Setting Up Your Parents With Simple Data Backup

Introduction

Backing up your parents’ data is crucial to prevent losing precious photos, documents, and other files in the event of device failure, accidental deletion, or other data loss events. As their child, you want to make sure their data is protected, but you may not want to overwhelm them with complex backup solutions. The good news is you can set up simple, user-friendly data backup for your parents that requires minimal effort on their part.

In this guide, I’ll walk through the steps I took to set up effective data backup for my parents, who aren’t very tech-savvy. The solutions I put in place automatically back up their most important data without them having to do anything once it’s configured.

Choosing the Right Backup Destination

The first decision to make is choosing what you want to back their data up to. Here are some popular options to consider:

External Hard Drive

• Pros: Inexpensive, easy to use, allows for local backups
• Cons: Risk of theft/damage, need to remember to connect drive for backups

Cloud Storage

• Pros: Accessible from anywhere, secure offsite backup, automatic syncing
• Cons: Monthly fees, slower initial backup, privacy concerns

NAS (Network Attached Storage)

• Pros: Local network backups, set and forget access
• Cons: More expensive, can be complex to set up

For my parents, I decided to use both an external hard drive and a cloud storage service to get the best of both worlds – easy local backups and offsite cloud backups.

Setting Up the External Hard Drive

I opted for a simple 2TB Seagate USB 3.0 external hard drive. The large capacity provides plenty of room for backups. And the USB 3.0 connection offers fast transfer speeds.

Here are the steps I took to get it ready for backup:

1. Connect the drive to your parents’ computer and allow it to install any required drivers.
2. Open File Explorer and right-click on the external drive. Choose “Format” and pick your desired file system (NTFS isrecommended).
3. Click “Start” to format/erase the drive. This preps it for backups.
4. Once formatted, the drive is ready for use. Now it’s crucial to explain to your parents to never remove or disconnect this drive once backups are configured to avoid interrupting the process.

Choosing Cloud Storage Provider

For the cloud storage solution, I went with Backblaze. It’s easy to use, secure, and cost-effective at just $6 per month for unlimited backup for one computer.

I also considered these popular alternatives:

• iDrive: $69.50/year for 2TB of backup space
• Carbonite: Starts at $72/year for unlimited backup
• Dropbox: 2TB plan starts at $9.99/month

Ultimately Backblaze won for its unlimited space and low price. Their customer service is also excellent in my experience.

Setting Up Backblaze Cloud Backup

With Backblaze, getting started is simple:

1. Purchase a Backblaze plan and create an account.
2. Download and install the Backblaze app on your parents’ computer.
3. Log into the app using your parents’ account credentials and choose backup settings.
4. Click “Start Backup” and Backblaze will automatically begin uploading your parents’ data.

The best part is there’s nothing more for your parents to do once backup is underway. It works continuously in the background to backup new/changed files.

One thing to note is the initial upload will take time depending on the amount of data, but subsequent backups are incremental.

What to Backup With Each Solution

Here’s how I chose what data to backup where:

External Hard Drive:

• Entire computer system image for full backups
• Photos, videos, financial documents
• Essential personal files

Backblaze Cloud Storage:

• Photos, videos, financial documents
• Quick access to important files if computer fails
• Redundant offsite backup of critical data

The external drive backups everything locally so I have a complete system image I can restore from if needed. Backblaze provides redundant offsite backup of their most important files.

Scheduling Backups

I scheduled the backups to run automatically and continuously:

• External hard drive: Set Windows Backup to perform a weekly system image backup of the entire system drive.

• Backblaze: Default continuous backup that runs quietly in the background.

With this schedule, the external drive does a weekly full backup while Backblaze backs up changes as they occur.

Testing the Backups

It’s crucial to verify backups are working properly. Here’s how I tested:

• Restored sample files from the external drive to confirm the system image is valid.

• Used the Backblaze web portal to restore sample files to another device.

Thankfully the backups performed flawlessly. But it’s important to periodically re-test to catch any potential issues early.

Educating Your Parents

Don’t just set up the backups without explaining them to your parents:

• Show them how to access their backed up files so they understand where copies are stored.

• Explain why continuous backups are important.

• Teach them how to restore files so they can do it themselves if needed.

• Let them know to never disconnect the external backup drive.

Taking time to educate them upfront prevents confusion down the road.

Conclusion

The solutions outlined above offer a simple yet robust data backup strategy that provides tremendous peace of mind. Your parents’ data is protected both locally and in the cloud.

The key is using solutions that don’t require much interaction once configured. That way your parents don’t have to take time to manage backups themselves.

With some planning upfront and ongoing testing, you can feel confident your parents’ precious memories and information are secure in case problems arise.