In this second post in our series about hard drives, we discuss what computer users need to do to keep the heart and soul of their computers in good shape.

It’s that time of the year again – time to take a good hard look at yourself and resolve to be better next year. And yes, time for magazines, TV news shows and blogs to suggest a New Year’s resolution for you. Yeah, irritating, we know. But this is one you should pay attention too. It’s not that hard and could save you a lot of grief when the inevitable happens.

Each time I return from getting my teeth cleaned, I swear it will be different this time: I’ll develop better dental health habits – brush after every meal, floss at least once a day – in order to avoid the uncomfortable gum scraping (and guilt-inducing “tsk-tsk”) from my hygienist.

Becoming technologically dependent is an almost unavoidable hazard of living in the modern world. The PC you are reading this post with is probably the most important (and least appreciated) piece of technology in your life. And, like other significant aspects of our lives (grandparents, dental health, houseplants), we often neglect the care and upkeep those things we will really miss when they’re gone.

Saving digital files used to be so easy — just hit “Control-S”, and “Bam!” — your spreadsheet was saved. If you wanted to take the file with you, you just burned it onto a CD, and you were off.