Backing Up User Data Flash Drive (USB)

It is highly recommended that from time to time users back up their documents to an external location such as a Flash Drive. Good reasons include:

○ Your computer crashes or is replaced/upgraded ○ Your operating system is changed ○ You need to work on files at home ○ Virus or other malicious software infects the computers

Storage Size:

USB Drives come in many size, shapes, and colors, but the only really important factor is the amount of data they can hold. Common capacities today are 2 GBs, 4 GBs, 8 GBs, 16 GBs, and larger.

It is highly recommended that you use at least an 8 GBs USB Drive. This should be sufficient space back up your files. If you have the opportunity, additional space never hurt, so a 16GB drive is also great.

Plug In USB Drive: Once you have acquired a USB Drive, insert the USB drive to the correct port on your computer. Most Computers have a USB port on the front of the desktop, however there are some USB ports on the back/side of almost every desktop and laptop.

For PC: Check to see that the drive shows up in the “My Computer” section as an additional drive. It should be the next available letter drive. For example if you have C: drive as your local disk and D: drive as your CD/DVD drive, then the E: drive will be your USB drive. Note: it does not have to be the letter E:, it can be F, G, H, etc...

Go to “Start Button” ⇒ Then Click on “Computer” ⇒ This will show you the drives on your machine

Before: After: No USB Drive USB Drive, This example it is E: drive

Drag and Drop: Backing up your files is as simple as dragging and dropping them to the USB drive. To do this you will need to have both the location of your files open as well as the location of your USB drive open i.e. the E: drive in our example. To highlight the items simply drag a box around the items to select what you want to copy, then click on the selected items and drag them to the E: drive or USB Drive. This will copy your files over.

NOTE: Many times drag and drop only creates a shortcut to the files rather than making a copy of them. To avoid losing your files, another option to copy over files is to first select them, right click the mouse button and choose copy. Then you go to the USB folder and simply right click and paste.

For MAC:

In a Mac computer/laptop when you connect the USB flash drive to the side, back, and/or front of the computer, you will get a new icon on your desktop. Most of the time the Icon is a white icon in the shape of a box. Ensure that you get this icon to pop up otherwise you will not be able to use that USB drive.

Before After

Next, you will need to go find the files that need to be copied over to your USB flash drive. Navigate to the top of the monitor and select “GO” option from the top menu, followed by the “Home” option. By selecting “Home” this will take you to the location where all your files can be stored. You will see folders such as “Desktop, Downloads, Music, Movies, ...etc” this is all the content you will need to save.

Drag and Drop: Backing up your files is as simple as dragging and dropping them to the USB drive. To do this you will need to have both the location of your files open as well as the location of your USB drive open. In our example you will need to perform the following:

1) Open the USB drive folder i.e. the white box icon. 2) Go to the top menu and select “File” followed by “ New Finder Window” 3) You can now place both the finder windows side to side to facilitate the copy and paste process.

To highlight the items, simply drag a box around the items to select what you want to copy, then click on the selected items and drag them to the USB Folder or USB Finder Window. This will copy your files over.

NOTE: Many times drag and drop only creates a shortcut to the files rather than making a copy of them. To avoid losing your files, another option to copy over files is to first select them, right click the mouse button and choose copy. Then you go to the USB folder and simply right click and paste.

Common Locations: Most of your data is likely in the following locations:

○ My Documents ○ My Pictures ○ Desktop ○ Downloads

For PC

To access these folders easily go to: “Start”--> Computer--> Local Disk C:--> Users-->Here you will see your log on name or names. Select the one you use.

For MAC

To access these folders easily go to the top menu and select “GO” ⇒ “HOME” ⇒ Here you will see your logged on files that were described above. Select the one you will like to copy.

Common Pitfalls:

● Avoid copying over “My Pictures” unless you actually need to for the purposes of your job. Pictures often take up a huge amount of storage space, and most people rarely if ever refer to them once they’ve used them once. ● Avoid writing over one file with another of the same name. You might have a file called “lessonplan.doc” which is your lesson plans for the year. Another file, also called “lessonplan.doc” might be your one-day sub plans. If you copy the second file to the same location as the first one, it will over-write one file with the other. Files can have the same name as long as they’re in different places (folders). ● Avoid exceeding the storage limit of the USB Drive you are using. The USB drive only has so much information that it can hold. Anything additional will not be saved.