There was a time when I would be ultra-paranoid about losing data, and would make backup after backup in order to be safe and secure about about my information (my writing, my personal images, my email, etc.). But with so many advancements in data storage, I'm less paranoid about losing all that information, although there might be some inconveniences should there be something catastrophic, like a fire or a flood. Still, with redundancies in place (even remotely), data recovery on a copy restoration level is much simpler than it was when tape (or diskette) backups were the main methods of protecting your information on a personal level.

Now I'm no computer expert (although I do dabble with computer repair activities when I'm upgrading a system or fixing a relative's machine), but I am pretty certain that I am in the minority when it comes to the ability to recover some lost data due to the seizure of a hard drive--and when no other backup copy exists (where are those redundancies!?). When you experience a computer crash, and you're in the middle of a big project, or you've failed to backup your programming, your novel, your will, your wedding list, your home inventory, or anything else critically important to your existence, you can feel your heart sink through to the bottom of your stomach.

You probably don't want to put yourself in that position anytime soon (why don't you back up everything right now on to a DVD-R at least? I'll wait.), so instead of waiting for your hard-drive to seize up, because it is inevitable that hardware will fail sooner or later, take the precaution of backing up all your information on a secondary machine such as a server, burn copies on to CD-Rs and DVD-Rs and then put them in your firesafe, your safe deposit box, and leave another somewhere remote like the office or a trusted family member's home. Also, take advantage of the vast amounts of storage space available on free email accounts such as Google and Hotmail. Take a moment to email something to yourself, and you instantly have a remote copy of your data online. And if you're old school, don't be afraid to print out copies of your important electronic documents, although make sure that you're not using thermal paper (it just don't last!).

Proper data recovery can be time-consuming and expensive. And sometimes you just can't afford to lose your information, or have it sitting on some computer repair technicians desk while he runs diagnostics trying to pull data off of the (hopefully) recoverable sectors of your dead drive. So, be safe, be secure, and back-up often. But do it smartly and efficiently--make it a regular task--and you won't be caught losing your life's work.