If you hard drive crashes, you may lose all of the data that is stored on it. Most of you are smart enough to back up your data files, but how many of you have everything that you need to reinstall all of your programs?

First, keep all of the disks that came with your computer and all of the program disks that you purchase in one place so that you can easily find them.

But today many programs are downloaded from the Internet. You will have no disks. Finding the websites for each of the programs that you have downloaded can be a real pain in the neck. In addition, you may be using the older version of a program that you paid for and when you go to the manufacturer's website you find that they no longer offer the older version for download. They expect you to purchase the upgrade. If you haven't kept good records, you may not even have your original purchase information to prove that you purchased the program and may have to pay for a full version.

Don't let this happen to you.  Create a list of all of the programs that you have installed on your computer and add to the list every time you install a new program. If you purchase a program and it has a password or key, make sure that you put that information in your notes.

After you download a program copy the program into a special folder called "Installed Programs" or something similar. The best place to put this is in the My Documents folder. Make sure that you backup both your list of programs and the folder where you are keeping a copy of the downloaded programs. Then if you have to reinstall a program, you will have everything you need.

You can also use a free program that will document what is on your computer. This information can be invaluable in the event of a hard drive crash. I explain what it is and how it works in my article entitled Free Computer Analysis.