Once easy way to make sure your data is always backed up is to:

• Always save your documents in a subfolder of My Documents.
• Schedule a regular backup of My Documents.

You'll also want to back the folder that contains your email. This depends on the program you are using. For more information on backing up email, see the tutorials on Email, later in this series.

Needless to say, if you do back up your entire hard disk, you'll also back up all of your data. If you have a sufficiently large secondary storage device, this may be your easiest option.