I'm so sorry this happened to you! This is one of my greatest fears! Good luck with your other stick.

I know how you feel, I was trying to copy my designs from usb stick to cd and thought I was doing great. Now the CD is stuck in the pc, I have one of the all in one pc's. I called gateway, and I have to send it back to them to fix it. I got the pc just this last July.

Been there - done that. Now I have 3 external hard drives and several usb stitcks plus a few CD's. I worked in the data processing industry for a while & backups were my main thing. No one media is 100% safe. Good luck

OUCH!!! So sorry to hear! I have been wondering if I should get a external hard drive and now I will! Good luck!
Hope everything works out for you somehow. Hugs Dawn

My heart hurts for you! I, too, lost a bunch of files on a USB...which I though were a safe way to store files! Nope. Now I back up on an external drive and a USB. I've also lost files on CD's..they just quit reading!! And to think I worried about those 3" floppy disks that no one uses anymore!

Oh no! I put mine on a USB then burned a CD for back-up. I feel it is safer that way BUT, what I have added since then are mixed in so eventually I will be burning another CD and disposing of the old one, maybe I'll use a re-writable one.

You may be interested to know that there is a recovery program available to get the data back. I have done this and was able to rescue my designs

I think it happens to all of us. I now back up on ex. hard drive once a week. On CD once every two weeks and hope they don't quit working. I real fell bad for you ,I know how I felt. Some places well replace but others did not. Good louk. JoAnn

I know exactly how you feel, I just had a virus on my computer and have lost all my designs as well as all my records for my family tree which entailed over 6000 people. I had a dual drive and had it backed up to the second drive, do not know yet if that was infected, I sure hope not. I was just thinking about burning cds but didn't get around to it. Have had computers for over 25 years and never at a virus. Lots of luck to you in recouping your designs.

ok scared me going to go back things up, lol

So sorry to hear this but a lot of us have been in your same situation and it is heart breaking not only to lose the designs but think of all the monies that have just gone into space from purchased designs. I try to back mine up a couple of times a month but of course I do forget.

OH - I am sorry to hear this - I have a couple USB dumb drives that I use for my designs - back and forth to my machines - but I have an external hard drive and a drive that is separate from my main drive on my PC - I lost my files - when I was fairly new and vowed then - that I would back up and do whatever it takes to keep my files in tack - luckly - the lightening storm that caused the problem - didn't totally fire my PC - there was some memory - and my files came back to me - after about 4 weeks of worry - it took the guy a long while to find them all - it was then - that I knew how important - backing up files can be - it was my back up that he found here and there. Do whatever it takes to keep your files - so you don't have to think about the money spent and lost - because you didn't want to take the time or set it up for your PC to do automatically. JUST DO IT!

Make time to back up your embroidery files, and any other files that are valuable to you and can't be replaced like your documents, pictures, and any downloaded software programs. Copy them to an external hard drive, CD, USB, or try a web storage site. I backup mine and put the date that I did the backup to keep better track. Good luck in rebuilding your design files. I know I would have been shattered if my got lost or deleted.

Yes, it only has to happen to you once!! I now back up nightly on an external hard drive......

What a dreadful thing to happen. My DH bought me an EHD as one of my Christmas presents as I had read that this had happened to other Cuties. I now back up all the time. I hate USB sticks as I once lost a huge work project. I hope you will come right.

Join the club. So sorry to hear about this. I mentioned in Nove 2010 that I have lost ALL my designs bought and gathered over 4 years. THE EXTERNAL HARDDRIVE PACKED UP!!!!!

Breathe. Just tell us what exactly happended the technical way. Are the files deleted accidently, corrupt now, did they just vanish? Is the stick physically broken?
Maybe we can work out an idea for you.
Annie23 has a good one.

I had the same problem with a USB stick as well. Luckily I had also downloaded them onto a disk and doubled up on my Computer.

It is safer to use multi type back-ups,Usb and external HD can also fail.
I back-up every three months and for designs purchased I copy seperately and more than once on DVD's (a CD is too small).
Only problem I had is panicked and put almost all discs back on the computer and had to find and sort/delete duplicated files.I first wondered why my files took up so much space on the computer.
Hope some clever I.T. could restore them for you.
Hugs and sympathy BEV

I use an external hard drive to back up my designs. I set it to back up everyday at the same time. I have used the backup several times to restore Something that was lost. If you are running windows you can set up the prefrences to back up every day at what time you want.It can restore everything, a catagory or a single design when you lose it. Do your backups every day and you lose nothing! Important!!! Suzanne