I’m in the market for an online backup service for my files. I had a hard drive die at work recently, and would be devastated if that happenned at home. I’m too lazy to burn DVD’s every so often, not to mention i’d have to store them somewhere else anyways in order to have true protection (if my house burns down, i’d loose anything anyways).
Hence, online backup is the solution!! Heres a quick rundown of some options, and my initial thoughts.
My needs:
- Photos
- Music
- Misc Data
- Access from multiple computers, windows and mac, and ideally phone
- Would like access from the web, and to send files/directories to friends
Sugar Sync
- Mutli computers, no extra cost
- They have mobile access
- Can share files with friends via static and hidden links (ie your files are browsable)
- They have a free trial, and decent pricing (premium 60gb for 100$/year)
- Lots of good info on their site, including lots of details about how their s/w operates
- Windows and Mac versions
Mozy
- Unlimited backup is one computer only – hence the 4.95 is deceiving
- Mention of gzip/rsync,etc. on their site makes me think for a savvy user they’d be good, but…
- Its hard to find details of what you can actually do with their software!
- Block level incremental backup sounds great… but really, most of my files will never change
iDrive
- Excellent pricing 150gb for 4.95 a month
- Good looking interface – focus on restore seems weird, and one of the main options from the web gui is “Enter your Credit Card”…?
- Stores 30 past versions of your files! This is a great feature, even if you muck with stuff, or delete it, you can still retrieve.
Carbonite
- Immediately turned off from their website – using fear to sell, not cool.
- They say they backup your files twice… HA!! If they’re using a reasonable encryption algorithm, this is pointless, and hence either they don’t know what they’re doing, or they’re doing something non-standard. Either way i don’t need to investigate these guys any further.
Backblaze
- Cute little intro, windows and mac is obvious from site
- Backs up everything, ala mac’s time machine. I think i need more control than this…
- However, its only 50$/year – mabye this is the way to go?
- Its a new product, hard to say i’d trust all my data with it.
EVault
- No pics of their software, or mention of its web capabilities – no go.
HP Upline
- Looks like it will meet my needs – 59$ year
- I actually tried this a while back, but they had some downtime and the client crashed a couple times… not sure if i should go back
Any thoughts or experiences out there? I’m leaning towards trying sugarsync’s demo on one computer, and perhaps backblaze on another one.
Update 1
-Some good comments on techcrunch about online backup services.
-iDrive requires a credit card to signup – makes it a no go
-JungleDisk is another option. Pay per use is interesting.
Update 2
- My goodness, sugarsync doesn’t seem to support my external usb drive!!! YIKES!! I was very close to purchasing, but without this support this is useless to me! I guess its back to the drawing board, i’ll have to re-evaluate to ensure what i choose had this (i assumed an external drive would be transparent, i guess not).
I’ve recently discovered that all the wiring in my new house is pretty crappy.
In the front part of the house some of the outlets appear grounded, but a lot of the wire in use is really old – one large casing surrounding a single high gauge copper wire. It looks like its all NMD style from the box in the basement, but when you get to the endpoints, its not like that. They’ve skipped some switch boxes too meaning theres no neutral in them, meaning no fancy dimmers/timer/etc.. That kinda sucks.
In the back of the house, all the wire is groundless completely, from the box even.
There are 2 panels, but i think its only 60amps to the house. The breakers flip in the kitchen regularly.
I may eventually rip it out bit by bit and replace it all with good new wiring. I was thinking, if i had to run brand new wiring to the upstairs, back, etc., should i bother running additional cable at the same time? Being a tech guy a few years ago, i would’ve said resoundingly YES. However now with the advent of wi-fi, i’m not sure its worth the hassle or expense. Wi-fi rocks, i don’t think i need data cable throughout the house anymore… in a few years? Mabye… mabye i’ll need some 10Gbit rated cable but if wi-fi keeps pace, and or wi-max takes off, i’ll never need data cable throughout my house.
Whos with me!!! Down with data cable!!! Up with late 20th century electrical standards!!!
Check out the neighbourhood at microsoft’s live maps. The resolution is crazy kickass!!! When i close in on my house, i can see my old tenants car in the driveway!!!
The same address at google maps.
Has microsoft finally surpassed google at something?? At least with google you can do “bank and gladstone”, but the resolution at live maps trumps that i think.
I think if the banks and credit card companies really wanted to prevent identity theft, they’d offer a service (i’d pay!!!) where they send you a text message every time something happens in your account. You’d ignore most of them when you’re out and about spending freely, but would easily make note of the one made when you’re on the couch.
Does anyone know of services like this at their bank or outside of it??
I got the following message sent to me by a friend on facebook yesterday:
Attention all Facebook membeRs.
Facebook is recently becoming very overpopulated,
There have been many members complaining that Facebook
is becoming very slow.Record shows that the reason is
that there are too many non-active Facebook members
And on the other side too many new Facebook members.
We will be sending this messages around to see if the
Members are active or not,If you’re active please send
to other users using Copy+Paste to show that you are active
Those who do not send this message within 2 weeks,
The user will be deleted without hesitation to create more space,
If Facebook is still overpopulated we kindly ask for donations but until then send this message to all your friends and make sure you send
this message to show me that your active and not deleted.
Founder of Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg
I suppose it was only a matter of time… i don’t use facebook nearly as much as a used to. Actually, i guess i never really *used* it, i just spent time there. Techcrunch posted the following funny video that pretty much sums up how i feel about facebook these days.
It was a novelty, its worn off for me, but i’ll occasionally still use it as a tool when i need to send a message out to friends in a manor more trusted than email… and so my picture is next to my message. Actually, its less reliable than email, moreso now though that they include the message in their notification email, but a lot of people likely don’t read them or have the notifications disabled.
In a totally unrelated note, google talk has added translation – this is very cool. You can now in theory IM people in different languages, and have google talk translate for you. Do i have any non-english readers that would care for a conversation???
I’m writing this 6 hour 250 question exam tomorrow. I’ve been studying for it for roughly 3 months. It has basically swallowed all my free time. Pass or fail, I will be very glad when it is through.
If i pass, i will definitely have my cats to thank. They’ve helped me through some tough times.
If i fail, i will definitely have my cats to blame. They’ve definitely caused me to waste lots of time.
Is it just me or is iTunes the absolute worst piece of casual software available on windows (i don’t have a mac, so i can’t speak to its effectiveness on its native platform)?
I started using my girlfriends iPod mini a year or so ago, and its pretty sweet. The interface is decent, its light, does what i expect, never skips, its cool. My first annoyance was when i wanted to put music on it. It was a new computer, so of course with its shite drm it has to trash everything thats on there. I’ve heard there’s ways around this, if anyone has quick links for the future i would be much obliged.
Adding stuff and syncing is relatively painless i must admit. Drag the stuff in there, if its “checked” it means it’ll show up on the iPod if you sync. But whats with the massive album art? Showing me 25 items on the screen is somewhat of a ridiculous use of space… this may be there “pretty” view and speak to my laziness for not investigating other options, but i have high standards for out of the box software!!!
All that i’ve mentioned i can handle. What i CANNOT handle is update software that is ridiculously in my face, and constantly FAILS!! Its now iTunes 7.5 that is trying to be installed, and it always fails for one reason or another. I don’t have the time or patience to try to fix it, i only have the time or patience to bitch about it, cause thats what i feel like doing right now. I’d get a mac for that sweet icon scroller thingy at the bottom, but if iTunes is my main music software, i think i’ll stick with my windoze.
