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Thread ID: 37696 2003-09-15 09:46:00 Backups Oliver (3618) Press F1
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175492 2003-09-15 09:46:00 This a real newbie question. My new computer has no floppy disk drive, just the CD drive. I want to back up some files. What do I need? blank CD's? A CD-writer - what's that?
Oliver.
Oliver (3618)
175493 2003-09-15 10:26:00 Oliver

Perhaps your CD Drive is a CD-writer drive? If not, then you will need a CD-writer and CD's as you mentioned. If you have two hard drives you can back up to the other drive, but that does not cover you in the event of fire, theft or hard drive failure.

Lyn (Oxie)
Oxie (1318)
175494 2003-09-15 10:28:00 Hi Oliver. Don't worry if you think it's a newbie question, just ask. Most here are happy to answer any question related to computers.
Ok, the normal CD you have in a PC is a "read only" device. Normally, if it is a CDWriter, it is marked on the front such as CDRW. A CDRW is a read AND write device. This is what you need the blank CDR for. Also there is another "blank" cd that is called CDr/w which is a read/write type of CDR, where it is like a big floppy disk and you can copy things to it and erase them also. Whereas CDR's are record ONCE only.
By fitting a CDwriter in place of your CDR drive, you can use it to back up your files and still be able to play your normal CD's in it as well. May pay to post your PC CPU type&speed to check that specification is good enough for CDwriter.
You may also be able to utilise a cable connection between to computers to transfer files, if you can access another PC.
hope this helps. Just keep asking questions till you understand.
Pheonix (280)
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