As many of you know, I had to reformat my computer not too long ago.  One of my readers emailed me and said he is now facing the same thing and wants to know what he needs to do regarding his niche stores.

This is a good question, but fortunately, your niche stores shouldn’t be too affected by a computer reformat.

Really, the only things you need to worry about prior to reformatting your computer are the following:

• Your downloaded Build A Niche Store (BANS) files, or other niche store software.  By this I mean the files you downloaded for the most recent version of BANS.
• Any modified versions of your BANS files.  In my case, I take the most recent version of BANS and add modifications to them, so that any new sites I create will already have most modifications on them.  This is a huge time saver for me so I would want to keep these modified files safe.
• Any backed up files, such as database backups downloaded from your hosting account(s).
• FTP settings for your hosting accounts.
• Email address settings.  If you created email accounts using any of your niche store URLs then make sure you save these settings to you can easily add them back to your computer after the reformat.

If you do have any of the above files or settings on your computer then you need to move them (or copies of them) to a location off your computer.  You can move these files to an external hard drive, thumb drive, CD or DVD disk(s), or even a location in cyberspace.

If you use an external hard drive or thumb drive, disconnect it, if possible, prior to your reformat.  This will prevent accidental deletion.  Trust me, I’ve done this.  My computer has three hard drives and I have accidentally reformatted the wrong drive, losing all the backup information on that drive.  (It was okay, though, because my other extra drive contained the same information as the one I lost - I’m ultra paranoid about losing information and this paranoia has saved me in more than one instance.)

Of course, you may have additional files or folders that have nothing to do with your niche stores that you want to keep.  I strongly suggest you go through each folder on your system to backup anything you need to backup, such as emails in Microsoft Office or music purchased via iTunes (make sure these are burned to disk as you are not allowed to redownload them).  Or, deactivate/transfer any registration codes for programs that have allow you to do this, such as Dreamweaver or Photoshop.  This will prevent you from using all your allotted activations that will eventually leave you with a program you can no longer activate. 

After you are done checking I suggest you check one more time.  More than once I’ve thought I backed up everything I needed to and started my reformat, only to remember something just minutes after starting the reformat.  You can’t be too careful!

After you complete the reformat you will need to set up all programs again.  For instance, if you had an FTP program setup to help you with uploads and downloads then you will need to set it up again after the reformat. 

If one of you readers thinks of something I missed then please share in the comments below.  Otherwise, good luck!

Rochelle