Someone asked me this at work. I use relatively modern Windows 2000/XP/2003 machines with USB ports as standard equipment. USB is also available with systems that use Windows 98.
I bought an External USB Hard Drive , and I also own a CD burner. It all depends on how much stuff you have to back up, and what you want to do with it. CDs will hold 750MB or so and the RW ones are re-writable. An External USB hard drive will hold 80-250 gigabytes of data. A DVD re-wtriteable is 4.7 GB of data. (See how to buy a DVD rewritable at PCworld: http://www.pcworld.com/howto/bguide/0,guid,28,00.asp)
I do CD backups of all my family pictures and financial stuff. I keep it in the safe. However, CDs will melt during a fire, even if they are in a fireproof safe. Most fireproof safes are design to keep paper from igniting. Paper burns at 451 degrees Farenheit, which is much higher than plastic CDs/DVDs and Tapes. So what I should do is have a safety deposit box or store them at someone else's house. I could also buy a safe that is UL class 125 rated for media, which will keep the temperature below about 125 degrees.
All my work files go onto my external 80 GB USB drive so that I can have them at work or at home. I keep program installs on my USB hard drive.
With windows 2000 and XP, you can plug a USB drive into the computer, and it will see it right away as a new hard drive and assign a letter.
I do have a third thing, a USB key 64MB "pen" or "flash" drive.
Here is an example of a Flash drive which holds 256MB ($39.00):
(Best Buy USB Flash Drive)
With flash drives and USB ports, the diskette drive is totally obsolete.
Last edited by BB on Tue Oct 19, 2004 12:40 pm; edited 1 time in total
fireproof media safe
Posted: Mon Oct 18, 2004 5:53 pm
jkgroove
Newbie
Joined: Oct 18, 2004
Posts: 1
I would also add to that or recommend checking into a fireproof media safe. I have friends who have taken all precautions - only to find that in the end a fire took it all away.
They range in price from a couple hundred all the way into the thousands. Just make sure it has a UL 72 fire resistance rating or a UL 125 rating. That provides adequate protection for your computer media in a fire. I have also heard that putting them in ziploc bags before putting them in a fireproof media safe prevents them drawing any moisture .
But that is my two cents. I have also spoke to a couple companies who sell this kind of stuff - if you need more info. there is a pretty good resource library located here. http://www.klsecurity.com
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