Backing up Your iPad

The press is telling us that sales in laptops are falling with a shift to the tablet world. Personally my time with tablets has been playing with the original iPad at my local JB Hifi. I was impressed, so was my 4 year old who got the hang of it very quickly.

It might be a lot of hype at the moment and only time will tell, although when Apple gets it right it really does. However I can easily see the 2nd and 3rd family computer in the next 2 – 3 years gradually being phased out by the tablet. Ideal for reading and surfing the net or watching online video.

The jury is out on how much data will be stored locally on them but when you use the net, you do download files to read and work on so inevitably you will store some important information on your iPad or tablet. The other category of data likely to find its way on your iPad or tablet is music and photos.

So, what do you do about backing it all up? Well I spent some time looking this up on the net and asking around Twitter and the iPad looks like it has a simple solution which works but the tablet on Android platform looks to be a little more manual.

For the iPad, you have iTunes as a way of backing up your contents.  This is where you can find out what the iTunes service can do for you. On reading it, it looks quite comprehensive but I will be interested to hear what people think of this. This service is for an automated backup which occurs when you sync your iPad with iTunes. It doesn’t happen automatically when you add a file etc like it does with Carbonite on your PC or Mac.

You can use iTunes to sync content on your computer (such as music, applications, podcasts, videos, photos, notes, email account settings, contacts, calendars, and bookmarks) with your iPad.

iTunes creates a backup of your iPad when you sync, which you can then use to restore from if you need to return to a previously backed up state.

iTunes keeps only one backup created during the sync process for each device. If you restore the iPad and choose to set up as a new device from the Set Up your iPad screen, iTunes will automatically sync and create a new, empty backup that will replace your previous backup. If you change your mind and want to restore to your previous state, you will have to retrieve your previous device backup from Time Machine (on your Mac), or other backup solution you regularly use.

Where Backups are stored
The folder where your backup data is stored changes depending on the computer’s operating system. Since iTunes only keeps one backup per device, you should ensure the backup folder is included in your periodic data-backup routine.

iTunes places the backup files in the following places:

• Mac: ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/
• Windows XP: \Documents and Settings\(username)\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\
• Windows Vista: \Users\(username)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\

You can create backups in the following ways:

If you have configured your iPad to sync automatically with iTunes on a specific computer, iTunes will back up the iPad after you connect it to that computer and sync with iTunes. iTunes will not automatically back up an iPad that is not configured to sync with that computer. iTunes makes only one backup each time you connect, even if you sync multiple times before disconnecting.

Trying to find information on how to automatically backup your Android Tablet has been a lot harder. Feedback is that it is manual. Plug the tablet into your local PC and manual move the files from the tablet to the PC. Nothing automated about this at the moment. I suspect that it is only time before this is solved.

I expect that over the next 6 months services like Carbonite will develop an application that can be installed on your iPad or tablet that will enable you to transfer the files automatically to your Carbonite Backup. One thing you will however need to be careful of when this eventually is delivered is your data quota, as these tablet are mostly on a 3G wireless data plan. If you are using your home internet connection and wirelessly accessing the net through this then it will not be a problem, but backing up when you are at the local cafe might be a bit of an issue.