Period.
Even if you think you’ve already backed up, just thinking that is enough reason to back up again.
So my hard drive crashed on my old, 5-year-old PC. I knew my machine was getting old, running slow, it would soon be time for a new machine. However, just like most of these types of situations, you are never prepared for it. But you should be.
It turns out I was due diligent with my music files. That’s what happens when you are a musician – the music is what’s important to you and, sometimes, the hell with everything else. However, that everything else could one day bite you in the ass.
My crash was a mechanical failure, but according to the data recovery company, the drive was no longer spinning and no longer able to read & write to it. While the disk platters (as they are called) are not really damaged and the chances of my data recovery are “very good”, it was classified as the highest tier level of fix required to read and transfer the data to another drive.
The highest tier. Usually the costliest.
Yeah. Like 4 figures costly.
A surprise hard drive crash is like a fender bender. When it happens, the damage is done. You learn the lesson to not let it happen again, but it will still cost you. A lot. To repair the damage and time involved, not to mention, in some instances, the cost to repair the system are too much. So add a new computer to that, you’re looking at a nice price tag.
Granted if my data is not recovered, I won’t be charged anything. However, the data that will be lost will be probably more costly than the repair itself.
For someone like me, this is really an inexcusable error. Yes, we black out at times as to whether or not we actually do a task. And despite the fact I was updating other hard drives I have to one or two hard drives, it’s still piss-poor of me, as a web programmer, to have allowed such a situation to happen.
A regular backup of my files would have made me simply shrug my shoulders and move on to another machine. Instead, I’m now paying out of my ass just to ensure I have what I need back.
So, word of advice to all my fellow musicians, web programmers, studio engineers and producers – always have a backup! And if you do, back up regularly. You don’t have to be ridiculous and do an automatic backup each night at a certain hour, but it should be a regular process.
No matter what.
And if you haven’t done it in a while, as the late great, soon-to-be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Stevie Ray Vaughan once said, “do it, do it tonight!”