I know a lot of you are going to want to virtually box me around the ears now, and you're perfectly right to do so.
When I got back from holiday, and switched on my comp the next day, there was a funny noise, it didn't boot, and when I took it to the repair shop, they kept it there for a full week to see if anything would get the harddrive going.
Nothing did.
At least I was sure that my last update had been sometime in May, so that the data loss would be manageable. I already know that "Dying of the Light" would be beyond retrieval, since I'd finished it just before the holiday and I knew I hadn't drawn a backup.
My last backup wasn't in May. It was in October, 2008. Nearly a year's worth of photos, drawn pictures, written stuff (among that the Rhyddion rewrite and six or seven Heroes fanfics), and loads of funny children's quotes - gone.
I know. I deserved that, I should have made backups regularly.
Then, last week, I got a call from one of Germany's top newspapers (Süddeutsche Zeitung), who were publishing a children's Fantasy book and wanted one of my pics for the cover. Guess which: Dying of the light.
Luckily, I had printed the finished picture so I could scan it, but for some reason, even in the copyshop with a really good scanner, we couldn't get it free of JPG artifacts. I spent most of last night repainting areas of it so it looked just about okay for printing.
I was lucky in a few other regards, of course - I was able to retrieve most of the written stuff from the places where I'd posted it, I'm so glad I posted the third chapter here after all (even though it's going to be redone with a lot of changes). I even managed to find most of the kids' quotes again by going through my old posts in a parenting forum where I posted most of them. (Of course, there are those I'd have remembered anyway. "Mama, when the dinosaurs lived, there were no humans, right?" - "That's right." - "Not even farmers?" - "No, no farmers either, of course." - "Then who looked after the dinosaurs?")
The holiday wasn't the best experience either - at least my husband and I now have a pretty accurate list of things that we have to avoid next time. And I think the most important thing to avoid next time is Spain, at least in summer. 42 degrees in Granada were just too much, and that wasn't the exception either.
There have been a few good things too. The kids now have a bunk bed in Timo's room, Jana has moved out of our bedroom, which opens up a world of new opportunities to be done in the bedroom (some of the more innocent ones are reading a book before going to bed, and employing a radio alarm clock again. For some reason, Jana always slept through the beeping of a normal alarm clock but but sit bolt upright when the radio went on at six AM.)
Another great find was a book I read in Spain, "Wales - epic views from a small coutry". I feel the need to rethink, rewrite, or maybe just enrich, pretty much my entire story. A wealth of wonderful stuff there. No need to devise your won Fantasy world when there's Wales!
Anyway, I guess it'll be a few months before I've got my comp back to the way it was, and until I've scraped together all my stuff again.
The first thing I did was buy a new backup drive, so I won't have to share my husband's any more, and I fully intend to use it at least once a week. More often than that if I happen to draw a new Best Pic Ever. Just in case.
`anmari has been spreading her infectious positivity throughout our community for over 6 years. Throughout this time Ana has been at the core of all things devious, passionately developing an eclectic gallery, helping organise devmeets, participating in chat events and also recently completed dedicating her time as a Community Volunteer. We are absolutely delighted to bestow the Deviousness Award for May 2013 to `anmari, congratulations! Read More
Sta.sh
Gloomy 
Backups are one of the things that we usually don't remember until it's too late. What I do is to automate them, so I don't have to remember (that's what computers are for). And also I make sure that, when the time for a backup comes, the computer doesn't stop nagging me until I do it
I don't know what solutions are there for automatic backup in Windows, but at least you could have a look at Dropbox ([link]). It's a very nifty and transparent online storage that gives you 2GB for free and that looks like any other folder in your desktop. If you get some program that periodically saves your stuff to that folder, you'll have a good backup (available everywhere with a browser, besides) without having to really care for it.
If you want to try it, PM me. I can invite you and you'll have 250MB more (and I'll earn another 250M for inviting, so it's interesting for me too
That said: have you considered sending your hard drive out for data recovery? you'll loose the drive permanently but it does not sound like that's a problem. when my dell was dropped and the drive scratched (millimeter deep and 5 inches long, it was nasty), they sent it off and managed to get about 98% of the data back.
you may know this already ><' in which case I apologize
I mention it because not everyone seems to be aware that drive content recovery is available. It's not cheap... but It's doable. And the drive dosent have to be in working order at all, just in one piece.
Also cant stress how important off-site backups are (although you may not live in a landscape that likes to periodically set itself on fire, still a good idea. I've seen lots of cases where people have had both computers, cds and external drives stolen in a single break-in). Best and cheapest way is to set up a gmail account and just send yourself all your work when you finish it. you would be honestly shocked how many IT/Multimedia professionals are doing this.
hope that came across as helpful and not condescending ><' You were one of my biggest inspirations growing up, and I admitt to still idolising you more than just a little ^.^
I mourn your loss... May such sacrilege never happen to you again!
I knew that the data can be retrieved, but with the kinds of prices I've been quoted, I think I'd rather just repaint "Dying of the Light" and mourn the loss of my photos quietly
If it makes you feel any better, my last major web project we had backed up 5 times, in three different physical locations. One break in, a small fire and an account hacking In one week and we managed to loose all 5. our luck flipsided for us finaly and someone found an older version in the hidden trash file on a hard drive, but it was an excruciating experience.
Sometimes it happens to the most prepared of us ^.^
I feel your pain, that's happened to me.. which is why now I'm so manic about backups. *hugs*
I've had this happen to me not once, but twice and both times the external hard drive that I save my stuff on also fried.
There is a special level of despair for those who make regular backups only to find that the backups are beyond recognition ><;
Needless to say, I don't trust external hard drives anymore. It's more expensive but I burn most of my things on DVDs or on a 16GB flash drive.
Still, that sucks about your stuff! I am really sorry to hear about it!
Though, I did learn how you can make an internal hard drive into an external one. Internal ones seems to be more stable but (and this is just because I've had such bad luck with them) I don't trust any of them.
Oh, I forgot to tell you how much the company charged to get my data from a $750 GB external hard drive.
...
....
.....
......$2,550.
I've got an external backup drive now and I'm looking into server backups, well away from home.