 | |
| Friday, June 02, 2006 11:00 AM PDT Store It on the Web These 17 free and low-cost services make it easier than ever to back up and share your files online. Jon L. Jacobi, Erik Larkin, and Steve Bass | |
All your important files--text documents, spreadsheets, music and videos, you name it--may start out sitting safe and snug on your PC's hard drive. But what if the drive goes belly up, or runs out of room? And what if you'd like an easy way to share those files with coworkers or friends? Web-based storage services let you back up your data, store your files on a Web server, or share them quickly and simply with anyone, often at no cost. Of the 17 services we tried, our favorite backup service is IBackup, while the GoDaddy Online File Folder is our pick of the storage sites. And for sharing files, we like the free 4shared.com service. In This Article:
Also, before you select a service, see our safety tip below.
| |
|
Back Up to the Web | |
|
Though IBackup is the best all-around backup service I tested, the beta version of Mozy has much to recommend it, despite some rough edges, so it's a service to keep an eye on. Of course, not the least of its virtues is that it's free. | |
|
IBackup
| |
| Both IBackup and XDrive cost the same, and their features are almost identical: multimedia streaming, browser-based file management, and file sharing. However, unlike XDrive, IBackup doesn't require that your friends open an IBackup account to view the files you want to share with them. The service's client software isn't as easy to use as the XDrive Desktop client. IBackup, though, didn't misfire as XDrive did in my tests. IBackup's IDrive feature, like XDrive Desktop, maps your IBackup files to a network drive to let you drag and drop files between the two. | |
|
XDrive
| |
| This service supports file sharing and streaming of media files to cell phones. You can manage your files via the XDrive Desktop client, or in a browser via the service's Web interface. Unfortunately, despite its features, the XDrive Desktop client stumbled too many times: I encountered C++ runtime errors and several failed backups. None of the other client programs I tried even hiccupped.
FirstBackup The client software that this service uses is well designed. My only complaint is that FirstBackup lacks an automatic backup capability during a PC's idle time. FirstBackup provides just one simple pricing plan: $4 per month (three months minimum) for up to 50MB, $8 per month for up to 300MB, $12 per month for up to 1GB, and $2.75 for each additional gigabyte. Those costs are affordable as long as you're backing up only limited amounts of data, but by the time you reach 5GB, the charges come to a total of $23 per month, more than twice what you would pay for the same amount of storage on either IBackup or XDrive. | |
|
This is one of the priciest services I tested, although its penny-per-megabyte-per-month plan has no minimum charge: Store nothing, pay nothing, or store only a few megabytes and pay only a few pennies per month--a boon for anyone who backs up only relatively small amounts of data. Though the service's desktop client software is reliable and easy to use, it lacks a "do backup now" option. Data Deposit Box does offer several nice bonus features such as the ability to share folders by e-mail, and a file-management interface that is exceptionally clean and practical. ElephantDrive Currently in beta, this site offers 500MB of free Web storage space. The pay plan is more expensive than that of the other free service I looked at, Mozy, but at $10 per month or $100 per year for up to 10GB of storage, Elephant Drive's per-gigabyte rate is half that of either IBackup or XDrive. If your system doesn't have a fast upstream broadband connection, however, it could take days to upload multigigabytes of data to this or any other online storage service. Like the other services I tested, ElephantDrive supplies client software only for Windows. ElephantDrive says it will switch from Microsoft's .Net Framework to the open Java platform to add support for Mac and Linux users. In my tests, transfers were stable and reliable, but the client dropped some connections. Still, any service whose marketing uses elephant puns bears watching. Mozy Mozy's client software for uploading and restoring files was in beta when I tested it, but the service performed well despite the lack of visual feedback while a backup restore is in progress (this should be fixed by launch time). Mozy's for-pay service is cheap compared with the norm: $20 for up to 5GB, $30 for 10GB, and $40 for 20GB--per annum. You get only five free restore operations per month, but that should be more than enough for most users. | |
| Online Backup: Keep Your Data at a Safe Distance (chart) These services ensure that your important files are secure on their Web servers no matter what calamity may befall the PC situated in your home or office. | |
| Find Ample Storage Online Anyone who owns a digital camera or an MP3 music collection knows it doesn't take very long at all to fill up a hard drive. If you have a broadband Internet connection, you could save some of the cost of a new hard drive by using one of the many services offering free or dirt-cheap online storage My favorite for music and video playback is Streamload, while Online File Folder is the choice for integrating online storage with day-to-day work. Online File Folder Godaddy's online storage service is decidedly businesslike. Online File Folder's clean, Explorer-style Web interface makes file management a breeze. But you don't even have to fire up your browser if you map the service as a network place in Windows, which then permits you to transfer files and folders by dragging and dropping them from within Explorer. This is the only one of the storage-focused services I looked at that lets you zip and encrypt your files and folders via the Web interface. Oddly enough, there's no search feature, although you can use Windows' search function to find files on the mapped network place. A small downloadable program allows you to sync an online folder with a folder on your desktop, so updating one automatically updates the other. You have no free option, and you must pay by the year rather than monthly. Still, $10 a year per gigabyte (up to 10GB) isn't bad, considering all the extras you get. Streamload Mediamax How does up to 25GB of free storage space sound? The gratis storage alone makes Mediamax worth a look. As befitting the name, Mediamax emphasizes storing your music, video, and photos. When you upload files, the service automatically sorts them under such tabs as "Photoshare" and "Music Locker." With Streamload's easy streaming options, the service acts as a ready-access library for all your media files. You just select a few songs or whole folders, choose Play, and listen via your favorite media player. | |
|
| |
| Unfortunately, you can quickly use up the free service's monthly 500MB download maximum. The limit leaps to 25GB (and a whopping 250GB of storage) for the cheapest paid plan ($15 a month). Streamload Mediamax is a new service, and it has rough edges aplenty. The file-upload features are clunky, particularly if you upload many files at once, since you can't choose the destination folder. And while a new Web interface affords good options for organizing your music, it sometimes balks with strange errors. A stand-alone software program is expected to arrive soon. | |
More Online Storage Services Box.net You get 1GB of free space and a clean, lean Web 2.0 interface with this service. File management, including the ability to tag your files and folders, is also simple. | |
|
| |
| Yet Box.net offers little in the way of extras. A stand-alone program that will synchronize with your desktop folders is still in the works. And while you can stream music, you can play just one song at a time, and only through Box.net's own little desktop player applet. The free version has some limits: You can't upload files larger than 10MB, and you can download only one file at a time. The paid options--$5 a month for 5GB, and $10 a month for 15GB--do away with these limits and offer both mobile access and support for additional users. Simdesk This service provides a number of nice features, especially for business collaboration. For example, you can map the service as a network drive, and you can sync online files with those in a desktop folder. It also lets you send online files to a shared printer via its browser-based interface. You can even get to that interface using a Web-enabled mobile device. | |
|
| |
| However, the Simdesk Web interface is inelegant, and file navigation is slow: To move a file, you have to use the program's buttons to cut and paste it rather than simply dragging and dropping it. Simdesk's pricing isn't so hot, either: It costs $3.50 a month for up to 1GB of storage and $6.50 per month for 2GB, which doesn't compare to GoDaddy's low-cost offerings. In addition, Simdesk imposes a 5GB-per-month transfer limit. FlipDrive Compared with the other online storage services I looked at, FlipDrive feels somewhat spartan. The site's free service provides only 25MB of storage, so it's basically a teaser. The FlipDrive Web interface is serviceable but plain, and there's no client program to use instead. The service's Web download feature stands out: Choose several folders and files, and FlipDrive automatically zips them to speed your downloads and preserve file names and directory structures. Still, dragging and dropping files to and from a mapped drive is probably faster. You can make as many sharable photo albums as you like and order prints of pictures in the album from FlipDrive. However, you can't download full-size, full-resolution images. FlipDrive costs about the same as Box.net--$5 a month for 5GB, $10 a month for 15GB--but its top level costs $20 a month for 30GB. Online Storage Solutions This service slaps a bare-bones interface around a large FTP (File Transport Protocol) account. It lacks online file management, media streaming, file synchronizing, and other extras. However, as with any FTP account, you can use Novell's free Netdrive utility to map a network drive. The upside is that you get more space for your money: up to 10GB for only $5 per month, and up to 100GB for $35 per month. For FTP users who are looking for a lot of storage space with few restrictions, and who don't require such niceties as a functional Web interface, Online Storage Solutions might be a good choice. Otherwise, one of the other storage services in this roundup will serve you much better. Extend Your Hard Disk to the Web Jump to our comparison chart here of the online storage services discussed in this section. Erik Larkin | |
|
Share the Web Way | |
| Sure, you can attach umpteen files to an e-mail and blast it to three or four dozen of your nearest and dearest, but, oh, the hassle--adding each address, selecting and attaching the files one by one, and then choking the pipes of your ISP and those of each recipient. A better way is to post the files on the Web and send everybody a single URL so they can retrieve and open the files on their own, at their convenience. For me, the icing on the Web-sharing cake is that many of the services are completely free of charge (and we all love a bargain). Of the five sharing services I looked at, my favorites are YouSendIt for its simplicity, and 4shared.com for its winning interface. Now let me share with you my opinion of these Web-sharing sites.
4shared.com | |
|
| |
| This free service provides 500MB of storage and lets you upload an unlimited number of files (though no single file can exceed 25MB in size). All of the folders you place on 4shared.com's servers are permission-based, so you can easily make some folders available to anybody while restricting access to others. You can also password-protect your folders, which adds another layer of security. Visitors access the folders through an e-mail link. In less than 10 minutes, I created a dozen folders and subfolders, each with specific rights. You can track how many files are downloaded, but unfortunately you can't find out who did the downloading. One quibble with the free account: You have to upload and download the files one at a time. You get more storage, multiple file transfers, and the ability to store files larger than 25MB for fees ranging from $48 to $84 per year. Groove Virtual Office Acquired last year by Microsoft, this collaboration service--and WebEx WebOffice Workgroup (see below)--differ from the other sharing sites I tested in their business-ready robustness, which makes them ideal for sharing data with work associates. However, Groove is also great for sharing with friends and family. The service provides you with a private, shared workspace and offers all the critical collaborative functions: file sharing, instant communications, and shared calendars. You can use Groove's desktop application to collaborate on projects and documents by storing and sharing files in various folders; edit and sync Word documents and other text files; view PowerPoint presentations; and enter meeting and other dates on a shared calendar. Besides sending e-mail within Groove, you can also conduct real-time, online meetings using the service's built-in instant messaging tool. If you have a microphone connected to your PC, you can use Groove's cool audio-chatting feature. The service even lets you do multiple tasks simultaneously--say, participate in an online meeting while uploading files and collaborating on a document. The 60-day trial version has document review and other features disabled; you can continue using the app after 60 days (the service is free for personal use), but the meetings tool and other functions won't work, and the connection speed is a poky 56 kbps, which makes the free version impractical for most PC users . | |
| Webex's collaboration tool, which it acquired along with Intranets.com last year, provides a variety of ways to share files. You can allow authorized users to access, download, and modify the folders you create. Unlike Groove, however, WebOffice doesn't let people work together on the online files. The basic plan limits storage to 250MB combined for up to five users. You can allow non-WebOffice users to view and download files. The WebOffice calendar features a group scheduling capability similar to the scheduler in Microsoft Outlook. You can attach documents and agendas, manage projects, and sync calendars and other data with your Palm (but not Windows Mobile or BlackBerry) PDA. Unlike Groove, in WebOffice all of your group's activity is done through a browser. WebOffice costs $60 a month for up to five users and $100 a month for ten users. WebEx Meetings costs an extra $50 per user per month. The fully-functional, 30-day trial includes WebEx Meetings. RapidShare This simple, no-frills, free site lets you upload as many files as you want, each as large as 100MB, and send the link to any number of recipients. The files can be downloaded an unlimited number of times, and they remain on the server as long as they're downloaded at least once every 30 days. To avoid the annoying 23-second wait before you can download a file, sign up for a premium account, which costs 10 euros--about $12--per month. YouSendIt This free service lets you upload files to its Web servers for temporary storage. You can include a personal note along with the upload; YouSendIt then sends an e-mail to the person with whom you're sharing that explains how to pick up the file. You're notified when the file is sent and when it's picked up. The recipient's name is automatically added to your YouSendIt Contacts, too. While you can send your file to several people at once, the "Send To" field won't hold more than 128 characters; the service says it imposed this limit to prevent spammers from using it. | |
|
| |
| The free version limits the file size to 100MB. The files you upload are stored for seven days or for a total of 25 downloads per file. That is probably more downloads than most people will need (it's plenty for me). But $5 per month raises the size limit to 1GB, the per-file storage period to 14 days, and the downloads to 100. | |
|
Collaboration: Online Storage (chart) | |
| Rather than wrestle with e-mail attachments, let these services distribute your digital images, documents, and other files to family, friends, and coworkers. | |
|
| |
Jon L. Jacobi is a contributing editor, and Erik Larkin is an associate editor for PC World. | |
| Become a PCW Member Join the community and start enjoying the benefits:
| |
 All rights reserved |
jueves, julio 26, 2007
Almacene y comparta su información utilizando servicios web.
Illustration: Headcase Design
Suscribirse a:
Comentarios de la entrada (Atom)
No hay comentarios.:
Publicar un comentario