Kortech Services » Windows

You have a backup right?

okorioth — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 02:17:55 +0000

That Sinking Feeling

That’s the question I usually ask when confronted with a drive failure, or a malfunctioning system. More often than not, the answer is usually a no. Its a tough lesson to learn, and backup is such an easy thing to do these days. Just remember all hard drives will eventually fail. There should be no more excuses, having a backup is an essential part of daily life now, everything is kept on a computer these days right? Along with installing an anti virus program, there should be some sort of backup process happening.

So let’s talk about backup, what can you and should you be doing about this? Yes I know trying to perform and maintain this boring task is hard, but as they say an ounce of prevention yadda yadda. These days backup software is designed to do it for you and you won’t even notice it running. I can’t tell you how many times a good backup has saved the day, from accidentally deleting that file to restoring entire drives. As a general rule, you want to have a least 3 copies of every important file. One on the computer, one on an external drive, and another somewhere not near the physical location of the computer (ie in the “cloud”). I’ve experienced this first hand when my house flooded. There goes my computer..along with the backup drive sitting right next to it. Lucky for me I had a 3rd copy of everything important stashed elsewhere online and not in my home.

While there are several decent and affordable 3rd party software vendors out there that can do this job, I will focus on the ones that you already have installed and you probably didn’t know it comes with your OS. If you are a Windows Vista or Windows 7 user, Microsoft has included a built in Backup and Restore program, much improved over its XP predecessor. As for Apple users, it should be obvious that there is something called Time Machine begging for you to configure it if you have not already. To get started with either, please go and invest some money in an external drive that attaches via USB and get one that will be large enough to hold all your data off the internal system drive and any additional stored data on the computer you would like to backup.

Windows 7 Backup and Restore

To get started using the built in backup software all you need is the external hard drive as I mentioned (or for the tech savvy a network file share on another system). There are two ways to invoke the Backup and Restore screen; one is to simply search under the start menu (the Windows bubble on the bottom left) for ‘backup’ and it should eventually bring up the listing above for Backup and Restore or click the long way and go to Start->Control Panel->System and Security->Backup and Restore.

To follow the prompts to get an initial backup is quite simple. Click the “Set Up Backup” option and another dialog will open that looks like this screenshot:

The first step is to choose the destination for where the data is to be stored, hopefully your external drive will be listed here. Or, for the advanced user one can choose a network share located somewhere else on the local network. Keep in mind the amount of data stored could be huge so it will take longer for the initial backup to complete. The next screen will ask you what data to backup, there are two options here. If you are not sure, you keep stuff locally in your profile folders (Documents, Photos, Music etc folders called Libraries) and you trust Microsoft to do it for you, choose the first option “Let Windows Choose”. This option also creates a system image and saves all installed programs as well. If you have additional data on another internal drive select the “Let Me Choose” option and on the next screen a layout of all your folders and drives is displayed. Make sure you check off all your user folder libraries, any other folders with data outside these and check the “Include a system image of drives: C:”

Clicking next will bring up a confirmation screen. Before clicking on finish however make sure you click on “Change Schedule” as by default it is set to run on Sundays at 7pm only. A backup is only as good as the last time it ran so once a week is not enough. I like to schedule mine for twice a week at a minimum and at a time when I know the computer will be turned on. Also note that if the backup window is missed, the program will run the next time the computer is on. Make the appropriate changes and save them. If this is the first time being setup the backup process will start. You with me so far? It may seem complex but really its not.

Next Steps

To make things even more easy for restoration purposes, Microsoft also provides a method of creating a System Repair Disc that ties into this backup system. If you machine has a fatal hard drive failure and cannot be brought back to life, simply boot off this CD/DVD and follow the prompts to restore the system onto a new drive. On the same screen for Backup and Restore off to the left is the option to create one with a CD/DVD burner. Make that and keep that in a handy location in case you ever need it.

Cloud Backup, The Third Copy

On top of running a local backup, I also recommend keeping a third copy of your data somewhere else that’s not local. You don’t have to keep absolutely everything out there, just the files, photos and other data that definitely should not get lost. For the paranoid, most services offer secure encryption so no one can get at this stuff without knowing your password. From the services I’ve seen, many have a scheduled backup option so again there is nothing to remember to do. A cursory Google search yields many options to go with from free to monthly costs, so read up on features and reviews accordingly. I personally use Jungledisk backup with Amazon S3 storage as the storage backend, which is an older service now powered by Rackspace and may not be available anymore.

Beware Of The System Check Trojan

okorioth — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:23:28 +0000

Lately in the last couple of months I’ve seen this infection making the rounds, and it is a nasty one. The System Check virus/Trojan, part of the FakeHDD family of infections is a fake computer analysis and optimization program designed to look like your Windows system is failing and that you need to purchase their software in order to fix it. The method of infection varies but most likely came from a deceptive pop-up ad that may appear as regular a Windows notification with links which look like buttons reading Yes and No. (Maybe its time to get yourself off Internet Explorer and use Firefox or Chrome with a pop up blocker.) On top of that, this Trojan wreaks havoc on your hard drive by removing all program shortcuts, blanking your desktop and basically hiding all files on the hard drive, including on secondary drives installed in the machine (I’m not sure about external drives but I’m assuming so). You’ll know there’s a problem immediately with your machine. The window that pops up looks like this:

There’s a great write up on BleepingComputer.com on how to get rid of this bug. Frankly, its my opinion there’s no way to really be sure that the machine in question is ever truly going to be the same again. So I would recommend that a format and reinstall is the only way to ensure that this Trojan has been removed. Before doing so you should move any data off the machine you need to save. Don’t worry, the files are still there you just need to unhide them again. You can do so either manually via Folder Options or as this web site instructs download the unhide.exe program to do it for you. Yes I know this is going to be a pain, you did have a good backup didn’t you?

Microsoft Releases Massive Batch of Security Updates For October

okorioth — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 02:32:24 +0000

Its the second Tuesday of the month, and that of course means in the Microsoft camp its patch Tuesday. And what a whopper this one is, in fact its the largest amount of patches ever released at one time. The range of patches pretty much covers almost every major product line, from Windows, Server, SQL, Office and even the yet unreleased Windows 7. So I strongly urge everyone to take the time to install these updates. More info on these flaws can be found here.

Unprecedented response to major DNS flaw

okorioth — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 16:28:56 +0000

Wow, this is simply unheard of. Yesterday it was publicly revealed that a major design flaw in the DNS protocol was simultaneously patched by vendors across the entire spectrum of the computer and technology world. The fact that they were able to keep this a secret for six months while they worked to plug the hole is simply amazing. The idea being of course to let the good guys fix the problem before the bad guys could take advantage of a critical function that runs the Internet. Details of how the exploit works is still forthcoming, but not until after everyone has patched. From what I understand this flaw will allow an attacker to poison the DNS cache which could potentially wreck havoc all over the Internets, causing unwitting users to think they are logging into a certain website only to actually be going somewhere else malicious for example.

DNS, or Domain Name System is what runs the internet. It is the main service that keeps track of the names to numbers so it is easy for you and me to go find a particular web site. In reality, all sites are just a bunch of IP addresses. Instead of having to remember 69.147.76.15 as a web site, we know to go to Yahoo.com, go ahead and paste that number in the address bar of your browser. Wow, magic! Through the hard work of DNS, this is how we keep our web addresses straight, simply speaking.

This flaw affects software and hardware vendors from a wide spectrum, including Sun, Cisco, Microsoft, Linux, Windows, Apple and a whole host of others out there. Needless to say, its time to start patching your machines pronto! Windows users should perform a Windows Update now, the patch is out there.