(running 64-bit Windows 7 on a Dell Inspiron 545s)
I am trying to back up my user data, and am having trouble finding where a lot of it is stored. I do have whatever the standard system back-up backs up.
In particular, I can’t find anything on the hard drive directory that looks seems to be my Firefox profile (bookmarks, etc) or Thunderbird (Mozilla e-mail client) mailboxes.
Very nervous, as the Dell diagnostics are warning of hard-drive problems. Wouldn’t say “no” to advice on new drive, either … 
For both Firefox and Thunderbird, I recommend using the MozBackup utility.
Thx, Duckster – worked for Thunderbird, too. 
Dewey – I may try that back-up utility later, but right now I just want my data files out of harm’s way.
I am an old mainframe software developer – assembler even! – and I have never adjusted to the Windows XP-through-7 way of doing libraries and directories ITS way instead of MY way. Not to mention install procedures strewing data and control files all over the hard drive in weirdly-named locations.
So keep the advice coming, Dopers. I need all the help I can get. :eek:
Generally, all this stuff is stored under c:\Users\username. Different apps squirrel their data away in a variety of places under this directory–sometimes under My Documents, other times under AppData\Local, and a few other places–but if you back up that directory you should have everything you need.
I just use rsync. There’s no compression but the biggest disk hogs on my system tend to be media files anyway which don’t compress so well. Besides, disk drives are dirt cheap these days.
Thanks to all posters – every bit of information assists in preserving the endangered bits on my hard drive.
And I clearly need a better species preservation plan that I currently have in place.
The latest:
I ran Microsoft’s pre-Windows load disk check-up & repair, including a CHKDSK that took nearly two hours.
Then I ran a set of Dell diagnostics. I seem to have a problem with invoking them; every time I run them I get a different set of tests.
Anyway, the SMART short self-test that failed yesterday, passed today.
SO – either:
– the Microsoft stuff fixed the problem, or
– I unknowingly ran a different test, yielding different results, or
– the first fail was a false alarm, or
– my hard drive has an intermittent problem (from a tech point of view, the “worst case” scenario)
But whatever it is, YES!, advice welcome!
For example: Is a copy of my files enough to re-load from, or do I need some specialty back-up software?
Both Windows 7 and the Dell Support stuff seem to have something like that, and such applications show up at “Giveaway of the Day” regularly (in fact, there’s one there today). I have my system installation disks that came with the machine, of course, and whatever is on the standard back-up.
Intermittent drive failures are a bad thing. However, they don’t really change the overall picture–every hard drive will fail, from something, sooner or later. Your case may be more urgent, but even without signs of impending doom, there’s no excuse not to have a backup plan.
I back up to two different destinations: a local server, and a cloud backup system (I use Carbonite and am happy so far, but I hear Mozy is pretty good as well).
An external USB drive also works as a local backup, if you have no other system to back up to, but it’s still important to have an offsite backup. The cloud systems also allow you to recover mistakenly deleted or overwritten files. And of course you want something remote in case of fire, water damage, etc.
So my suggestion is to set up at least one of these back-up systems, and preferably both. Then just use the system normally–if your drive actually fails, or becomes unreliable enough to actually use, then you can replace the drive at that point. But at this point there’s no harm in continuing to use the drive if the data is safe.