User Guide

Getting Started 27
Using Student Survival Kit
Safe & Sound automates the back-up process, doing the time-consuming and
repetitive workfor you.It lets youdecide whichtypes offiles to back up,how
often to save them, and where you want the backup set located (on the same
drive, another local drive, or on a shared network drive). With Safe & Sound,
you can create mirror backup sets that are, at any given time, an exact replica
ofthefilesyou’veselected tobackuponthesourcedrive.Youcanalsospecify
a short time delay in the backup, or back up manually by copying files to the
backup set on your drive if you prefer.
All forms of data storage are susceptible to losing the information they hold.
The most common types of data storage—hard drives, 3.5-inch disks, ZIP
disksorSyQuesttapes—areoftencalledpermanentstorage(thus differentiating
them from the volatile storage in your computer’s RAM, random access
memory). Permanent storage means the information remains intact even
when you turn offyour computer. Permanent storage does not mean eternal
storage.
Many things can causethe dataon disks,tapes ordrives tobecome garbled or
lost:hardwaremalfunctions,wornoutmedia,electricalstorms,excessiveheat,
static electricity, magnets, loose cable or power cord connections, and so on.
CDdiscs,thoughdurable,canbecomescratchedenoughtodamagetheirdata.
Human actions can also cause lost data, such as deleting the wrong folder or
formatting the wrong drive. Even a well-designed application can sometimes
causeitsownfilestobecomecorrupt.
With so much at risk, you have everything to gain by allowing Safe & Sound
to automatically make backup copies for you. You simply decide what
information is importantto you,how you want it to be backed up, and where
you want the backup copy to be stored. Safe & Sound takes care of the rest!
How Safe & Sound Creates Automatic Backups
When you select to have Safe & Sound automatically create a backup set for
you, it creates the first backup set while you are stepping through the Safe &
Sound Wizard. Thereafter, while the Enable Automatic Backup option is
selected,itcontinuestoupdateyourbackupsetatthetimedelayyou’ve
specified. If you chose to make Mirror backups, Safe & Sound updates your
backup set at the same time that you resave the original source files.
If you selectawrite-behind delay longer thanzeroseconds (aMirror backup),
Safe&Soundupdatesthebackupsetat anytimeafterthespecifiedtimedelay
when your PCis idle. This allows Safe & Sound towork in the background so
that itdoesnot interrupt the work you are doing. This is a goodoption to use
with the protected volume file backup type since it eliminates any speed loss
due to more frequent disk accesses and larger file sizes associated with the
protected volume file backup type.