As the price of laptops continually drop, more and more people are replacing their aging desktops with portable notebooks. But laptops have some problems that are unique to them, which don’t plague their stationary cousin, the desktop.
Lost & Stolen Laptops
Laptops are more prone to theft than desktops, as they’re often carried around and even accidentally left behind. Each year, 637,000 laptops are lost in airports alone across the country. The FTC says
Pay attention in airports. Keep your eye on your laptop as you go through security. Hold onto it until the person in front of you has gone through the metal detector — and keep an eye out when it emerges on the other side of the screener. The confusion and shuffle of security checkpoints can be fertile ground for theft.
If over half a million laptops are lost in airports each year, imagine the commuter trains, taxis, coffee shops, hotels, schools & universities… people are losing their laptops all over this country!
In a recent survey, 76 percent of companies surveyed say they lose one or more laptops each year. 22 percent of those were because of theft or other criminal behavior.
Human Error
The worst thing about computers is they do what you tell them to do. If you select your photos folder and delete it, the computer doesn’t think twice about it, and your memories are gone. This can affect both laptops and desktops and behind Hardware or System Problem is the #2 cause of data loss.
But with laptops, there’s other human errors to be found: spilled coffee, dropped laptops, and stomping on the machines are all possibilities.
Laptop Rage
Laptops are a wonderful thing: nicely packaged, easy to handle, lightweight… perfect for throwing across the room when something doesn’t go your way. It’s even easier to do this when the laptop belongs to your employer, and not yourself!
Laptop Rage accounts for one in ten decommissioned laptops. It’s a bit less if you’re in the UK: only 6% of laptops die at the hands of rage over the pond. But here in the States, the number is twice that at 13%.
Solutions
We recommend installing LoJack for Laptops. If your laptop is stolen, LoJack will be able to track down your laptop and will work with local law enforcement officials to recover your property to you.
And of course, backup your data! If you travel at all, an external drive doesn’t make any sense, as you can’t backup while you’re on the road if your drive is at home, or you’ll have both your laptop and drive in the same bag, which could be stolen together. Online backups are the way to go.
Tags: Lojack for Laptops
