Pro tips for backing up your devices

About this article

This article includes tips from TLT and User Services on backing up your laptop and tablet. These tips are based on personal experience and are not official university recommendations or guidelines. This article is intended for the entire WSU community, but may be particularly relevant for students and employees participating in the E-Warrior Digital Life and Learning Program who are scheduled to exchange their old devices or pick up new devices during the summer of 2014 and the 2014-2015 academic year.

Tips

Only you can prevent data loss

• Here's the problem: too many people only think about backing up their personal folders and files the day before their laptop-tablet exchange. You need to develop habits that keep your work organized and protected all year round. The other day, a bookend fell from a bookshelf and landed on a TLT staff member's laptop, destroying her hard drive. Nothing could be recovered. How fast could you recover from such an event? The answer should be, "immediately." You should be able to pick up another laptop and continue working without delay, information loss, or rework. The only way that's going to happen is if you get your digital act together. I have seen some of your desktops and Documents folders and they are not pretty. Ken Graetz (talk) 07:52, 10 May 2014 (CST)

Use network and cloud storage

• The best way to stop worrying about the stuff on your laptop is to get it off your laptop. Use OneDrive for Business to store important school-related files and synchronize them with working copies on your laptop. Ken Graetz (talk) 23:02, 19 May 2014 (CST)
• Search through your laptop hard drive carefully, don't forget to back up any documents saved to your desktop, and check your Downloads folder for any files you may have left in there.

Other Considerations

• Personal Software - If you purchased software and installed it on your old laptop, now is a good time to find the original installation disks and/or any license/serial numbers required to reinstall it on your new laptop. In some cases, software companies will not allow you to install the application on a second machine without deauthorizing the tool on your old laptop. Some tools are no longer supported and will not work on newer operating systems. Contact the vendor if you have any questions or concerns.