NWA-PCUG Newsletter Article, May 2006
President’s Corner
by Bill Moeller, President
wmoeller@arkansasusa.com
(click to email author)


Judging by the small number of folks who went to sleep and the large number who stuck it out to the bitter end, I would declare our March meeting on Backup Practices and Procedures a roaring success. Thank you Robert, Bill, and Pat for sharing your backup experiences and preferences with the rest of us. And thanks to all of you who were there for your active participation, and your questions and comments.

Our Panel made clear that how you back up, and how often, depends very much on how you use your computer, and what you use it for. Robert, for example, has multiple hard drives full of all kinds of downloaded and other programs and goodies which would take days to reload and reinstall, after which he would have to reenter all of his preferences and the like, and then suffer the loss of those things he couldn’t find again (or perhaps even remember that he had). At the other extreme, Pat has a limited number of programs that she says would be no big deal to reinstall should it ever become necessary. She is far more concerned about the loss of valuable data, which might be irreplaceable. This makes the point—Robert very likely spent more time producing that impressive stack of backup DVDs than Pat spent the last time she had to reinstall and reload everything on a new computer. For Robert, the time spent on a complete backup is time well spent; for Pat, it would not be.

On another note: before the program started Bill Shook asked for further comments about the newsletter and a lively discussion followed. As before, member sentiment was strongly in favor of retaining the mailed out hard copy edition, even if the entire newsletter becomes available on line.

Our next meeting will be on May 13th, a week earlier than normal. Take heed! Bring your questions, and the answers to mine! See you then.

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