I'm glad to see so many of my customers really starting to take backing up seriously. As we start storing more and more crucial or even irreplaceable data on our computers, it is absolutely imperative that you learn to backup your data properly.
Once you start backing up, you may start to wonder, "Hmmm, does that disk really have the information that I need on it?" If you are backing up by simple using the Send To function or copying data straight to a flash drive or CD/DVD, then the easy way to check your backup is by double-clicking the drive in My Computer. This will open the drive and let you peer at its contents. If nothing shows up, then your backup method is failing, and you need to adjust. If the data is there, then pat yourself on the back and enjoy the feeling of seeing that your data is safely located on a disk other than your computer's hard drive.
If you use a program's internal backup system (i.e. Quicken, genealogy programs, etc), you still want to employ the method I described above to make sure the data exists on the drive you used during the backup. However, most of these backups create a single proprietary backup format that you won't necessarily recognize or be able to click and open. Just look at the date of the backup (Right Click the file and choose Properties) to ensure the backup is current. To restore this type of backup, you need to open the original program and use the "Restore" option it contains. It can be found in the same spot where you found the Backup function.
