One of the final steps in setting up your new computer should be to install and use Dropbox. We’ve written about Dropbox before, here are some links:

Dropbox 1 – Six reasons to use it. 

Dropbox 2 – How Dropbox can save your bacon

Even if you only use one computer, Dropbox (or something similar) should be part of your daily routine. Here’s an explanation of the concept, just in case you don’t know about this handy piece of free software.

Imagine for a moment that you lost your purse or your wallet. Big stress moment, right? What if you had an exact duplicate of that purse or wallet in another room? What if you had an exact duplicate in another pocket or drawer? We think the stress would be substantially lowered. When we say ‘exact duplicate’, we mean just that. A perfect copy of your lost item, down to the old pennies at the bottom and the fluff in the corners.

Dropbox keeps duplicate copies of one folder, the Dropbox folder, on your computer and on the Dropbox website. If you have another computer at work or at the cottage,  your Dropbox folder is synchronized as soon as you fire up that computer. No matter what kind of computer, even a tablet, Dropbox keeps track of everything that’s in the folder and syncs them all almost instantly, you only need an Internet connection.

What if your wallet had ten dollars in it before you lost it? Let’s say you find your wallet and the ten dollars is missing. No worries. The duplicate copies still have the ten dollars in them, wherever they may be. Dropbox keeps records of your current files as well as previous copies of those files in an archive folder online. If you accidentally delete an important file from one of your Dropbox folders, that file will still be available in the Dropbox archive folder. You’ll need to access your online folder to get it but that’s easy to do. Read the link above, the one about ‘saving bacon’, to get an idea of how important this is.

Dropbox gives you 2 gigs of free storage, more if you refer a friend to the site. 2 gigs is more than enough to store your documents, important photo files and family videos. Once you archive those files to a DVD, you can delete them from Dropbox. Any current documents should be saved to Dropbox in order to access them from any computer anywhere in the world that you have an Internet connection.

You can also share files with other people. There is a public folder that you can share as easily as sending an email. Dropbox has a complete set of easy-to-follow instructions which explain all of its features. Trust us, don’t use a computer without it. Dropbox is worth its weight in gold…but it’s free, of course!

Thanks for reading!