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OK, we've talked about the importance of backing up our computers, pictures, etc before.

I've always been very diligent about having everything in two places. But, a few years ago, I moved almost all my backups to one external hard drive (not quite all - some things are also on some thumb drives). And I always said I better get another external hard drive and copy the one - just in case. I can't figure out why I never purchased it, but I didn't.

Guess what is no longer readable? My external hard drive. Guess what the computer guy said today? He can't read it either. He could "attempt" to open it up and no guarantees, but he didn't feel comfortable doing so as he thought he'd be more likely to render it completely useless. He did give me copies of people/companies who do only that type of work. Then he warned me that they can be very expensive.

Guess what the most important (to me) stuff is on this external hard drive and no where else? ALL my pictures I've taken since I started rving. ALL of them. The only ones I'll be able to "save" are those I posted on FB or to my blog at some point.

So, for those of you who backup - let me recommend that you have a backup to your backup. Just sayin.

The computer guy tried to make me feel good, because he told me he had 8 years of things on one backup drive like mine that he also didn't backup anywhere else - and didn't think of when he replaced a computer and didn't move that stuff over - and lost it all.

I'm pretty much accepting that everything on that drive is gone. Not sure I'll call all these companies - might make one or two calls, but if the price is as high as I'm expecting, for only the possibility ... well, I'll be purchasing two external hard drives - or buying extra space in the "cloud" for one - and making sure I save everything to both and copy over blog pictures and fb pictures, etc.

I feel very lucky for the things that were also on the thumb drives - need to get those copied to a 2nd place now that they aren't any more !!!

So sorry to hear that Beth. Don't pitch the drive If it is a simple motor not spinning, keep asking PC folks and someday you may run into someone who has a like hard drive who can swap the motor long enough to make your drive spin up and get copied. Used to do that couple of lifetimes ago. In the town of Tucson used to have folks that specialized in doing that kind of work. Was pricey, but doable. Depends on how much you want the data.

Years ago, before we did back up drives and all we had were cd's, I had a few months old HD ( internal) go bad. I had all the kids grad from HS pics on it. I was sick. My hobby, trained as a electronics computer maintenance tech for the Navy, managed to turn the bad drive into a "slave drive" and the good drive into a master drive, and though he had to restart the system over and over through about a 48 hour period, he managed to save about 95 to 98 % of all my data and pictures. Learned a lot through that experience. Never since have we only had one copy of something. There is the copy on the laptop, then the continuous backup on the external, plus I keep another two copies of the most important stuff. It's a hard lesson to learn.Beth I hope a solution comes your way.
Velda

Sorry about your data. I would be very upset also I get panicky about the thoughts of losing my photos. I keep one external hard drive in a drawer in my motorhome. I also keep one at my son's house in his gun safe and a third in my safety deposit box. I get one that costs about $60, which is cheap considering the alternatives.

Now, the problem is that I have not copied data to the one in the safety deposit box for a year! Completely forgot when I was in Ohio--just got busy. The one in the gun safe was backed up in May. So, you have reminded me that I need to backup the one in my drawer and also copy stuff to my spare laptop.

And I agree that you should not give up on that "dead" hard drive. Keep it and try to find someone to recover data for you. When my current hard drive died two years ago, I did find someone to retrieve data. He was able to retrieve all photos and documents, but no emails or contacts, which was OK.

Sorry you might have lost your stuff and photos Beth. Thanks for the reminder, I need to go get another backup - on my list for today.

Linda

Beth - this is the same thing that happened to my daughter. They have all the kids pictures on it and the computer guy could not retrieve anything. He said to send it to someone special to try to retrieve the info is about $1,000.00. But he also said to hang onto it, because someday in the future they will figure out a way to retrieve the information and it will be a lot cheaper to do so. So that is what my daughter is doing, she put the external hard drive away and hopefully someday will get the pictures from it. Sorry to hear this has happened to you also.

It's so easy to let that kind of thing slide; hope you can salvage at some point Beth. That said my back up is way behind too and only in one place. BUT I do have on my list to save pics to a cloud storage while I'm here in Austin. So sorry this important lesson to us all has been at your expense!

My backups are called negatives

Wow, what a shame, I wonder what makes that kind of stuff happen

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Thanks for the bad-news reminder! Sorry about your hopefully-not-lost data.

Just checked - a terabyte external hard drive is only around $50-$60...small price to pay.
I know I'll get another drive now...

Good luck!
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Got my backup done today with a 2TB backup plus slim portable drive.

Linda

mitch5252 wrote:..
Thanks for the bad-news reminder! Sorry about your hopefully-not-lost data.

Just checked - a terabyte external hard drive is only around $50-$60...small price to pay.
I know I'll get another drive now...

Good luck!
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Exactly why I told on my stupidity, because I know better yet let it lapse thinking I'd do it "tomorrow" and tomorrow never came.

I'm not giving up and will continue inquiring with data recovery services and hope I'll find one that can and will do it without asking for one of my limbs.

know what you are feeling. I backed up all my stuff on an external - then one day it just quit working. all the pictures from my travels in Europe, China, etc. BUT I had also made CDs with them - but now I'm finding that some of the CDs won't work with the new operating systems and the old programs won't either. GRRR. I back up my computer the first of EVERY month - but again if the external drive goes ... wondering about using The Cloud - I do have 2 external drives - one with my PC and one I take when we travel - so now I back up to both of them. Beginning to think paper and pencil work really good for some things.

I've always had multiple backups -- but last summer I got lazy. One external drive died. Before I could replace it and do a backup from my second external drive, a thunderstorm fried that one. I'd never had either thing happen in the over 30 years I've used computers, but then within a week . . .

I'm seriously considering the cloud for a third backup -- different technology, remote location.

I upload my photos to Google which works very well for my blog and is free. I have also started backing photos up to One Drive which I got with my Microsoft Surface. All the photos on my computer are backed up on to an external drive plus Google. A couple of years ago, I had a big problem with my computer. The computer guy said he was able to salvage everything but he was worried about my pictures. I just downloaded them from Google and was back to normal. These techie devices are so wonderful until they aren't and then it's upsetting.