Carbonite is Great for Multiple Computers

I probably should be getting a kickback from Carbonite since I talk about it so much, but I pay for it just like everyone should.

Because I teach computer science classes at Austin Community College, I get a ton of computer-related questions from friends as well as people I barely know. Today, it happened on the trail where I walk. I ran into my friend Ron who I hadn't seen in about a year. He's a retired chaplain with homes in Hawaii, Colorado, and Texas. He'd just arrived here in Texas from Hawaii last week and was having problems reading a flash disk he brought with him. He said he had all his data on the flash disk, including documents and photos. He was especially concerned about a tax form he needs before he goes back to Hawaii where his desktop computer is.

The problem is his laptop says the flash disk is bad and must be reformatted. He knows that a reformat will cause all the data to be lost. He said he'd talked to the computer club here and tried the flash disk on other computers, but nothing has worked. Some there was some talk about a recovery software package, but it didn't sound hopeful.

I suggested he find someone in Hawaii to access his desktop computer and send the files to him here, but he'd already thought of that. The only friend there who could do that for him is in the hospital.

Since I couldn't think of anything else to do, I told him about my experience with Carbonite in hopes that he could prevent this from happening again. I tried to do it in a non-critical way.

I have three computers with the online backup system Carbonite. It is so easy to use I sometimes forget it is there. The other day I wanted to move a file from my laptop computer to my desktop computer. Often, I use a flash disk to do this. Sometimes, I'll email it to myself. But on this day, the laptop was turned off, so, while sitting at my desktop computer, I logged into Carbonite.com, opened the file from my laptop and saved it on my desktop computer. Simple, huh?

When I told Ron about that, he said he'd check it out. I know it's too late for the problem he's having now and perhaps we'll find a solution for that yet, but using Carbonite is an ideal solution for transferring data from computer to another, across the country or within the same home.

For more information, click: Carbonite.