ASTM International is one of those organizations that have had a huge effect on consumer’s lives and those consumers may not even be aware of its existence.

Formerly known as the American Society for Testing and Materials and now called ASTM International, this organization is a globally recognized leader in the development and delivery of international consensus standards. Today over 12,000 ASTM standards are used all over the globe to improve product quality, enhance safety, facilitate market access and trade and build consumer confidence. ASTM has been in operation since 1898 and its members include over 30,000 technical experts from 135 different countries.

What is an international standard? It is a document that has been developed and established within the consensus principles of the organization and meets the requirements of ASTM procedures and regulations. Full consensus standards are developed with the participation of all parties that have a stake in the standards’ development and/or use. ASTM has no role in requiring compliance or enforcement of their standards but they may become mandatory when referenced by an external contact, corporation or government.

Where and how do people use ASTM standards? These standards are used by people, companies, agencies, purchasers and sellers, who incorporate them into contracts; scientists and engineers use them in their laboratories and offices; architects and designers use them in their blueprints; government entities use them as reference material for laws and many others refer to them for guidance on various issues and products.

ASTM divides their standards into six categories.

1.  The Standard Specification, which defines the requirements to be satisfied by subject of the standard.

2. The Standard Test Method, which defines the way a test is performed and the precision of the result.  The result of the test may be used to assess compliance with a Standard Specification.

3. The Standard Practice, which defines a sequence of operations that, unlike a Standard Test Method, does not produce a result.

4. The Standard Guide that which provides an organized collection of information or series of options that does not recommend a specific course of action.

5. The Standard Classification, that provide an arrangement or division of materials, products, systems or services into groups based on similar characteristics such as origin, composition, properties and use.

6.  The Terminology Standard, that provides agreed definitions of terms used in other standards.

IoSafe products such as the Solo and the SoloPRO are tested and proved per the ASTM rating E119 which covers test methods for fire tests or building construction and materials. IoSafe tested these products for heat and flame up to 1550 degrees Fahrenheit and for periods up to 30 minutes. An ASTM rating means that the methods ioSafe used to test their products work and they can prove their conclusions and claims.

If a company wants to put an ASTM rating on their products, they need to build their tests, products and organization to ASTM standards. They are one of the most commonly used independent rating companies but they are by no means the only one.

ETL SEMKO (formerly Edison Testing Laboratory) is a division of Intertek Group plc and they specialize in electrical product safety testing, EMC testing and benchmark performance testing. They have more than 30 offices and laboratories on six continents.

CE Mark, this rating is a mandatory conformity mark for products placed on the market in the European Economic Area.  It is necessary for certain product groups in the European Union and countries where EU products are sold. Seeing the mark on a product means it has been tested and it meets EU safety, health and environmental protection requirements.

Underwriters Laboratories is an organization established in 1894 and deals chiefly in product safety. They also develop standards and test procedures for materials, components, assemblies, tools and equipment. They also analyze drinking water and clean water samples through their laboratory in South Bend, Indiana. They are recognized by OSHA for safety standards.

NSF International is a Michigan-based not-for-profit public health and environmental organization that provides standards development and product certification. They were founded in 1944 and they work primarily in public health and safety. They have over 1200 employees in 150 countries and work with the World Health Organization.

The Canadian Standards Association is a not-for-profit crown corporation founded in 1919 with the stated aim developing standards for over 57 areas of specialization such as climate change, business management, industrial equipment, construction materials, boilers and pressure vessels and electronic/electrical equipment. Their employees are composed of representatives from government, industry and consumer groups.

SGS S.A. is an international organization that provides inspection, verification, testing and certification services for traded goods. They are divided into ten divisions; agriculture, automotive, consumer testing services, environmental services, governments and institutions, industrial, life science, minerals, oil/gas/chemicals and system/services certification. They were founded in 1878 and have spread from France to 1250 offices and laboratories across the world.

Seeing an ASTM rating on a product like having insider knowledge that it’s well-tested, well-made and can suit your purposes. Researching products for this rating is worth any consumer’s time and energy.

Ever had that sinking feeling you get when you empty your computer’s Recycle Bin, only to realize that an important file that you really needed to keep was inexplicably among the other junk files you just deleted?

We’ve probably all done it at some point, and likely suffered the consequences for it too, but did you know that it isn’t really gone for good?

Because of the way a typical hard drive reads and writes data, the chances are high that with a little bit of digging, you will be able to retrieve a whole host of deleted files from an external hard drive. You don’t need to be a data recovery specialist; you just need the right tools for the job.

Recuva, from Piriform, is a free disk utility that was designed for one purpose – restoring deleted files from your hard drive. Once installed, the included program  wizard will ask you what type of file to look for, and will ask you for its location before it was deleted. This is not essential information, merely a way to filter through the large volume of files Recuva will likely find.

Once it has scanned your hard drive, Recuva will display a list of files that it found. All that is left for you to do now is check the boxes next to the ones that you want to resurrect, and click Recover. Then, as if by magic, you will quickly have access to files that were once deleted from your computer.

There will, however, be times when Recuva is not a viable option. Not everyone is comfortable using tools like Recuva to restore files, and you may have some physical damage to your external drive from vandalism, fire, or flood damage. In cases like this, you will be glad you invested in an external hard drive from ioSafe.

Not only are ioSafe’s disaster proof hard drives among the most rugged in the world, but all ioSafe hard drives come with a unique Data Recovery Service (DRS) as standard. It covers any data loss, for any reason, whether accidental or on purpose. This one-time use, no questions asked service is the ultimate insurance for all your data needs, and it ensures that you never have to worry about lost data every again.

ioSafe’s expert team of forensic data recovery specialists will recover any and all data that it finds on your  external hard drive, and ship it back to you on a replacement device free of charge. The DRS is just one more reason, if it were needed, as to why ioSafe hard drives are the best option for businesses looking to secure their important data.

Contact our team today for more information, or to receive a quote for this industry leading product.

When you’re selecting which hard drive to buy, you have a plethora of products to choose from. Here is a selection of companies that produce hard drives, some of the choices they offer and links to their websites.

ioSafe: This company broke new ground when they were founded in 2004 by creating the industry’s first fire and flood protected external hard drive. They incorporated in the state of California in 2005 and won Design Magazine’s Golden Mousetrap award in 2006. In 2007 ioSafe received patents for their fireproof and waterproof technology. IoSafe continues to make many varieties of disaster-proof hard drives. Like the ioSafe Rugged Portable; this product lives up to its name with Crush protection up to 5,000 lbs. and virtually any situation is covered. It has Shock/Chemical/Immersion/Altitude/Extreme Environment protection. As with all ioSafe products, the drive comes with a no-hassle warranty and the Data Recovery Service.  Another well-regarded ioSafe product is the ioSafe SoloPRO. This drive is available in 1TB, 1.5TB, 2TB and 3TB capacities and has quiet forced air cooling. It can protect your data from 1550 degrees of heat for 30 minutes and has USB 3.0 SuperSpeed which allows it to plug and play up to 5Gb/s.  The SoloPRO comes with several optional DRS plans, three year warranty and the forensic recovery service.

Toshiba: This company is a world leader in high technology and has roots going back to 1875. It is the world’s fifth largest personal computer vendor and is among the top 20 world leaders in semiconductor sales. In 2009 they acquired Fujitsu’s HDD product line. They produce several varieties of hard drives for personal consumers. Among them the Enterprise HDD, this family of solid state drives is designed for higher performance and lower energy consumption and has SAN/NAS storage applications. Toshiba also offers 2.5-type Hard Disk Drives which offer fast data transfer rates, large storage capacity and efficient energy consumption. They are ideal for personal computers as well as other electronic devices such as TVs and digital recorders.

Samsung: They are the 19^th most popular brand in world for consumer electronics and the company has continued to grow for the last 70 years. They are the world’s second largest chipmaker and second largest shipbuilders. The Samsung Group accounts for a fifth of South Korea’s total exports and it were a country; it would have the 35^th largest economy in the world. They produce many different solid state and external hard drives. One such product is the 64GB 470 Series Solid State Drive; built for multitasking and gaming, this drive can access data very quickly and can boot up a computer in as little as 15 seconds. In the external sector, they have such products the G3 1 Terabyte Desktop Hard Disk Drive.  This product has a 1 terabyte storage capacity, USB 2.0 connectivity and features a 480 Mbps data transfer rate.

Seagate: Incorporated in 1978, this company is one of the largest manufacturers of hard disk drives in the world. Their first hard drive was the 5-megabyte ST-506 which was released in 1980. In 2008, Seagate was the first company to ship over a billion hard drives.  One of their most popular products is the Barracuda XT 3.5 Internal Kitted Drive; it has a 64MB cache for improved burst performance, native command queuing for organizing incoming command in the most efficient order and combines a SATA 6Gb/s interface with a 7200 RPM spindle speed for optimum performance. For external storage; their FreeAgent line offers many good choices such as the FreeAgent Desk. This product is available in 500GB, 640GB, 1TB, 1.5TB and 2TB capacities. It has a USB 2.0 interface, preloaded software, smart utilities and a five-year limited warranty and is compatible with Windows 7.

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies: This company is scheduled to be acquired by Western Digital this year for 4.3 billion dollars. HGST’s parent company is Hitachi, Ltd.; which is one of the world’s largest technology companies. They produce a variety of drives and support systems. Their drive are high-quality, like the Deskstar 7K3000. This design can store up to three TB of data, has a halogen-free design and is very eco-friendly. It has 7200 RPM performance in a 3.5 inch form factor and it is the first Hitachi hard drive with a 6Gb/s SATA interface. They have made great strides with external drives as well; the LifeStudio Desk Plus is an inventive product. It is a USB 2.0 drive available in 500GB, 1TB and 2TB storage capacity. It has an auto-sync USB key and automatically finds and organizes your files and data.

Western Digital: Founded in 1970, Western Digital has a long history as a maker of semiconductors and integrated circuits. They made the jump into the hard drive market in the early 1980s and today are one of the largest hard disk drive manufacturers in the world. Among their many innovations was the 1990 introduction of the Caviar Drive. They have also launched a line of products using green technology and they make the fastest SATA drive in the world. Western Digital’s Caviar Blue drive is an award-winning product with a SATA and PATA interface and it is available in 80GB to 1TB capacity.  Their My Book Essential external hard drive has WD SmartWare backup software, universal compatibility with the option of upgrading to a USB 3.0 connection and has password and encryption options.

WiebeTech: A relative newcomer to the hard drive market, WiebeTech was founded in 2000 by James Wiebe, a 25 year veteran of the computer industry. Their goal is to put more and more storage into smaller and smaller packages. In 2008, the company was acquired by CRU-DataPort which continues to operate it as a unique brand. One of their more popular products is the ToughTech FS Mini; slightly larger than a deck of playing cards, this drive features passive cooling, accepts SATA drives and stores up to 750GB. WiebeTech’s  SilverSTATA series is another well-regarded product line. They accept the largest and most high-capacity 3.5” SATA drives and it is fully interchangeable for transferring data.

CRU-DataPort: Since 1986 this company has been at the forefront of the data security and data devices field.  Its products are available throughout the world and are used in many technological fields. Their DataPort 10 is one of the latest designs in removable drives. It has vibration resistant features, features applications in; hard data swapping, physical data protection, disk-to-disk backup, media archiving, PC sharing and drive cooling/protection. It also combines 30,000+ insertion-rated connectors with a five year warranty plan. Another popular product is the Data Express DX115; which has dependable steel construction; supports 3.5” serial attached SCSI or serial ATA and has applications in security, backup, testing, audio/video editing and drive swapping/testing.

Dell: This well-known company has been setting trends in the computer industry for years. Founded in 1984, they were a pioneer in the “made to order” approach to manufacturing. They are one of the largest technological companies in the world and are number 41 on the Fortune 500 list. One their most highly rated products are the DELL 500 GB 7200 RPM Serial ATA Internal Hard Drive. A spindle speed of 7200 rpm and a 16MB cache ensure fast data access while a SoftSonic motor ensures a quiet operation and perpendicular recording enhances data density and Clean Sweep calibrates your drive every time you start up. Dell also puts out the DELL 160 GB Serial ATA Hard Drive. It is marketed toward laptops, workstations and small form factor PCs. It provides data transfer rates up to 300Mbps and includes the 3D defense system.

Buffalo Technology: A subsidiary of Melco Holdings Inc. Since 1975 this company has been about building strong international alliances with corporations like Intel and Microsoft. They are committed to environmental standards in all of their technology. Buffalo’s DriveStation USB 3.0 HD-HXU3 is their next generation in high speed external storage. It offers maximum interface speed of up to 5 Gbps and it will work with all future 3.0 models. It has an eco-manager which monitors power consumption and backup software. In portable storage they offer such products like the MiniStation Plus HD-PNTU3. The MiniStation has a compact and lightweight shock-proof chassis with hardware disk encryption. It also is Time Machine compatible and USB powered.

Iomega: Since the late 1980s this company has sold over 410 million digital storage drives and disks. They were acquired by the EMC Corporation in 2008. They produce many different types of desktop hard drives like the Iomega Professional External Hard Drive. It has one the fastest speeds available with its eSTATA interface. This drive has secure MozyHome and Iomega Never Down software and one free year’s subscription to Trend Micro Internet Security.  In the portable drive sector Iomega has such products as the Iomega Prestige Super-Speed USB 3.0 Portable Hard Drive. It is 2.0 USB compatible with 256-bit hardware encryption and Protection Suite software. It is durable with Drop Shock technology incorporated into its design and it has a three year limited warranty.

Lexar: This California-based manufacturer has been in business since 1996 and they were acquired by Micron Technology in 2006 and in 2007 Lexar began marketing Kodak brand flash memory products. They are one of the largest DRAM and NAND manufacturers in the world. An example of their backup drive technology is the Echo ZX Backup Drive. It has interface speeds of up to 28MB/s read, 15MB/s write and it securely encrypts files. It is compatible with both PCs and Macs and has a two year limited warranty. Another great product is the JumpDrive V10 USB Flash Drive. This product can be purchased with 4GB, 8GB or 16GB storage capacities. This hi-speed USB drive is also available in several different colors and is compatible with over 800 digital devices.

Apricorn, Inc: Established in 1983, this company produces computer storage products and has branches in the United States and Canada. They have a line of hardware encrypted drives, an example being the Apricorn Padlock – USB 2.0; this product has an encrypted drive with PIN access, up to 10 PIN keys can be added and it comes with real-time 128-bite or 256-bit military grade AES hardware encryption. It also comes with Brute Force Self Destruct, a software free design and a integrated USB cable. It is also protected by VTC technology. They also produce external drive products like the Aegis Max 1TB. It is a 2.5” ultra-high capacity portable hard drive. There is no need for an AC adapter because it is Bus powered and it has a 16-point Omni-directional shock mounting system.

OCZ Technology: This company produces a range of hard drive products. They were founded in 2000 and in 2007 it acquired the company, PC Power and Cooling. In January of this year OCZ announced that they would cease their RAM production. They have offices in the United States, Brazil, the Netherlands and Taiwan. OCZ produces such drives as the OCZ RevoDrive 3 X2 PCI-EXPRESS SSD. It has been designed with power users and multimedia designers in mind. It has command queuing and queue balancing algorithms and delivers 1.5 GB/s of bandwidth. There is also the OCZ Agility 3 SATA II 2.5” SSD. These machines are built for a balance of performance and value and it has a cutting-edge SATA 6Gbhps interface. It has no moving parts and never requires defragmentation.

Plextor:  Founded in 1985 as a division of the Shinano Kenshi corporation, they produce many different drive and flash memory products. Such as the SSD SATA 6Gb/s; it is one of the first drives to support the SATA 6Gb/s interface. It uses the Marvel 88SS9174 controller chip which helps boost read and write performance. It also has a 128MB cache buffer which stabilizes the SSD and results in a quicker transfer rate. There is also the PX-NAS2-2T1; which is a NAS device designed to offer more storage than ever before. It has auto backup software and has encryption algorithms and can come with up to two 1TB hard disks.  It also comes with utility software with minimum transfiguration duty.

Intel: This world giant was founded in 1968 and became a household name with its “Intel Inside” ad campaigns in the 1990s. Intel was an early developer of SRAM and DRAM memory chips and in 2010 was ranked 48^th in the Millward Brown listing of 100 most powerful brands. The Intel Solid-State Drive 710 Series is a high-endurance SSD designed for data center performance. This series brings out single-cell endurance in a multi-level cell package. They also combine NAND management techniques with NAND silicon enhancements. There is also the award-winning X25-E Extreme SATA Solid State Drive; it comes in 32GB and 64GB capacity and has a life expectancy of two million hours mean time before failure. Its native commands queuing is powerful enough to enable up to 32 concurrent operations.

Rebit: This company is a recent entry into the hard drive field, founded in 2005. They produce SaveMe, a backup and recovery solution and Rebit 5 which preserves automatic backups and system recoveries. They also offer both portable and desktop hard drives. Their portable version has 500GB capacity and their desktops come in both 1 TB and 2 TB varieties. They use a NTFS-formatted, non-RAID system disk drive and have available 1.1, 2.0 or 3.0 USB port. They also offer 90 days of free phone support and a one year limited warranty.

LaCie: This producer of computer hardware is based in France and Oregon that specializes in external hard drives, RAID arrays, optical drives, flash drives and computer monitors. Founded in 1987, they often gear their products toward graphics professionals with an emphasis on color matching. Their hard drives use a number of interfaces like Ethernet, FireWire and eSTATA.  One of their desktop models is the LaCie Hard Disk MAX Quadra; this product has a quadruple interface for universal connectivity. A front USB hub feature and a full software bundle for easy formatting and backup. It has a capacity of 2TB and two year limited warranty. The LaCie Rugged Safe is a portable drive that comes in either 500GB or 1TB capacity. It has 128-bite AES software for data encryption and Bus powered and fully compatible with Macs or PCs. It is fully plug and play and comes with a three year limited warranty.

Promise Technology: While it was founded in San Jose, California in 1988, Promise Technology, Inc is a Taiwanese company based in Hsinchun. They are long-time producers of hard disk controllers and they recently introduced a NAS enclosure. Promise also produces RAID host adapter cards. Their SmarStor DAS has four high-speed interfaces; eSTATA, FireWire 400, FireWire 800 and high-speed USB. It is ideal for storage expansion on a PC or Mac and has excellent media streaming performance. The SmartStor ZERO is a true zero configuration NAS and digital media server. It is available with a 1TB or 2TB hard drive; Windows and Mac OS X are fully supported. It has WebPasm II AJAX base for advanced setup. It also has iTunes and Facebook media applications and Gigabit Ethernet.

Verbatim: This North Carolina based company is a subsidiary of the Mitsubishi Chemical Holdings Corporation of Japan. Verbatim was formed in 1969 and was acquired by Mitsubishi in 1990; it produces such products as USB flash drives, DVD-RAM, SD cards, Compactflash Cards and HD-DVD-Rs. They also produce several lines of hard drives; like the USB 2.0/FW 400/FW 800/eSTATA II Desktop Hard Drive.  Along with its combination drive, this product has a 500GB capacity and has data transfer rates of up to 3000Mb/s.  It also includes Nero BackItUp Essentials software and is backed by a seven year limited warranty. There is also the Acclaim portable hard drive. It is compact and compatible with all USB connections and has a 320GB storage capacity. It is backed by a seven year limited warranty and 5GB of Norton Online Backup and an eMusic offer of 35 MP3s.

Corsair: This computer peripherals and data storage company is headquartered in Fremont, California and has distribution centers in the United States, Europe and Asia. They also maintain a production facility in Taiwan. Corsair designs and sells speakers, ATX power supplies, high-speed DRAM modules, SSDs, USB flash drives, computer cases and many more products. Their hard drive lines include the Force Series GT 180GB SATA 3 6Gb/s Solid-State Hard Drive. This drive is built for speed; it has up to 85,000 IOPS and read speeds of up to 555MB/s. It is compatible with both STATA 2 and 3 and features support for the Windows 7 TRIM Command. It has no moving parts and S.M.A.R.T. support. Corsair’s Nova Series 2 60GB Solid-State Drive works well as a secondary unit in tandem with a boot drive. It features TRIM support and has an onboard cache of 128MB. It is fully compatible with PCs and Mac OS X.

Clickfree: A subsidiary of the Storage Appliance Corporation, this company was formed in early 2005 and is based in Canada. They specialize in backup systems such as the C2 Portable Backup. It automatically backs up any PC or Mac with no extra software needed. It includes Facebook integration, iPhone music sharing and built-in DVD archiving tool. It comes in storage capacities of 500GB to 2TB. It also has 256-bit encryption and EASY Organizer/Restorer/Archiver. There is also the C2N Automatic Home Backup; this backup drive includes the new BackupLink. It can connect to both Mac and a PC system at the same time and is available in store capacities from 250GB to 2TB. It is password protected and comes with EASY Run/Music/Viewer and allows you to create custom backup schedules.

Hewlett-Packard: This American company operates in nearly every country in the world. HP’s net revenue in 2010 was $126.3 billion and it is number two in the world for IT services. It has roots going back to 1939 and is a leader in the fields of personal computing, printers, data storage, networking hardware, designing software and delivering services.  They produce such hard drives as the HP Portable USB 3.0 500GB External Hard Drive; the maximum data transfer rate is 640 MBps. It is supported on the PC platform and uses the USB 3.0 host interface. HP also makes the HP 320GB Pocket Media External Hard Drive; which is meant for photos, videos and music. It is compatible with any USB-enabled PC or Notebook and is backward-compatible with PCs that use USB 1.1. The drive has integrated software and a one year hardware warranty.

IBM: Founded in 1911, this international, US-based conglomerate is the 18^th largest firm in the United States and the 31th largest in the world. Famous IBM inventions include the ATM machine, the floppy disk, DRAM, the magnetic stripe card, the relational database and the hard drive itself. IBM has over 425,000 employees in over 200 countries. The company produces such hard drives as the Ultrastar 73.4 GB Internal Hard Drive. This product has 320MBps and 10,000 RPM; as well as large 8 MB multi-segmented buffers.  It also combines 4.51GB and 9.10GB capacities with a Wide Ultra SCSI interface. It also has 7.5 ms average read seek time and a one year warranty. There are also the 160 GB, 500GB STATA and 500 GB SAS Hard Drives. These drives have SAS compliance, S.M.A.R.T. technology and rigorous testing has been done on them through ServerProven program. They are compatible with all major operating systems and come with one year warranties.

Crucial Technology: Another consumer brand of Micron Technology, this company produces SDDs, memory and hardware accessories. Their solid state drives include the 64GB Crucial m4 2.5” SATA 6GB/s; which has groundbreaking SATA SDD performance, it reads speeds up to 415MB/s and second generation command queuing with backwards compatible with 3Gb/s. Crucial also produces the 512GB m4 2.5” with Data Transfer Kit. This product has the most advanced NAND process technology in the semiconductor industry. SSDs have many advantages; no moving parts, less heat generation and reduced power consumption. This product comes with a limited three year warranty.

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One of the best options available to consumers is the hard drives from ioSafe. This company produces many rugged pieces of equipment that are perfect for copying and protecting data such as your music collection. One such product is the ioSafe 500GB Portable Hard Drive; this drive can fit in your backpack or briefcase and is built to MIL Spec standards. It’s water-proof, crush-proof, shock-proof, and chemical-proof and has full Extreme Environment protection. Combine that with data encryption, theft protection and a no-hassle warranty and you’ve got a great backup for your laptop or desktop.

If you’re looking for something larger for your office or home then check out this ioSafe drive; the 1TB SoloPRO USB 3.0 Desktop Hard Drive. Styled in a sleek black box, this product has the fastest interface available on the market today. It is Linux, Mac, Microsoft Sever and PC compatible and has data transfer rates of up to 3GB/s and it can connect to a NAS. It is water and fire proof and has Active Airflow Cooling so it operates at the optimum temperature and with the built-in security slot; it can secured to any surface.

This ioSafe product combines a lot of great options. The 1TB ioSafe Solo, this hard drive is a fantastic way to protect a separate copy of your music and videos.  Its water-proof, you could soak in 10 ft of water for three days and still recover your data; along with its fire protection, you don’t have to worry about the weather. The drive has SUB 2.0 connectivity and with its In-Home Media Vault, you never have to worry about losing your music library or photo albums.

All of these ioSafe products come with the Data Recovery Service which offers you unmatched protection. No matter what happens to your hard drive, DRS will recover your data files and it comes with one to five year warranty plans. This service is an essential part of your ioSafe package.
If you’re a Mac user, you have another great opinion open to you. It is called Time Machine for the Mac OS. This utility backup creates incremental backups of files that can be restored at a later date. Time Machine keeps an up to date copy of all your files, music included and it’s compatible with the ioSafe external hard drives.

The process of moving your iTunes is a very simple and straightforward procedure.

First thing you need to know is that iTunes stores all your music in an iTunes folder (Mac users can find them in their Music folder) and XP users will find it in their My Music folder within their My Documents and Windows 7/Vista user will find their iTunes in their Music folder in their libraries.

If you can’t find your iTunes folder, you can locate it by going to the Preferences menu in iTunes and clicking the Advanced Tab. At the top of this window will be a dialog box called iTunes Media Folder Location and you’ll be able to see where your music is located.

Once you find your folder, click on the folder and drag it over to your external hard drive icon. The folder itself doesn’t move but a copy is made and stored. It is just that easy, find the folder, click on it and drag it over to your external hard drive.

Never depend on one hard drive to hold your audio/visual libraries and save yourself the trouble of buying and looking for the same music you’ve already acquired. Your favorite playlist will sound all the sweeter when you know your music is secure.

Written by Joseph Fowler

Step One…Don’t Panic!

Take a deep breath and look at your situation. Your hard drive has just crashed and this is problem that needs to be addressed right away but it’s not a catastrophe! You can fix this and you can prevent the loss of not only your data but also the pictures of your family and friends.

We live in the age of the digital camera and snapshots taken with our phones and people are moving away from the habit of having physical copies of their pictures. While the technology has changed, this core concept has not; you need to protect your collections of photos. We used to order multiple copies of pictures and keep them in photo-books for protection and presentation. Now people show their photos on social media sites, blogs and their various electronic devices and they still have to worry about losing their memories.

We’re going to walk you through some troubleshooting techniques that you can use in response of a hard drive crash. There are many options open to you in a situation like this and remember the most important thing is not to lose your head; you’re not on a sinking ship, you just need to plug a hole in the boat and fish your luggage out of the water.

If your hard drive is making clicking, whirring or grinding noises turn it off and unplug it. Then carefully remove the hard drive from the computer (remember that hard drives are very sensitive to static electricity and physical jolts). Do not assume that the files are unrecoverable and if you don’t have a backup in place, you’ll need to turn to commercial services.

Often the best options for laypeople are on the internet and with recovery software. One such company available is DriveSavers. Since 1985 this company has been helping people and businesses protect and recover their data and they have various options for recovery plans and will service a wide range of devices. The website Kroll Ontrack has developed protocols to meet virtually any recovery need and they offer helpful user guides and software for sell.

The website savemymemories.org is a good resource for tips and troubleshooting advice about recovering photographs. Their advice is straight-forward and is geared toward educating as well. They talk about hardware and software, how to prepare and protect your photos from disaster and they a great page of links about not just about protecting your memories but about many different aspects of digital photography.

One of the best options you can take to protect your photographs is be prepared before anything happens. One of the best ways to go on the offensive against potential crashes is to invest in an ioSafe hard drive; one of the best features that ioSafe offers on these hard drives is the Data Recovery Service. This product is available with numerous drives like the ioSafe Solo, the Rugged Portable SSD and the SoloPRO SSD. These hard drives are a great choice not only because they are disaster-proof and protect your photographs from outside threats; the Data Recovery Service ensures an unmatched safety net in the case of internal loss. With such features as access to expert technicians, up to $1000 of forensic data recovery, replacement hardware pre-loaded with recovered data and a three-year limited warranty.

No matter which option you choose; your best plan to prevent these types of emergencies before they happen. So when investigating plans to fix your crashed hard drive, look for the best way to prevent this from happening again.

Written by Joseph Fowler

Safety First…Backup Your Data

One of the largest technological concerns a business or individual can face today is the loss or corruption of their files and data.

It is vital for your company, clients and to your own sense of security that you have a ready and adaptable backup plan in case a disaster scenario occurs. Research conducted by the University of Texas shows that only 6 percent of companies that suffer from a catastrophic data loss survive while 43 percent never reopen and 51 percent close their doors within two years.

A recent NFIB poll shows that man-made disasters affect 10 percent of small businesses and natural disasters have affected 30 percent of small businesses and in the United States hurricanes are by far the most destructive natural force affecting businesses with losses. The International Data Corporation analyst firm shows that 70 percent of all successful attacks on computer networks are carried out by employees and company insiders.

You need a plan.

Here is a three-step, easy to follow plan that will help your business protect its data files.

1. Archive Your Business Data Regularly:

There two steps to correctly archiving your data; identifying the critical data that needs to be saved and using an archiving method on a regular basis. Executables like software programs don’t need to be saved, if they are lost, reinstall them. All files that you have created and or modified should be saved and archived. From accounting numbers to individual e-mails.

After you’ve selected which data to archive, select and use a backup software program. There many different programs you can choose from. The key is to remember to archive your data regularly, on a nightly basis is often suggested.

2.  Creating Physical Data Backups:

Having a physical backup is necessary because of the chance of computer failure. Even dropping your laptop on the ground or spilling coffee on office unit could be disastrous.

One of the most reliable and cost effective physical backup methods for a small business is the external hard drive. They are simple to use (with most you only have to plug it into your computer’s USB port) and the price range is usually only several hundred dollars. Many external hard drives are also disaster-proof, like ioSafe’s SoloPRO

3.  Off-Site Data Backup:

To be truly secure, the best option is storing copies of your data off-site from the main archive. There are many options for this method; many businesses keep copies in bank vaults or at the homes of different employees.

One of the most popular methods is online backup; these websites will backup and save your data for a monthly or yearly fee. Here are some of the most popular companies that offer this service.

• Carbonite: Since 2005 this company has backed up over 100 billion files and recovered 7 billion of them from being lost. They offer a program for small businesses that is $229.00 a year for 250 GB of storage space with the option of upgrading, automatic backups and a free month-long trail. http://www.carbonite.com/en/
• Mozy: Also founded in 2005, this company has over 70,000 business customers. They have many options for businesses such as encryption, custom configurations and automatic backups. The pricing is different for desktops and servers; learn more here: http://mozy.com/
• SugarSync: This company offers different features such as Apps for smart phones and pooled storage for multiple users. Their business plan is 100 GB of storage for three users at 29.99/month and 299.99/year and is upgradable. Learn more about them here: https://www.sugarsync.com/

The fact that you’re thinking about data backup and considering a plan is a great step in the right direction. It is also important to remember that when it comes to the safety and success of your business and clients, redundancy is the magic word. If you use online backup then also have an external hard drive in your office or a disaster-proof lockbox filled with zip-drives. If you backup your data every night then make sure that a copy gets sent to a secure off-site location.

Whatever system you decide to use to backup your data, backup that backup system!

Author: Joseph Fowler

Today, the majority of our most important data is stored digitally, so it is essential that you take appropriate precautions to safeguard this information. Nothing is better suited to this task than the ioSafe SoloPRO SSD. It is the ultimate solution for all your backup needs. This disaster proof external hard drive is fireproof, waterproof, and comes with a 3-year warranty. In short, it is one of the best safeguards you can have to protect yourself from data loss.

The Intel SSD version of this resilient hard drive is particularly impressive. An SSD, (Solid State Drive), is generally more expensive than a traditional mechanical hard drive because it is a relatively new technology. It also won’t always offer you the largest storage capacities you can buy today, but it does offer a number of important advantages that are quickly making it the format of choice in external hard drives.

For instance, an SSD is much faster at accessing data than its HDD equivalent due to its speedy NAND Flash memory technology. They are also more rugged and reliable because there are no moving parts to damage or fail under stress. This means the life span of an SSD is likely to be significantly longer than an HDD. An SSD is also quieter than a regular hard drive, it doesn’t get as hot, and it draws less power too.

The Intel 320 Series SSD that is used in the SoloPro is the perfect partner for ioSafe’s legendary durability. It comes in either 300GB or 600GB versions, and has a sequential read performance of up to 270MB per second. It has built-in data protection features and ensures that backing up to an external hard drive is quick, easy and painless. The 320 series is also a third generation product, so it has all the benefits of a well-engineered technology and the backing of an industry leading brand.

To help you feel even more secure with your purchase, ioSafe include a 1-year Data Recovery Service with all its SoloPRO drives. So, even if your data does fall foul of an unforeseen disaster, ioSafe’s forensic data specialists will work to recover any and all data that it can and ship it back to you on a factory fresh unit.

Together, Intel and ioSafe offer you an unparalleled level of security. Intel provides the technology while ioSafe provides the protection. This makes the SoloPRO SSD an ideal companion for anyone who is concerned about data security.

Click here to learn more about brand names of hard drive manufacturers

Why is surge protection important?

Sudden unwanted increases in voltage, called power surges, can damage or destroy electronic equipment. Huge voltage spikes caused by lightning or failed power lines can wipe out or fry your electronic equipment. Although these are the most dramatic instances, they occur in less than 30% of cases. The constant switching of lights, heating and air-conditioning systems, refrigerators, pumps and other electrical equipment cause frequent small disturbances. A 17-month study done by IBM in 49 cities across the country found that an average of 128.3 disturbances happened in each monitored facility, every month.[1] Most were surges that did not cause immediate damage, but could wear down equipment over time, corrupt data and shorten the lifespan of equipment. While it is impossible to prevent voltage surges from either entering a building or from occurring inside a building, surge protective devices reduce and divert transient voltage levels. Surge protection is a cost-effective solution to maintain business continuity and prevent equipment damage.

What is the risk?

Although statistics vary, as much as 40% of data loss incidents occur because of power surges.[2], [3], [4] Recent statistics have shown that 59% of all electronics casualties are due to power problems, and most computers are subject to two or more power anomalies a day.[5] Data loss from hard drive failure and power surges accounts for the largest chunk of data loss incidents. Additionally, businesses typically misplace their worries and spend more money on theft and virus protection when it only accounts for less than 15% of data loss occurrences.[4] Since power surges or blackouts can occur anywhere and at any time, it only makes sense to protect your computer by investing in some sort of surge protection device.

What are the costs of data loss?

The costs incurred from lost data loss and equipment failure can be catastrophic. A 2008 Price Waterhouse Coopers Survey found that a single incident of data loss costs business an average of $10,000.[8] A 2010 study at Pepperdine University estimated annual data losses to PCs cost US businesses of at least $18.2 billion.[4] The average business has $60,000 worth of computer data and many of them have little or no protection at all. The average PC data loss can cost more than $2,000 when you consider technical support for recovery, lost productivity, and lost data.[6] There are several reasons to believe this is a conservative estimate. In addition to replacing equipment and lost work, man hours, recovery periods and lost sales can add to the costs. Additionally, legal costs and damage to a businesses reputation during an extended period of computer downtime are hard to quantify and could be the crucial difference between staying in business or having to close up shop. Extra costs would be incurred if a data loss incident occurs to two or more PCs on a network.

What about lightning strikes or downed power lines?

The Insurance Information Institute (I.I.I.) found there were 185,789 lightning claims from homeowners in 2009 costing $798 million, with an average claim totaling $4,296.[7] These losses ranged from damage to expensive electronic equipment to structural fires that destroyed entire homes. Regular surge protectors and built-in computer surge protectors aren't enough to combat the massive voltage in these situations. Without proper surge protection these incidents can wreck a busness.

It's only a matter of time

Data loss concerns for businesses are only going to get worse. As we rely more on informations and data to drive our business, data loss from power surges will result in an even greater financial burden. A company that experiences a computer outage lasting for more than 10 days may never fully recover financially and 50% of these companies suffering will be out of business within 5 years.[4] Another survey claimed 93% of companies that lost their data center for 10 days file bankruptcy in a year.[5]

As our technology grows so do our risks. Increasing storage capabilities make it more convenient to store all data in one place, but also make a hardrive failure more dangerous. Networked computers that fail can create a virtual information chain disruption, causing workflow stoppages. Without proper surge protection businesses are running the risk that one bad day can make for a very bad year.

Learn about ioSafe hard drives and protecting from data loss

 

1.      http://www.surgeassure.com/faq.aspx#Topic35

2.      http://expertscolumn.com/content/maximize-life-your-hard-drive

3.      http://www.pc-security.com/statistics.htm

4.      http://gbr.pepperdine.edu/2010/08/the-cost-of-lost-data/

5.      http://www.ontrack.com/library/rdr_2003_whitepaper.pdf

6.      http://www.tech911inc.com/rb_what.htm

7.      http://www.lightningsafetyalliance.com/press.html

8.      http://www.pwc.com/gx/en/information-security-survey/pdf/safeguarding_the_new_currency.pdf

9.      http://www.gerhard.fr/DAM/part2.php

10.  http://www.nemasurge.com/spd/r-whatisspd.html

11.  http://www.gdv.ca/DisasterRecFacts.htm

12.  http://lyle.smu.edu/emis/dt/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=26

 

Spikes in electrical voltage are often referred to as “surges” in power. These power surges of high voltage can cause unwanted damage to electronics and appliances that cannot handled a voltage that is larger than what the components are rated for.

A surge protector or surge suppressor is designed to decrease or limit the amount of voltage that supplies your computer electronics or hard drives by way or one or more methods. This includes the blocking of the surge or shorting the surge to ground. Many times a surge is caused by a lightning strike during a thunderstorm or severe weather.

What Can I do to protect my electronics and data?

For many consumers, the idea of protecting or preventing electrical surge damage has been a guessing game. Buying surge protection equipment generally isn’t too high on the “To Do” list and that said there are many ways that you can protect your entire house from damage.

One solution is to buy a surge protector power strip for every bit of electronics in the house from your HD television set to your iPhone, iPad and laptop computer. While this isn’t the most realistic scenario, it might work for you and it’s certainly better than zero surge protection in your house.  If you don’t have power strips with surge suppression do you unplug every appliance and  gizmo during a storm? Of course not, you don’t have the time or care to get shocked!

Another method is to rely on your homeowner’s insurance policy to cover losses, but this is less than ideal. While insurance coverage is necessary, it’s not the right thing simply rely on taking your losses against your deductible. The best solution is to improve upon your surge protection insurance policy from lighting by preventing surge damage before it happens with SurgeAssure whole house surge protection.

Surge Protection Systems

How does a whole house system work? Well, it’s a series of protectors that work in conjunction with each other. Often called Zoned or Zones protection, your entire home, the appliances such as TV, oven, microwave and washer and dryer will all become protected from lightning damage and lightning strikes.

How SurgeAssure Works

1.       First, surge protectors are applied and installed to the incoming electrical, cable/satellite, and telephone utility services to keep externally generated surges from entering your home. This step ensure that you have a primary surge protection in place where most damage enters the home.

2. At key locations throughout your home, localized secondary surge protection is installed to safeguard against any residual surges from the main electrical service and any internally generated surges.

At the heart of a whole home system is a breaker panel protection system, telephone line protection, cable internet and cable tv protection, and then outlet surge protection for electronics, hard drives, computers and more.

By the Numbers

According to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) the  direct annual structural lightning losses at $138.7 million as averaged over 1989-1993 (13). This information came from the nation's fire chiefs, who also reported 20,000 lightning-caused residential fires. Surge damage can be caused by lightning and claim costs reported by State Farm Insurance Co. in Colorado, Wyoming and Utah have been extrapolated to national figures indicating  there to be 307,000 separate lightning claims totaling $332 million annually.

In closing, no one wants to have any type of loss or claim with their insurance company. The smart choice is to take extra steps to protect your home and possessions, electronics and that precious computer hard drive from damage with surge protection from SurgeAssure.

It's true.... many moons ago ioSafe manufactured a NAS storage device called the ioSafe R4. This network attached storage server could house up to 4TB of storage and provided the end user with all of the bells & whistles you would expect from a NAS including RAID, hot swap hard drives, remote administration and even a built-in backup manager. Alas, ioSafe no longer makes the ioSafe R4 but there are still many ways in which you can reap the benefits of a NAS and still get the fireproof & waterproof protection that ioSafe is famous for.

NAS meet ioSafe. ioSafe meet NAS.

At our office we recognized many years ago how important RAID is to our own data

backup strategy. We value redundancy and multiple backup copies of client information, databases as well as Exchange and .PST files. We also recognized that the missing link was disaster protection. What if the hard drives crashed or a fire ripped through our building. The simple solution was to connect the ioSafe hard drive directly to the NAS. It may sound elementary ( and it very well is) that for $500-$1,000 small businesses could now afford a solid data backup plan that may very well keep them in business should disaster strike.

 

Our Setup

In our office we have an Exchange server, ReadyNAS 1100, ioSafe Solo and the first generation ioSafe S1 (the ioSafe S1 is no longer manufactured).

We run a mixed environment with a combination of PC and Mac. [Our graphic designer prefers the Mac platform for all of the wonderful imagery you see on our website today - thank you Mr. Maximumedia :) ]  The ReadyNAS 1100 acts as our office file server with seven (7) workstations connecting to it on a daily basis. The ioSafe Solo is directly connected to the ReadyNAS and we utilize the built-in backup manager to backup our RAID 1 hard drives to the ioSafe. This set-up gives us TRIPLE REDUNDANCY, fire protection, water protection as well as the best in class ioSafe Data Recovery Service (DRS) with up to $5,000 of forensic recovery should our ioSafe hard drive break for any reason, no questions asked.

Cost

As the cost of storage has dropped tremendously in the last few years you can now get an ioSafe + NAS for as little as $500.00. A quick Google search reveals that the ReadyNAS Duo can be found for under $160.00, add in 2 x 1TB hard drives for $55 each and an ioSafe Solo starts out around $150.00.

Total Cost of NAS + ioSafe TODAY: $420.00

Several years ago when we first implemented our setup the price was much higher with the ReadyNAS 1100 priced at $2,300 and came with 4 x 500GB hard drives. Toss in the ioSafe S1 at $3,000.00 and you were digging deep into your pockets.

 

Total Cost of NAS + ioSafe 5 YEARS AGO: $5,300.00

That's an 80% drop in cost over five years! 

Comparing the PROS & CONS

At first glance combining the benefits of NAS storage and an ioSafe hard drive may seem confusing (especially to small business owners that are not IT or tech junkies at heart). However when you start to break down the benefits and compare apples to apples there is a tremendous value to the SMB to implement this or a similar data backup plan.

PRO's

RAID. RAID. RAID. Yes, the value of redundancy cannot be emphasized enough and multiple backup copies are always better than one.

Standby Hot Spare - with a 4 disk RAID set up you can run two (2) hard drives in a RAID 1 (mirrored backup copies) and have an extra hard drive on standby in case one of the drives in the RAID crashes. The standby drive will automatically kick in and begin making a backup

Remote Access - With the NAS in your backup loop you have access to your business data without sending it to the cloud where it may be subject to more risk than it might be worth. We'll leave that up to you to decide.

Disaster Protection - fire, flood, accidental deletion, you name it and the ioSafe DRS has you covered with no questions asked. It's remarkable that ioSafe is the only hard drive manufacturer that offers this service with their product.

CONS

More Equipment - yes, with this setup you must now purchase two (2) pieces of equipment. For many small businesses or mom & pop shops extra equipment is often a no, no.

Price Points - While many of our readers with say that the ioSafe + NAS set up is a cheap way to get data protection they are presuming that every business has the same cash flow as they do. The reality of the small business world is that budgets are tight and most of the time non-existent until year 3,4 and even year five.

To sum things up if I could help all of our small business clients implement the ioSafe + NAS system I would. This setup works very well for the majority of our clients and without a doubt a mixture of brands still achieves the same goal. Whether it's a Seagate BlackArmor NAS, NetGear ReadyNAS, Western Digital NAS or an HP MediaSmart server the point is that combining ioSafe hard drives with network attached storage is a very wise choice for the small businesses around the world.