<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <meta content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type"> </head> <body text="#333333" bgcolor="#ffffff"> Reinstalling using the existing home folder is a fabulous idea thanks! But you still need to back up in case of problems. And I back up constantly anyway in case I accidentally delete files myself or am struck by lightning etc etc. I use rsnapshot, which keeps rotating timed backups in a very small space. These instructions are for remote backup but you can also use them to backup onto an external drive or another drive on the same network (just omit setting up the password-less ssh login and don't allow rsnapshot to create a destination if you're using a removable drive) - it's pretty simple: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/linux-rsnapshot-backup-howto/">http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/linux-rsnapshot-backup-howto/</a> For my music library at home, I use an rsync script to back up to a backup server with a simple script. You can either run the script with cron or I put a short-cut on my panel and run it manually when I have my laptop connected to the network. If you want a GUI, there's Grsync or Backintime or Timevault (but I've found Timevault very buggy) etc etc. Paula </body> </html>