Is it possible to install Manager on a USB and use it from there? I just had a scary thing happen after closing down my computer. When I opened it up again something had changed everything and wiped out my document, pictures, and video’s plus several programs including Manager.
Instead of having 1/2 a hard drive free I now had 1/4. I did a system restore and it brought everything back but now I’m afraid to turn it off again in case the same thing happens. I feel a USB would be more secure. Any idea’s or help out there? Thanks.
I don’t think that Manager can be installed on a USB but the one thing you can do and will help you is to change the application data. This could be done navigating to About Manager when you open the program and then clicking “Change” in the Application Data. From there you can browse the USB you want to put all Manager data and that’s all. From this point forward Manager will use this location to store and read all the data.
Remember to do your backups frequently so even your USB burned or something you will be able to restore all your data to another location. I would recommend to do at least weekly backups to some cloud service like Google Drive, Dropbox, etc. Manager backups are not so big unless you have a massive amount of data, so a free account in any of these services should be enough to do regular backups.
As a computer technician I will state the following:
To ensure safety of data - always backup your data daily!
Never keep important data such as your accounting database on a USB drive. They can go at any time without any warning! They are very unsafe as a storage medium. Use USB drives to transfer data or to store data that you have stored on your computer at home.
I don’t know if you can run Manager on a USB, but its a really bad idea.
What you need to do is invest in a backup program and backup your data to a NAS so that if somthing goes wrong with your computer you can recover the data.
@dori, consider everything @dalacor said concerning the reliability of USB flash drives. That said, however, there really should not be any reason you cannot run Manager from one. Once you open the application, it will be on your computer in RAM. The application itself is fairly small by modern standards.
The issue will be poor performance, because data transfer speeds to/from the USB drive will be quite slow compared to the local bus. No data is stored in the application. All data is in the application data folder that @sulfuror mentioned. Constant access is required for good performance. Performance will be governed by where your data file is, not where the application is.
There is never a worry about losing Manager. You can always download a new copy from the web site. The issue is safety of your data, which is why backup files should never be on your computer and should be made frequently. Never allow more time between backups than you are willing to re-enter all the data.
Thank you all for the help. I do have an external hard drive but I do not have instructions and every time I do a back up it backs up my whole system each time so in just a few days the HD is full. Now I use it as an USB. That’s where the data from Manager is now being saved. I know I can always get a new copy of Manager but the data is lost. Hopefully by using the HD for Manager data storage that will not be a problem. 31.03.2017, 16:07, “Tut” <manager1@discoursemail.com>:
@dori, consider everything @dalacor said concerning the reliability of USB flash drives. That said, however, there really should not be any reason you cannot run Manager from one. Once you open the application, it will be on your computer in RAM. The application itself is fairly small by modern standards.
The issue will be poor performance, because data transfer speeds to/from the USB drive will be quite slow compared to the local bus. No data is stored in the application. All data is in the application data folder that @sulfuror mentioned. Constant access is required for good performance. Performance will be governed by where your data file is, not where the application is.
There is never a worry about losing Manager. You can always download a new copy from the web site. The issue is safety of your data, which is why backup files should never be on your computer and should be made frequently. Never allow more time between backups than you are willing to re-enter all the data.
I don’t know what backup program you are using, but you are either not using it correctly or you have too much data to backup to the USB hard drive.
Keep Manager Data ON YOUR COMPUTER. Get a local IT technician to come round to your place and setup an online backup system for you to backup all your important data (not just Manager, but all your documents, photos etc).
Or if you only want to backup Manager - then I would really recommend that you use the Cloud version of Manager as this gives you backups, you can access it any computer and you don’t have to worry about your computer losing the data. If you lose your accounting data, it will take you months to recreate all the information if your business is years old.
As you don’t sound like you are that technical with computers, I would say for peace of mind and the safety of your data - use the Cloud Version of Manager. I will say again - if you save your data on the USB (as the primary medium) I can guarantee that tears will be the end result when the USB Hard drive corrupts the file etc!
It is also important, @dori, to understand the difference between (1) the application data folder, where Manager looks for data on virtually every keystroke, (2) backups of your accounting data, and (3) general backup of your entire hard drive.
No. 1 is what needs to be on your local computer’s drive. That’s what I was talking about when I said running Manager from a USB drive would result in poor performance.
No. 2 refers to special backup files, which are formatted to contain all your accounting data, allowing you to save snapshots of your entire business history at a moment in time. That’s what needs to be somewhere besides your computer. This could be a network accessible drive, cloud storage, etc.
No. 3 is a backup of your entire drive. @dalacor is right that you are using it incorrectly if its repeatedly copying your entire disk. The point is to update your stored information using appropriate backup software, not just clone the drive over and over.
