Is this the best deal around for cloud storage

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darylblake

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#156024 16-Nov-2014 22:46

Hi There,

I have about 200-300gb of mainly electronic photos my wife and I have accumulated over the years. I have a copy on another hard disk here, but was looking at cloud storage costs.

I looked at dropbox/googledrive/onedrive and it seems Microsoft Onedrive had a very good deal charging $6.99 USD per month or $70 USD for a whole year with a license to use Microsoft Office 365.
This seems like such a good price, and a Terrabyte seems like plenty of storage. Does anyone have this plan? Is there anyhting I need to be aware of before I go purchase this to keep backup copies of our photos?

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#1177066 16-Nov-2014 22:47

I doubt many companies could compete with MS, espeically if they bundle software with it.

ech3lon

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#1177072 16-Nov-2014 23:25

Amazon glazier. Got 150 GB worth of photos and home video backed up, cost only around $2.50 a month. Choose Australia server for fast transfer speed.

billgates

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#1177073 16-Nov-2014 23:26

The storage limit is unlimited now for OneDrive with the Office 365 plan AFAIK. Includes monthly Skype calling as well.

Do whatever you want to do man.

timmmay

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#1177093 17-Nov-2014 07:07

Glacier is US$3/month. Calculator here.

davidcole

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#1177103 17-Nov-2014 07:35

Why not just back it up with a backup solution? Crashplan is good value at $50USD a year for unlimited. Carbonite however has a better mobile app that allows viewing of photo thumbnails, so its like being in cloud storage - while also protecting you from the stupid (accidental delete etc).

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freitasm

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#1177108 17-Nov-2014 07:58

A backup solution is a better plan if you just want... backup. Cloud storage usually is used to synchronise content, which also means synchronising deletes, even accidental ones.

I use OneDrive but also have Crashplan. OneDrive keeps my laptop and tablet in sync, while Crashplan protects the content from loss.

Different solutions for different problems. I like Crashplan bettern than Carbonite, which I used for a couple of years before. Crashplan has Australian servers, so it's a fast (kind of) upload. 200GB will still take some time to upload unless you have a fibre connection.

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SirHumphreyAppleby

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#1177112 17-Nov-2014 08:06

billgates: The storage limit is unlimited now for OneDrive with the Office 365 plan AFAIK. Includes monthly Skype calling as well.

OneDrive with an Office 365 plan will be unlimited, but it isn't yet. You do get 1TB to start with, and given how slow OneDrive has been with my testing, unlimited will likely be phased in long before you upload that much.

I am presently using CrashPlan for backups, data stored in Sydney, and am able to upload at around 10Mbs^-1. With OneDrive, unknown location, I was getting about 1/3 the speed. Unfortunately, CrashPlan uses absurd amounts of memory for their Java-based client (600MB of RAM per TB of data), and there is no sign of the native client they've been promising for years.

davidcole

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#1177120 17-Nov-2014 08:26

freitasm: A backup solution is a better plan if you just want... backup. Cloud storage usually is used to synchronise content, which also means synchronising deletes, even accidental ones.

I use OneDrive but also have Crashplan. OneDrive keeps my laptop and tablet in sync, while Crashplan protects the content from loss.

Different solutions for different problems. I like Crashplan bettern than Carbonite, which I used for a couple of years before. Crashplan has Australian servers, so it's a fast (kind of) upload. 200GB will still take some time to upload unless you have a fibre connection.

Yeah I prefer crashplan as well, but it's a nightmare for looking through photos is that is your main reason for having it. Both mozy and carbonite has better facilities for restoration.

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#1177123 17-Nov-2014 08:32

I like Carbonite for this, and it is a true backup solution where accidental changes or deletions can be undone for a reasonable amount of time.

I find the Office365 sync less reliable - it breaks at the drop of a hat (e.g. very long file names)

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#1177139 17-Nov-2014 09:02

OneDrive can easily "get" lost. I had files that have not been touched in ages suddenly present sync errors and then end up with two versions of the same files - including a few hundred photos... A pain to clean up when this happens.

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#1177151 17-Nov-2014 09:24

It all depends what you're looking for in cloud storage.

The best deal specifically for photo storage is probably Flickr, which offers 1TB for free.
Onedrive is good for generic cloud storage, especially if Office is important to you.
Google Plus will store photos which are 4 megapixel or less and videos less than 15 minutes for free, then uses your Google Drive storage. Google Plus is surprisingly good for photo management.

I think backup on top of one of these is important due to versioning and redundancy, and like others here I like Crashplan. You don't have to pay for their cloud storage in that they offer peer to peer backup for free - I have a hard drive hanging off a PC at my parents' place which I back up to (and vice versa) without paying - but the cloud storage option is easy to set up and use.

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myopinion

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#1177156 17-Nov-2014 09:33

I've switched from OneDrive to Dropbox. I got sick of all the Sync errors that OneDrive throws with the annoying file naming reg's and sync limits (5000 for SharePoint and 20000 for personal). Dropbox seems rock solid and the paid version very fast at syncing. In my opinion, worth the money. And now that Dropbox integrates with MS Office, even better. I also use CrashPlan for backup of servers and PC's.

darylblake

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#1177785 18-Nov-2014 09:55

Yeh, while the office deal looks great, I think that with the amount of problem people have had with onedrive I think I will pass on it.

Im probably gonna use that Crashplan Pro, or might go buy a 1TB dropbox account. Have not decided yet. But 1TB is big enough for me, and I can use selective sync.

I think I will avoid glacier, its designed to be a long term archiving plan. We use this at work to store EBS Images of servers which we probably wont use again (but might).

Bhavicp

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#1177958 18-Nov-2014 14:14

Personally I use Dropbox. 1TB is more than enough, and i've been using it for several years now. I don't think I could live without it! Keeps everything in sync, including uploading my photos from my phone. It also has some versioning which is great.

On my main desktop I run Backblaze just to make sure I have an extra backup of everything. At $5 /month for unlimited, it's a steal. The app works great, doesn't use CPU/memory, and you can set throttle limits etc (I use Crashplan at work, and i'd say it's got the same features, though I don't actively touch Crashplan, set it up a while back and haven't even looked at it).

I've downloaded stuff from Backblaze quite a few times, and it's really easy. You can select certain folders/files and it will zip em up and give you a download link.

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gcorgnet

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#1177966 18-Nov-2014 14:29

Crashplan currently has a 50% off offer for Black Friday (or whatever) which brings it down to AU$75 for a year, which is pretty compelling IMO

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