My New PC

[DaMenace]

Well here's what I finally settled on..
thought I'd try to brag a little bit heh

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/Pu...Number=9702874

A friend has a video card for me, a GeForce 8600.. and I'm just gonna use one of his extra monitors I think..
Keyboard, mouse, and speakers are as basic as can be.

[ArcadeNut]

Well here's what I finally settled on..
thought I'd try to brag a little bit heh

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/Pu...Number=9702874

A friend has a video card for me, a GeForce 8600.. and I'm just gonna use one of his extra monitors I think..
Keyboard, mouse, and speakers are as basic as can be.

If you can afford it, get yourself a second hard drive, and setup a RAID 1 (Mirror) of the first hard drive.

I've had 3 HD failures in the last year. Having a mirrored drive saved me from having to set my system up again. I just pulled the bad drive out, swapped in a new drive then re-mirrored.

[OldSchoolGamer]

Or simply image your drive with something like Acronis Disk Image (save image somewhere safe like external Hard drive or even DVD Media) if your Hard drive dies just pop in a new drive and restore the image, this is what I have been doing for a few years and it works great for me..............

[ArcadeNut]

Or simply image your drive with something like Acronis Disk Image (save image somewhere safe like external Hard drive or even DVD Media) if your Hard drive dies just pop in a new drive and restore the image, this is what I have been doing for a few years and it works great for me..............

My issue with that, is, that the image would get old (lots of updates would have to be applied) and it would not have all your data. It would be a good idea if you wanted to install again, or if both drives died at the same time.

On another note, a RAID is NOT a means of backup. Both drives could fail, one could get corrupted and the corruption could get replicated. Make backups of your IMPORTANT data often.

[OldSchoolGamer]

My issue with that, is, that the image would get old (lots of updates would have to be applied) and it would not have all your data. It would be a good idea if you wanted to install again, or if both drives died at the same time.

On another note, a RAID is NOT a means of backup. Both drives could fail, one could get corrupted and the corruption could get replicated. Make backups of your IMPORTANT data often.

Well I do an image at least once a week so it is never too old. I keep one image that is a basic install with all drivers and updates (at time of creation) as well as a 2nd image never more than 1 week old. But that's just me, in my experience I cannot imagine a time before I started imaging my OS lol! My Email/Favorites and DOCS are all backed up separately to in an even more recent backup. Of course there is no perfect way but this works for me and has saved my bacon often, which method on prefers is up to the individuals own preference of course. As long as everyone does something, it is funny the hard time I have convincing friends/families the importance of backing up by SOME method. I always tell them what would you do if your Hard drive died tomorrow? What would you lose and how fast could you recover?

[ArcadeNut]

Well I do an image at least once a week so it is never too old. I keep one image that is a basic install with all drivers and updates (at time of creation) as well as a 2nd image never more than 1 week old. But that's just me, in my experience I cannot imagine a time before I started imaging my OS lol! My Email/Favorites and DOCS are all backed up separately to in an even more recent backup. Of course there is no perfect way but this works for me and has saved my bacon often, which method on prefers is up to the individuals own preference of course. As long as everyone does something, it is funny the hard time I have convincing friends/families the importance of backing up by SOME method. I always tell them what would you do if your Hard drive died tomorrow? What would you lose and how fast could you recover?

How big is your HD that you are imaging?

What do you use to make the image with and how big are those images?

I just made a backup of my important data after posting my last message

[OldSchoolGamer]

How big is your HD that you are imaging?

What do you use to make the image with and how big are those images?

I just made a backup of my important data after posting my last message

See that is where some people have trouble who don't partition their drives, I know that wont be an issue for someone like you since you do the RAID thing and all you obviously have some knowledge. My drive is partitioned as:
C:\ 50 gig (for Operating system, most used utilities, Office, etc.)
D:\ 414 GIG (Games and pretty much everything else)

Even with VISTA Ultimate, Full OFFICE 2007, Video Editing Apps etc. My whole O.S. Partition still has almost 30 GIG free. So when I image the drive I only image the C:\ drive because that is the most important, getting my OS back with all updates and optimizations I have worked so hard on.
I use a bootable CD with ACRONIS DISK IMAGE to image the C:\ drive, the images created under default settings are around 12 GIG and I always do a FULL new image and never incremental as I don't trust just adding the "Changed" files and prefer a complete new image each time but that is just me. Lastly, the program can be installed/run from within windows and even store images to a "protected" area of the hard drive called Acronis secure zone but I prefer to do everything from the bootable CD because if the drive totally dies that protected secure zone will be useless............
I have restored my OS many many times and continued where I left off never any issue's.