Tag: backup

The Macbook of Theseus

My computer died recently. Was on vacation and it stopped booting up. Something about it, the timing perhaps, made me think it was the bad death.

But, I still hoped. I hoped it was the 3rd party charger I had with me, so waited until I got home to use the original.

Then I made an appointment with Apple, hoping a simple reset of some sort could help. And indeed there was about two minutes where my machine was connected the service computer that it looked like we would be able to flash and reinstall the firmware.

Alas, it was not meant to be, it threw up errors.

It was the bad death, the motherboard would need to be replaced, and because of the way this Macbook is made, it would take my harddrive with it.

It is one thing to have a back up strategy, and another to have to exercise that strategy.

My important files are kept on a local Nextcloud, synced with multiple devices. I keep a back up of my writing specifically on my Dropbox.

I have a Time Machine, but it had been giving me issues, issues which were a perpetual # 3 on the todo list. The last backup I had was January 2024.

I keep a lot of my nerdy programming projects on a Pi Zero I have set up just to be a git server and have started moving more to my online repository (https://code.jacobhaddon.com)

So. I was fairly confident I was ok. Fairly. Mostly. I was an anxious mess. Sigh.

It was only made worse when I got my computer back and discovered the January backup was corrupt, and no data could be retrieved. I had a June 2023 back up, it worked fine, and filled in some of the concern in my heart.

You see everything important was already on Nextcloud and Dropbox… I hoped. Because without the backup I couldn’t be sure, and that being sure part is what I needed as a part of the backup plan.

A few things were lost, things I can remake or download easily.

And the computer itself? The following were replaced:

  • Logic board (which includes HDD and RAM)
  • Touch ID board
  • I/O Board x2

Which means I think the only thing in there original is the battery… which I kinda wish had been replaced as well.

I didn’t lose anything other than some sleep, but I am not happy with the way things went with this effort. So right now I am still planning on how I’m going to make a better backup plan. My previous confidence seems was partially based on the idea I could rip the machine open and get to the hard drive if push came to shove.

Which is no longer the case.

Check your backups. Keep your important things in multiple places. Print, publish, push to keep things safe.

Be safe out there.

Tragedy Avoided – A Computer Story

Anyone who I’ve talked with enough about computers knows that I will pester you with the virtues of backing up your stuff.

Yesterday my computer started acting flakey. I would get some odd twitches, and then just blank screen crashes. This, as we say in the geek world, is not a good thing ™.

This morning, amidst reading, it went out again, a twitch and some screen babble first. I have seen this behavior before, and I know this isn’t good. If I am lucky we are talking just bad RAM, or a failing hard drive. If we are not, we are talking a new computer.

I’m still working on what’s wrong, but that isn’t the intent of this post. You see, when that screen came up, when the first fleeting thoughts of “I think it is really dead” came through my mind, there was something else as well, or should I say a lack of something. No panic.

I have two back up hard drives, one is Time Machine, which is Apple’s built in back up software, and the other is one where I manually dump things. My writing files and most of my LampLight / Apokrupha files live in Dropbox, meaning they are synced not just online, but on at least two other computers as well.

You see, my laptop isn’t just a computer, it is my most valued tool in these ventures I have, between writing and editing and publishing. A failed hard drive is more than an inconvenience, because without preparation, it is the loss of months and months of work on LampLight, on all of my writings, my photos.

If I had not been prepared, a hard drive failure, quite simply, could have been the end of LampLight, the loss of thousands of photos, and the loss of nearly twenty years of writing. And that, friends, is not a risk I am willing to take.

So, my writer friends, editor friends, even just normal ones… what is your back up plan? If your computer was stolen or fried this very second, what would you lose? What story or photo could you never get back?

Backup. Backup. Backup.

Remember, it is not Apple or Microsoft’s fault if you lose stuff. Not Google, dropbox, not Western Digital nor Matrox. It is not HP’s, it is not Dell’s, it is only and always yours. These are your files, your digital creations, keep them safe.