External Drive Backup Warning

External / Portable / USB Drive Backup

Backing up your critical data on an external drive provides only minimal protection against only one type of data loss...hard drive failure and nothing else.

External drives are easily damaged, lost or stolen. Portable drive backups are rarely taken offsite, are insecure, time-consuming and
limited.

1. Affordability: Cheap Storge is High Risk
   External drives cost about $100-500;
2. Reliability: Failure-Prone Media and Drives
   External drives are subject to the same data loss risks as internal hard drives: viruses, worms, data corruption, etc.
   They are notoriously failure-prone, vulnerable to degradation by the environment (oxygen, heat, sunlight, humidity, liquids, dust) and human mishandling (scratched, cracked, bent, misplaced, etc.).
   External Drive Backup WarningLike other magnetic backup media, tape are frequently damaged by electromagnetic fields emitted by TVs, monitors, speakers, etc.
   Since they are portable, they can easily be damaged. Pocket drives are often lost, go through the laundry, get bumped and broken, etc.
3. Data Protection: Not Offsite is Not Alright
   Unless they're taken offsite every night (which rarely happens regularly), external drive backups fail to protect data offsite
   against natural disasters (fire, flood, hurricane, tornado, lightning, solar flares and earthquakes), or theft, disgruntled
   employees and sabotage.
4. Data Security: Portable Media = Inherent Risks
   Where do you store your external drive backups -- a safety deposit box, a glove compartment, a purse, a night stand, or
   you don't know? Proper storage is in a climate-controlled environment.
   Is your data encrypted or even password protected?
5. Convenience: Manual Process
   Daily external drive backup administration is time-consuming manual process requiring human interaction (inserting DVDs,
   selecting files or running backup software, labeling & cataloging, taking offsite, etc.). CD-RWs are usually limited to 4x burn
   speed.
6. External Drive Capacity
   External drives typically can store all the data on your hard drive.
7. Remote File Access: Not Available
   You can only access your data backed up on an external drive through your local network if the drive is plugged in and
   shared. You may be down for a full day if you store your backups offsite.
8. File Versioning: Complicated and Unreliable
   Finding and accessing specific data backed up on an external drive can a hassle, and does not use delta block incremental
   technology.
9. Full System Backup: Cumbersome, Unreliable
   Backing up your full system to a external drive requires specialized software. Recovery typically is an extremely
   cumbersome, time intensive and failure-prone process.
10. Support: Nowhere to Run
    What will you do when a backup external drive holding data you desperately need to recover no longer works?
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