And finally, please, please, please, back up your fics to floppy disk after
every revision! It's easy to do and there's no reason for disasters like
this to happen when it's so easy to back up.

(A floppy disk used for backup purposes is about 99% likely to have
acquired a serious case of bad sectors within a week, IME)

No, they're not the most reliable format (I just got a Zip drive and it's
worth every penny!), but they're better than nothing, especially when what
you had on your hard drive suddenly becomes *nothing*.

And if anyone out there is thinking about buying a backup device, basically
there are two categories: Big and small. If you only want to backup your
documents, image files, spreadsheets etc., then a Zip drive or LS-120 is
the way to go. If you want to back up your whole hard drive, then a Tape
Backup or a Jaz or a SparQ drive should do the trick. CD Burners are an
option too, but if  you're going to get one, go SCSI or Internal IDE: the
External parallel port models are much slower and not as reliable IMO.

Andy Skuse


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EVOLUTION!
"BG Cross" ~ http://www.execulink.com/~askuse/bgcross
Raven's Garage ~ http://www.execulink.com/~askuse/ravengar,html
"If humans don't want us, then why did they create us?" - Naomi Armitage