To store online or not
Over the last week I have been thinking about the benefits of storing data online. This includes things like email, calendar, news readers, bookmarks, and online backups.
I use Google’s Gmail client. I have not opened a desktop email app in about a year. I originally made the switch because I was using several different computers and traveling a lot. Using Gmail allowed me to send and received email wherever I was on whatever computer I was using. The downside to this convenience is that I do not have a local backup of all my emails. A problem that is easily fixed for email, but not so easily done for things like calendars and news readers.
In addition to Gmail, I use — 37signals’ Backpack and Highrise, Google reader, and Google Calendar. The data in the apps is not as easily replicated without entering it twice.
The last area I have been thinking about is online backups. I have looked at two companies; Mozy.com (I am trying their free account now) and ElephantDrive.com. Both have very attractive plans at reasonable rates. The upside is that they provide offsite backup which is good to have. The downside is that if I ever loose my data locally, I may have to download 50 Gigs of data one file at a time. It almost makes more sense to buy a terabyte drive, fill it up, and store it in a bank vault.
The question I would like to pose is what do people think, do you use online applications or do you put all your data on your computer? In this age of online computing, does it makes sense to have all your data online, or is there still a place for desktop email clients and news readers?
Great if you are connected all the time, but what if you want to work on a document remotely, on the train, on a plane?
I’ve been thinking the same thing. I came to the following conclusions:-
– My broadband is too slow even at 8Meg
– The bandwidth costs could get out of hand all to quickly
– Do I really trust the backup provider? In terms of security and longevity?
– Incremental backup costs more money than a simple backup with these sites
In the end I’ve bought a large 500GB hard disk connected to an NSLU2 and I use it as network storage. I then backup to DVD the most important files and store them at my parents house. So, no incremental backup really, just simple backups of my most important files.
Until bandwidth speeds increase massively and costs come down for online backup (I mean proper backup) then I’ll stick with my manual method.
Hi Chris,
As I did a lot of international travel I needed an online backup so couple of years back I started using online backup from xDrive.com.
Everything worked fine, until xDrive was purchased by AOL. Not only the site became terribly slow, but they lost my data as well. Fortunately, I had my data in a terradrive – I was safe.
Do you really want someone else to protect your data?
I think another alternative is:
Have a terra drive with RAID and get an remote access account which allows you to access your drive.
Cheers,
Munjal
Google calendar has an API which effecively allows you to backup and sync to other sources.
They also recently released an API for contacts, which as a result became my default storage for contact data. I can use contact data from anywhere with web access but also write management apps locally, sync with my mobile and do backups in case Google goes bust and takes my data with it.
For online backups I have been using (and found very good) rsync.net – especially good if your large volume data is largely static since you can use rsync (the program) to ensure a minimal transfer after the first one, provided you only need a current record not a “from two backups ago” guarantee.
Do you really need the same level of guarantee for all your data? I just backup online that which I can’t afford to lose.I have two computers which back-up to one another so I hope it will take a catastrophe before I ever have to do a full restore in anger, and then I will have bigger worries (all my stuff stolen or house burned down, presumably). A USB disk would work as well.
Even if all your data cannot afford be lost it’s still probably less hassle to maybe download 50GB or more once or twice in a lifetime (assuming you have local backup to deal with common failures) than to do a manual off-site regularly.