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Its amusing how pc users the world over are mortified of losing data by a virus attack but don't care much about backing up files. Though the intention is the same to save data, people are concerned more about virus attacks rather than having back up program.

Saving files in a separate floppy, CD or even a different pc is known as back up of files. In the event of a data loss, it can be recovered if its saved elsewhere. What and how much to back up is completely an individual choice. Normally, data of importance like financial records, tax statements, personal files and anything that is important to a person should have a back up. The Back up worthiness of a file is the value of the file itself. Back up takes, so little time yet saves precious money, time and energy.

A simple back up solution for your files is attach all your files to your email box. If your pc loses data due to whatever reason, you can still access all your files from any other pc that has an Internet connection. Simple, all it requires is your willingness. The next methods are to save your data in to a floppy or a CD. However, these act only as short-term data stores as they are not immune to getting blighted. Storing even an average file would require lots of floppies. Therefore, the best long term back up option is to store data in zip drive or tape drive. This then mandates checking of the tape at least periodically for quality that might deteriorate with the passage of time.

Windows utilities offer a back up facility. While installing Windows XP, Ntbackup.msi, a back up program of Windows utility, can be installed too. Unfortunately, Windows back up utility does not involve a third party and is done within the pc. So if data stored in a drive is lost, Windows back up fetches it back from another drive where its stored as back up. This saving exercise has to be performed religiously every week or so. Still Windows back up utility is not a safe back up option.

To solve this problem there are software utilities that cover back up automatically. Software utilities offer back up programs that back up files the moment they are saved in the pc. The back ups provided by software utilities are good for even complete hard drive failure. Disaster recovery and back up of open files are the features of some Software back up utilities.