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I never felt unsafe in Malaysia, wherever I was. Nevertheless,
I was cautious.
The key issue, of course, is not to look like an obvious target
of theft. So I looked just like any other backpacker and made
sure that my electronic gear wasn't (too) visible. Basically,
I hid it in a by now rather ugly Freitag bag, which was a good
choice in any case, as the truck tarp Freitag stuff is made of
is very robust and fits this climate well. I usually brought out
my laptop only in hotel rooms, and where necessary, handed it
over to the hotel safe.
For backing up, I used my MP3 player, which can also act as
a USB-connected hard-disk.
I was more worried about loosing my data than the hardware
(in particular since I won't be near a professional backup device
for my total 5 months of travel). So I reduced risk by separating
my notebook from the MP3 player. If the notebook was in my hotel
room, the player was with me wandering around town; if the notebook
was in the hotelsafe, the player was in my hotel room; etc.
To protect the notebook from too much humidity, I used Roadwired
sleeves (also for my MP3 player). I had some problems with the
Thinkpad battery not holding water, but it recovered once I had
returned home. The MP3 player stopped working in Singapore (sometimes
>95% humidity) but recovered once I had returned home and found
the time to take care of it (*).
The only thing that got stolen was a blue Travelsmith polo
shirt. It was stolen in the most unlikely place: Laban
Rata, the base camp of my Mt Kinabalu climb.
(*) It is rather stupid: The Archos Jukebox could not recharge its batteries to such a degree that the MP3 player part started working again. However, the USB part worked just fine, primarily, I guess, because it gets some power from the laptop. I had to recharge the player's batteries using an external charger to get the MP3 player to work again.
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