Get in a Good Habit: Back Up Your Data

Your Basic Backup

The fastest, cheapest way to back up your important data is an old-fashioned file backup. Some of the better-known programs for this chore include the $80 Dantz Retrospect Professional and Stomp BackUp MyPC, which sells for about $70. But the one I recommend costs only $19. It's Datahjaelp's Zip Backup to CD, and you can download this shareware program from the company's site. Not only is it cheap and simple, but it compresses the backups into standard .zip files--a popular format that many programs can read. And despite the name, it can back up to DVD and hard drives, as well.

Whether cheap or expensive, these programs simply copy the files--usually compressing them as well--to your CD, DVD, USB drive, or other backup media.

File backup programs generally allow you to create personalized "sets"--your definition of what files and folders should be backed up--so that you don't need to back up everything on the drive. Getting these sets right is especially important if you're backing up to CD, since backing up only the essential files can save you the hassle of swapping discs.

Most file backup programs let you make entries into an "Include List" of files and folders to back up, along with an "Exclude List" of files and folders within the Include List that the program can skip. What belongs in these lists? That depends on your version of Windows. To find out what should go on--and what can stay off--these lists, see "What to Back Up in Windows 2000 and XP" and "What to Back Up in Windows 98 and Me."

These programs offer two ways to back up these sets: full and incremental. A full backup copies every file in the set. An incremental backup copies only those files that have been created or changed since the last backup.

If you're the do-it-yourself type, you can easily create your own backup routine with WinZip (a popular program that I recommend for plenty of other purposes), a few free programs, and some text files. For details, see "Easy Backups With WinZip and Freeware." You can download WinZip 8.1 or 9.0 beta 2 from PC World Downloads.