Massive computer failure

[angellous_evangellous]

Yesterday I had a massive computer crash that wiped out almost all of my dissertation.

I have some backup on an external hard-drive. I backed-up everything chapters 1-5 and my awesome, beautiful 731 entry bibliography on Sunday evening. But somehow the back-up is dated in late August, so all my work since then is gone.

Notes, bibliographies, everything. I have a fairly good draft of chapters 1-3 in my email outbox, but the loss of my notes and chapters 4-5 is absolutely devastating.

I worked on trying to restore it for about 12 hours yesterday, and I'm going to spend some $$ today on a data recovery program. It looks pretty ******* bleak right now.

Needless to say I went to bed quite drunk last night. And I intend on doing the same thing asap.

I AM FORTUNE'S FOE!!!!!!

 

[Revoltingest]

First, let me offer my condolences. Rage & loss must be your new found persistent companions. I became a computer security freak 20 some years ago when
I had a crash necessitating re-entry of half a year's accounting data. Since then I religiously (atheistically?) back up everything in multiple cycles using multiple
means in multiple locations. I also regularly test restoration procedures to verify proper function & to keep familiarity. I keep important data in 2 redundant
places on my primary hard disk, & in a mirror image 2nd internal hard disk, & on several USB jump drives. Some functions are automated, & some are manual..
....a good mix. You have so much more work to do, that perhaps it's useful that you had this wake-up call now, rather than later. I advise talking to a computer
support guy (or gal) & make some plans to avoid such grief. I know, I know...my advice is too preachy & too late, but it's all I can think of to help.
So tell me....was your language the blue streak I imagine?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

First, let me offer my condolences. Rage & loss must be your new found persistent companions. I became a computer security freak 20 some years ago when
I had a crash necessitating re-entry of half a year's accounting data. Since then I religiously (atheistically?) back up everything in multiple cycles using multiple
means in multiple locations. I also regularly test restoration procedures to verify proper function & to keep familiarity. I keep important data in 2 places on my
primary hard disk, & in a mirror image 2nd internal hard disk, & on several USB jump drives. Some functions are automated, & some are manual....a good mix.
You have so much more work to do, that perhaps it's useful that you had this wake-up call now, rather than later. I advise talking to a computer support guy
(or gal) & make some plans to avoid such grief. I know, I know...my advice is too preachy & too late, but it's all I can think of to help.

That's my downfall this time. I should have double checked the backup on my external drive before I did anything else this week. I've been backing up stuff for years and never had a problem as strange as this. I also save data on a USB jump drive and keep hardcopies in a safe deposit box.

But the thing is I have so many drafts that I wait until the final draft of a chapter to put it in the safe deposit box and the USB drives. When I'm putting various drafts in different places, I end up editing the wrong draft sometimes, and that's almost as big a pain as what is happening now.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

So tell me....was your language the blue streak I imagine?

My language was one long streak of explicatives.

 

[Revoltingest]

But the thing is I have so many drafts that I wait until the final draft of a chapter to put it in the safe deposit box and the USB drives. When I'm putting various drafts in different places, I end up editing the wrong draft sometimes, and that's almost as big a pain as what is happening now.

I have a similar problem with contracts I draft. The only solution is to design a practical system to track them all in a way which makes it easy & reliable to
update the right ones. Clearly, the modern theologian must employ good system design theory.

I recall the Nietzche quote from Conan The Barbarian, "Whatever doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.". The most we can learn from life is not repeat mistakes.

 

[stillsearching]

Sad for you, angellous! I too have done that and it is such a horrible, horrible feeling. I wish you luck in getting it all back.

 

[Renji]

Yesterday I had a massive computer crash that wiped out almost all of my dissertation.

I have some backup on an external hard-drive. I backed-up everything chapters 1-5 and my awesome, beautiful 731 entry bibliography on Sunday evening. But somehow the back-up is dated in late August, so all my work since then is gone.

Notes, bibliographies, everything. I have a fairly good draft of chapters 1-3 in my email outbox, but the loss of my notes and chapters 4-5 is absolutely devastating.

I worked on trying to restore it for about 12 hours yesterday, and I'm going to spend some $$ today on a data recovery program. It looks pretty ******* bleak right now.

Needless to say I went to bed quite drunk last night. And I intend on doing the same thing asap.

I AM FORTUNE'S FOE!!!!!!

Still lucky

I think, my case is worse. We have a "GROUP" (3 members in a group) thesis last sem. My group's topic is about Acute Pancreatitis, it's common cause and why only Asians (majority of cases) die of that illness. I really hate my group because I was the only one who's doing the research, interview and its arrangement. My 2 other groupmates didn't contribute that much.They just pass the draft I created to the proff for corrections. During our final exam, I was the only one who's finalizing our paper, while these two have a long time reviewing.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

Wow hells bells.

Do you not even have some in hard copy to scan.?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Wow hells bells.

Do you not even have some in hard copy to scan.?

I don't print hardcopies until I have the final draft.

Big reason there is money. It's simply too big to print all the time.

 

[Revoltingest]

I don't print hardcopies until I have the final draft.
Big reason there is money. It's simply too big to print all the time.

Hard copies take up a lot of space too. I save original hard copy source material, but depend upon electronic storage for my work.
It requires great care & planning. I absolutely cannot afford to lose records for my customers' properties.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

*pees on keyboard*

 

[YmirGF]

I don't print hardcopies until I have the final draft.

Big reason there is money. It's simply too big to print all the time.

My heartfelt condolences, Nate. In the future, I would recommend that you forget about traditional backup programs etc. When I am working on an important project, DAILY, I burn the contents to a cd/dvd. Date the disk, rinse and repeat. The cost in media and time is negligible. Yeah, you do quickly run into a sea of disks, but you could also just do this every 3 or 4 days. When my data is important, I don't think I can be paranoid enough to protect it. Obviously, once a month simply toss the antiquated copies into a shoe box... works like a charm.

That said, I also went through a similar experience. Do computer crashes ever happen at convenient times? Well, I lost a project I had been working on for months and sat there speechless when the hard disk went "THUNK" one night. After I regained consciousness and attended to the dripping cut on my head from falling to the floor... and after several days of being liberally medicated I set about recreating what I had done.

The second time around, isn't quite so bad, as you know where the text is going. You've already been there, so it is familiar ground. After about a month I was back to full steam and now had a product that was, in my view, superior to the original.

Think of your misfortune as a dry run. Now, wipe your eyes and get to work.

 

[croak]

That sounds... truly painful. I had a laptop whose hard disk was slowly but surely dying, and didn't realize it. It would make clicking noises, randomly shut down, not always start up... things like that, it was a while back. Then it died completely and there was really no way I could retrieve anything from it.

So long as your hard disk isn't a useless slab, you may still have a chance with the recovery software. I wish you luck.

Think of your misfortune as a dry run. Now, wipe your eyes and get to work.

This. Maybe one more night of drinking, but then get right back to work.

 

[linwood]

I wish you luck with the data recovery AE.

I`m with Revolting.

I`ve got stuff backed up everywhere, multiple copies of everything on multiple flash drives xhard drive, dropbox, googledocs, mobileme and anywhere else i can upload them.
I`ve lost a fortune in printable master files of art/graphics that I`ll never be able to duplicate.

If you get it back or even have to start from scratch DropBox is a great alternative with 2 gb free storage space and you can work from it just like any folder on your machine.

https://www.dropbox.com

I paid $100.00 for 50gb of space with a guarantee it can`t be lost.

I don`t even save to my HD anymore I save directly to my DropBox folder.

I`m going to be getting myself a Time Capsule shortly and wirelessly auto-save daily without even thinking about it.

Not happening to me ever again

Good luck and happy drinking!

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Hey, Nate - you've been telling us about all the stuff you've been submitting to your thesis advisor; would he have a copy you could use as a starting point? Could you have something in your email Sent box?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

After several hours of hard labor, I managed to recover most of it. I think.

I'm sorting through the mess. It should set me back a week or less.

It's a major victory because I have most of my bibliography - it's missing about 250 entries - and I'm reasonably confident that I have the latest editions of all my chapters.

But I'm still upset.

 

[Valjean]

Total Bummer!

 

[Revoltingest]

Total Bummer!

Vexing as it is, to face only a week's effort to recreate the work should offer some relief.
Plus, you newly found sense of data paranoia will serve you well.
Btw, it could've been worse.....far, far worse......It could've happened to me!

 

[croak]

After several hours of hard labor, I managed to recover most of it. I think.

I'm sorting through the mess. It should set me back a week or less.

It's a major victory because I have most of my bibliography - it's missing about 250 entries - and I'm reasonably confident that I have the latest editions of all my chapters.

But I'm still upset.

But not as upset, I imagine. Focus on the good news!

 

[angellous_evangellous]

I basically caught up with all the lost work last night. Because I had done it all before, I was able to replace a week's worth of work in two days. I have about two hours worth of work and I should be done.