The one thing...***

...that no academic should ever forget:

Never, ever forget to back up your files.

(corollary -- don't "lose" your jump drive, only to find it in the top of your closet, gathering dust. Jump drives are more convenient, and thus more likely to be used, than normal methods of backing up files.)
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Following this simple rule will help you to avoid the frightening moment where you have to scour your memory in a dead panic -- did I save that crucial file to a disk?

And because, it seems, computers only crash when it's absolutely irreplaceable information you'll need in approximately 24 hours that you have not backed up in any useful format...this might also be the secret to a computer that never dies. Time alone will tell.

***This post is related to the medieval only in so far as both my files for working in Rare and my paper on Catherine of Alexandria were saved onto a jump drive mere hours before my computer returned to its suicidal state. Thanks to a very tech savvy sister, I am able to breathe again. So I thought I would share the fruits of my panic, in the hope of averting similar near-death-experiences in others who might find themselves as dependent on their computers as I am on mine...