Doug Steele
dbdoug at gmail.com
Sat Mar 8 09:24:43 CST 2014
I have a desktop at home and use a laptop when I'm away. I use Dropbox for syncing - all my working files are in my Dropbox folder. That syncs continuously on any file changes when I'm connected to the Internet, and also means I have three identical copies of every file - one on each computer and one in the cloud. The only gotcha is if you open a file on the two computers simultaneously and make changes to both. You end up with two copies of the file - one labelled 'Conflicted Copy'. That's happened to me a few times when I've made changes at home, then forgotten to close the file and later made changes on the laptop away from home. Doug PS Speaking of backing up different hardware configurations, here's one distinct advantage to Macs, where Apple controls the hardware with an iron fist. Both my computers are Macs (I run Windows on Parallels). A full backup of either of my computers will restore to either machine just fine. As well as the standard Time Capsule continuous backup that Apple provides, I use a program called Super Duper for regular, offline backups to USB drives. The drives are fully bootable - this has saved my bacon a couple of times. I had a hard drive failure recently, so all I did was plug in a backup drive, boot to it, recover the files I needed, install a new HD, restore the system with the last good Time Capsule backup, then copy my recovered files back. The whole process took less than an hour, not counting the HD replacement. On Fri, Mar 7, 2014 at 10:33 PM, Bill Benson <bensonforums at gmail.com> wrote: > I use a DELL laptop with port replicator and dual monitors, external > kb/trackball... and this in general gives me all the look and feel and > performance of a desktop machine. However we developers need to build for > lesser performing client (customer) systems anyway, so that if a solution > is fast for us, we know it will be at least almost-fast for our customer, > and not the other way around. That said, there are some reasons to use a > desktop machine, and that is durability... If you are like me, you may have > lost a laptop HD a time or two. Having a desktop running dual drives with > RAID 3 would have been nice at such times. Also, the faster spin and huge > capacities of desktop HDDs is a plus, as are the plethora of ports and > (generally) better ports. Laptops are, due to form factor and nature, > skimpy on ports. > > If I knew of a simple way to keep dual systems in synch in terms of > programs and OS and data, there is no way I would use a laptop as a home > system, I would use it only when moving around the house to "run" my > desktop remotely, if for no other reason than data protection. But the time > cost of keeping everything I want in two places is prohibitive, and I live > with the risk of data shock with everything on one system (laptop). I > compensate by regular full system backups, but if my laptop becomes > obsolete, that multi-partition backup probably will not be able to get > recovered to a new one. Happened just last year, my E6510 could not be > recovered to a E6530... although I have heard that with the 2014 edition of > Acronis True Image one can recover from one hardware configuration to > another. I have my doubts. > > > On Fri, Mar 7, 2014 at 11:31 PM, John W Colby <jwcolby at gmail.com> wrote: > > > LOL, my HP laptop has the worst keyboard I have EVER run into. I use a > > wireless keyboard and mouse. The laptop is propped up against the wall > at > > the edge of the table, completely out of the way. > > > > > > John W. Colby > > > > Reality is what refuses to go away > > when you do not believe in it > > > > On 3/7/2014 11:23 PM, Stuart McLachlan wrote: > > > >> I'm the same. I do all of my work on a laptop with external mouse > >> (wireless) and second > >> monitor attached (the laptop primary screen is 15.6in - 1366 x 768). > >> > >> I don't bother with an external keyboard since the laptop has a full > >> keyboard with numeric > >> keypad. > >> > >> > > > > --- > > This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus > > protection is active. > > http://www.avast.com > > > > -- > > AccessD mailing list > > AccessD at databaseadvisors.com > > http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd > > Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com > > > -- > AccessD mailing list > AccessD at databaseadvisors.com > http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd > Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com >