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... and use backup program in OS to backup automatically. >>
I hope the backup programs that come with Windows is better than it was, before when there was one bit out of place and the entire backup set was toast. In order to use a Windows backup after a crash, you have to install Windows first, which is never fun when you have work to do. I use Drive Image software, whenever a crash happens, or if I just need to switch out a hdd, I can be up and running in about an hour, the time it takes to restore the image to the C: drive.
A daily backup of data using the OS backup utility, and a weekly Drive Image backup on a seperate hdd would keep you well protected.
Fred Langa has a newsletter that has excellent explanations about backups in the archives, which you should read if you are serious about saving your data. Here is an example from the Oct. 16, 2000 newsletter:
"Backups are usually file-by-file copies. That's fine for data files--- the word processing documents, spreadsheets (etc) that you create on your system. With a backup of these files, if the live copy on your hard drive gets lost or munged, you can replace it with a good copy from your backup set.
"But standard backups aren't so good for helping to restore system files. That's because a standard Windows-based file-by-file backup can't access any files that are in use when the backup is being made (and this usually includes Windows' system files). Because those files can't be backed up, they can't be restored from the backup if such a file becomes corrupted and causes instability and crashes. Your data is safe, but you may still have to rebuild or reinstall the OS itself.
"Plus, a file-by-file backup-and-restore arranges files in an arbitrary order: Using an ordinary backup to restore files usually can *increase* the amount of fragmentation of your hard drive contents.
"In contrast, drive imaging is a low-level sector-by-sector copy of your hard drive--- all files, no exceptions. Thus, a drive image is an excellent way to restore not only data files, but also system files and all your system settings, tweaks, and tunings--- everything, no exceptions. Drive imaging also copies the structure of the drive contents--- the way the files are laid out. So, if you image your hard drive when it's fully defragged, then when you restore that image, you'll get what you started with--- a fully-defragged drive.
"Any backup is better than no backup. But drive imaging is a kind of "ultimate" backup that goes far beyond what ordinary backups can do. In my opinion, imaging is about as good as it gets."
Drive Image can also be run from a batch file so you can do your weekly backup automatically. Info about this and a batch file example can also be found and the lange.com site.
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