I think we need a hardware or off-topic forum.
I don't know of a more appropriate place to post this. If you've had issues with HD backups, please post your tales of woe. I need a new drive and would like to avoid this in the future. Please see below about my unfortunate incident.
When I upgraded my CAD I was careful to have a full time backup utility running. I was hoping everything I did was being captured.
Well, yesterday the backup drive just -quit-. The drive got a small error that was resolved with the Windows checkdisk utility and it was out of space.
I cleaned up the external drive and proceeded with 24 hours of backing up my internal drive (both the Windows backup and the Seagate Memeo backup).
Not an hour after I finished with the Memeo backup, the drive started making noises. OUCH! 
The drive is dead as a doornail! Probably a heat related failure or simply worn out. This drive has sat there quietly for only a 1-1/2 years.
No more Seagate branded products for me! 
Drive: Seagate GoFlex 1T (FreeAgent) with USB 2.0.
Being a backup drive for my active computer makes this loss less painful, except for the Windows backup I had from another computer. Fortunately, I also had a backup of that computer on a different drive so my data loss is minimal. Are you ready for a backup catastrophe?
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On another note about Windows 8 to 8.1; You might need to know this if you upgraded your system from Windows 7.
I updated a spare laptop with Windows 8 when Microsoft was pushing it out for $15. On the install, it offered to save all my previous Windows 7 data, which is did. And you could access your folder structure if you wanted to with a little difficulty as Libraries sometimes got confused.
However, and this is the WARNING! ...when you upgrade to Windows 8.1, you loose that Windows 7 backup. It is overwritten with the Windows 8.0 backup!
You can now go back to your regularly scheduled programming 