Wrapping Up 2006, continued - software

Logos Bible Software has become a staple of mine in study. When they upgraded to version 3, I sprung for the Scholar's package, which while duplicating some of the resources I already had, made enough sense because of what it added.

GreatNews is my blog reader. It is free, easy to use, does not crash, has not choked on any feed that I give it, and did I mention it is free? Great program.

With the cost of storage so inexpensive, and having been bitten by not having backups of my data in the past, two programs have been useful in my own backup strategy. I have two internal hard drives in my PC - one for programs and data (divided into a couple of partitions so that data is on a different partition than my programs) and one for backup. Then I have an external backup drive as well. I use SyncbackSE, a shareware program from 2BrightSparks. They have a freeware version, but I paid for the full program and am glad that I did. When I run SyncBackSE, it notes any changes to my files and copies the newer versions to my backup drive. I use this daily. When I want to back up my main partition, which includes only my operating system and program files, I use Acronis TrueImage. Many people use Norton Ghost, but I have been using TrueImage (now in version 10) through 4 incarnations. If I try out some freeware that I don't like, it takes me 3 minutes to restore my main partition. I've also created some baseline installations of my operating system (just basic, with drivers, with programs, etc.) so that in the event of major program changes I can restore to what is essentially a fresh install of my system. A little obsessive? Maybe, but lose your data and you'll wish you had been more obsessive.