows (e.g. zip, jaz, CDRW) and most tape drives. Tape is the least expensive media for very large amounts of data.