Published · 4 min read
The rule that covers ninety percent of cases: three copies
Keep three copies of your important data: the one you work on, a copy on another device in the same place, and a copy away from the place. The first is lost when the laptop dies. The second is lost with a fire, a theft or a ransomware virus spreading through the network. The third is what saves you when all of that happens at once.
In a small business that means, in practice: the files on the laptop, an automatic copy on a network drive or external disk in the office, and a cloud copy.
What to back up first
Start with what cannot be recreated: invoices, contracts, accounting files, customer data and the database of the POS or clinic system. Then the daily documents. Last, the programs, which can be reinstalled.
Write a list of the folders holding these things and which machine each is on. You will be surprised that half of them sit on one person's laptop, in a folder called Desktop.
The practical setup in four steps
- 1
Move daily files to the cloud
OneDrive or Google Drive with the company subscription. The folder looks ordinary on the machine, but it is saved to the cloud with every edit and keeps previous versions for about thirty days. This alone solves the dead laptop problem.
- 2
Add a nightly backup for databases
The accounting program, the POS and the clinic system keep their data in a database that does not copy as an ordinary file. Set the nightly backup inside the program itself to a folder that is in turn uploaded to the cloud.
- 3
A local drive for fast recovery
A small network drive in the office takes a full copy of every machine. Restoring from it is far faster than from the internet when you need a hundred gigabytes on a rushed morning.
- 4
Test a restore every three months
Pick one file from last month and download it again from the backup. If you cannot, you do not have a backup, whatever the screen says.
The mistakes we see in almost every company
An external disk permanently connected to the same machine: ransomware encrypts it along with the original. A backup set up two years ago that then filled the disk and stopped silently, with nobody looking at the message. Company email treated as the archive, while deleting a departed employee's account deletes all their correspondence.
And the biggest mistake: believing that files in OneDrive or Drive need nothing else. Sync carries deletion too: a file deleted by mistake is removed from the cloud everywhere after thirty days. The real third copy is independent of sync.
What this costs
For a company of ten: the cloud subscription is usually already included in Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace at no extra cost, the local network drive is bought once for the price of a mid-range laptop, and the setup and testing are a limited number of working hours. Less than the price of recovering data from a dead disk once, if that even succeeds.
When to call us
If you do not know where your system keeps its data, have never tested a restore, or have discovered the backup stopped months ago, this is one remote hour in which we set up the three copies and document for you what is backed up, where and when. If a machine has just died with data on it and no copy, do not switch it on again, and call us before trying anything.
Common questions
Is OneDrive or Google Drive enough as a backup?
Enough to protect files against a dead machine, and not enough on its own. Sync carries deletions, wrong edits and ransomware encryption to the cloud as well. Add an independent copy that does not sync in real time.
How often should I back up?
Daily files continuously through the cloud. Databases every night. The full machine copy weekly. The rule: how many days of work can you afford to lose? That is the gap between backups.
The laptop just died and I have no backup. What do I do?
Switch it off, do not try to repair it yourself and do not install recovery programs on it. Every start-up lowers the chance of recovery. The data can usually be pulled from the disk if it is not mechanically damaged.
Related services
Setting up the three copies, testing restores and checking the backups monthly are part of remote and onsite IT support in Madinah. If a machine has died and you need what is on it recovered, that is computer and laptop maintenance in Madinah.