Why do you favor CDs over DVDs? I haven't explored using the DVD burner yet, but if they hold a lot more data, fewer are required. Are there issues with how the data is stored or retrieved on a DVD disk? With a very large machine hard drive you can be talking about a lot of work and a whole bunch of CDs. (I'm not asking this question because I refuse to use CDs, mind you, but because it would be nice to spend a weekend doing something other than loading CDs into the machine all day long if there are backups that require less media and cataloging of them. And keep in mind, I will have an external hard drive again for backups.)

Thanks everyone for the offers of equipment. I always knew that Mudcatters were a generous group, and you've proved that again now. So far I'm up and running with one computer system here, and this is the one that the insurance company is most likely to dispute, because the bits and pieces were older. I haven't replaced it all yet, but I've been checking prices. I'll pick up the backup hard drive soon, and I saw them, same make and size, in CompUSA for $179. Mine cost about $250 in late 2003, so even replaced with the same size new, Allstate is going to pay less than I did. What is annoying is that if I should choose to try to spend the same amount of money I did before, to get a larger external drive, then they would protest that I'm upgrading and they won't pay for that.

The bits that I need to replace but would like to upgrade are the things I'll buy last. I'll send in the receipt information (copies) then after this is all settled with the insurance folks, take the few items back and pay the difference to upgrade. The insurance folks then have 15 working days to process the information and send me a check for all of the stuff that I had to purchase again. I think that's easier than trying to argue over the price I pay for the upgrade and what they say they would have to pay for the replacement.

When I finish with all of this, there will be fragments left from the old system that I can't use, but that might work as replacements for others with systems needing some tweaking or repair. OS disks left behind, left-over HP keyboard and mouse (I use more ergonomic equipment), etc.

SRS