One of the most important ways to protect the valuable information on your PC is to back up your files regularly. If you accidentally erase an important file or if your PC has a hardware malfunction that destroys some files, you can restore your lost files from your backup.

You can also use backups to keep your PC's permanent disk from becoming filled with old and seldom used files. Once you have backed up such files, you can remove them from your PC and restore them later if you need to use them again.

Norton 360 allows you to conveniently back up your files to external drives, network storage folders, CDs, DVDs, HD DVDs, Blu-ray discs, iPods, and other removable media such as flash drives.

Norton 360 also provides a safe and private online storage environment to which you can back up your files. Because your backed up files are stored in a different location from where you use your PC, disasters that damage or destroy your PC won't harm your backups. In addition, when you use the Norton 360 online backup, you can restore your files from any computer at any time.

No matter which backup method you choose, you can always add or remove items from the set of files that you select to back up.

Norton 360 can back up your files to several kinds of storage locations. Choosing where you store your backup files is a decision that affects how quickly backups take place, how safe the backups are, and how much information can be backed up. No one backup location is best in all situations and for all users.

You can choose any of the types of storage locations that Norton 360 offers for your backup location, depending on your PC and the devices that are connected to it. Use the information in the following list to choose a location that best meets your needs for safety, speed, and storage capacity:

Secure Online Storage: Your subscription to Norton 360 comes with an allocation of storage space on a secure server that is located on the Internet. This is the safest, most secure backup choice available because it stores your information in a remote location. As a consequence, even disasters that might damage or destroy your PC will not affect your backups. Online backups can take place automatically, as long as your PC has an active Internet connection.

(C:) Local Fixed Disk: This choice backs your files up to a special folder on drive C of your PC. Backing up to drive C is very quick and convenient, and is only limited by the amount of free space available on your drive. You can run automatic backups with this choice. Backing up to drive C, while convenient, is also the least safe backup method, because any mechanical problem that the drive might experience can damage both your original files and your backups.

Other internal or external drive: This choice provides for fast, convenient backups. You can run automatic backups and you will always have access to your backed up files as long as the drive is connected to your PC. Although using another drive is safer than using drive C, doing so still leaves your data at risk from some PC hardware malfunctions that can occur.

CD, DVD, HD DVD, or Blu-ray discs: This choice requires that you have recordable CD, DVD, HD DVD, or Blu-ray discs and that your PC has an optical drive that is capable of recording on them. You cannot select automatic scheduling of backups when you back up to CD, DVD, HD DVD, or Blu-ray discs since you have to be present to insert and remove discs when requested. Backing up to CD, DVD, HD DVD, or Blu-ray disk is slower than backing up to drives and less convenient because you have to be present during the backup.

Network drive: You can use this choice if your PC is connected to a local network that offers a storage location to which you have access. Depending on the speed of your network, this choice can be almost as fast as backing up to an internal or external drive. This choice does not appear if your PC is not connected to a network that offers a storage device to which you have access.

Flash drive and removable storage devices, including iPod: Flash drives and similar data storage devices that are attached to your PC can also serve as backup locations. Norton 360 displays such devices as external disk drives. If such a device is always attached to your PC, you can use it for automatic backups. The amount of storage space that is available on these devices can be less than on hard disks. These devices are useful for making quick backups of relatively small numbers of files. If you use a flash drive for backups, you should also back up your files occasionally to another storage location.

Norton 360 provides the Norton Backup Drive in your Windows Explorer after you configure your backup. Norton Backup Drive contains a list of backup destinations where your files are backed up. Each backup destination contains the Backup Sets to which the backup destination is configured.

Norton Backup Drive displays the files that you backed up to a media device. You must connect and turn on the media device before you view your files.

You can also view the files that you backed up to Secure Online Storage. You must be connected to the Internet and logged on to Norton Account.

The reason to have a good backup is so that you can restore your files from the backup if the need arises. Norton 360 provides an easy method to restore your backed up files.

By default, Norton 360 restores files from the most recent backup location, and saves the restored files to their original locations.

When you restore files, you can change any of the following settings:

• Where to restore from: You can choose any of the locations to which you have previously backed up files

• What to restore: You can restore all of the backed up files, pick individual files from a list, or search for files by name

• Where to restore to: You can restore to the original locations of the files, select a folder where the restored files are placed, or create a folder for the restored files