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This handout can be found online at: | Diskette care and backup February 2,1993 |
Magnetic diskettes and the documents stored on them are more fragile than most micro-computer users suspect, until disaster strikes just before a deadline. Diskette users can help prevent disasters by taking proper care of their diskettes and by properly making backup copies of their documents.
How to care for your diskettes
Temperature: Store your diskettes at temperatures between 50 and 125 degrees fahrenheit, or between 10 and 52 degrees centigrade. Diskettes can melt in an automobile parked in the sun. Documents can be softened on a sunlit window sill or desktop.Humidity: Keep your diskettes dry at all times. Rain and excessive humidity will destroy your files. Pockets do not protect your diskettes against perspiration. Backpacks are ineffective against rain. Do not bring a cold diskette into a humid environment, otherwise water vapor from the surrounding air will condense on your diskette and render it useless.
Pressure: In spite of the flexibility of the 5.25" diskette, and the hard case of the 3.5" diskette, these cannot endure much physical stress without losing your documents. Pockets, books and backpacks are terrible places to put diskettes. Keep your diskettes in a rugged container which can withstand the unexpectedly high stresses which occur when you are transporting your diskettes in your backpack.
Cleanliness: Do not touch, and do not let anything else contact, the exposed part of the diskette (behind the metal shutter in 3.5" disks). Carrying your diskette in your pocket or backpack will cause hair, lint and dirt to work its way inside your diskette. Using an eraser on your diskette's label, drinking beverages or smoking near your diskette, or doing anything that introduces the slightest risk of contamination to your diskette is risky business. Keep your diskettes in clean, rugged containers and avoid all risky activities when using your diskettes. Annually have your microcomputer's diskette drive cleaned, aligned and degaussed by qualified service personnel.
Magnetism: Microcomputers store your documents on your diskettes with tiny magnetic charges. Many household appliances and objects can produce magnetic fields which are strong enough to destroy your documents on your diskettes. Keep your diskettes away from all sources of magnetism, such as magnets, transformers, power supplies inside computers and monitors, color televisions, microwave ovens, electric motors, audio speakers, etc.
Age: All diskettes go bad after several years (don't let that lifetime warranty fool you). Brand new diskettes in unopened, cellophane-wrapped boxes go bad after several years sitting undisturbed on a shelf in your air-conditioned home. Your diskettes that contain your precious documents will go bad. You can do nothing to keep your diskettes young, but you can keep your valuable documents on young diskettes by making annual backup copies onto new diskettes.
Due to the inevitability of diskette failure, you must act accordingly:Timely: Every time you have made significant changes to your document, you must make a backup copy. If you don't you will have to remember the changes you made and redo all the work you will have lost when your diskette goes bad.
Different Disks: Copy the new version of your document onto another, different, backup diskette. Although many applications will make automatic backups for you, they store these on your same diskette with your original document. Don't be fooled by the false sense of security this gives you. When your diskette dies, so does your backup on that same diskette. Use different diskettes for your backup copies.
Previous Versions: Keep several backup diskettes and rotate their use as you back up your document over time. This will give you several previous versions of your document in case disaster strikes. This is not an optional strategy. A common disaster is for the user to unknowningly save an empty or corrupted original document, and then to promptly make a backup copy of the new (corrupted) original. Without previous versions stored on different diskettes, this document is gone forever.
Paper Copy: Print your document periodically. Should a disaster strike all of your diskettes (perhaps a new computer virus), you will have a paper copy to fall back on.
Disaster is not a big problem when you've been faithfully making backup copies of your documents, as described above. However, assuming no serious physical damage, it is sometimes possible to recover a needed document from a corrupted diskette. There are various software utilities which can attempt diskette repair and document recovery. Sometimes this is a quick and easy process, sometimes it takes much longer than recomposing the document. The CIRCA microcomputing labs have some of these utilities available for your use in the lab with Macintosh diskettes. You should seek additional help if the lab's utility seems too complicated, fails to recover your document, or you are not a Macintosh user.
Help is available from the UF Computing Help Desk , E520 CSE, between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday; the phone number is 392-HELP. Consulting for faculty and A&P personnel is also available at the UF Faculty Support Center, 2215 Turlington Hall, between 8:30 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday; the phone number is 392-7249.