The online storage fun continues
Posted on 03. Sep, 2009 by zevmo in Apple, Technology
There are a lot of online storage companies out there, and I have tried about 4 of them (iDrive, Mozy, JungleDisk (S3), and Carbonite on Windows). I have a large need for storage; my iTunes (600GB) and iPhoto (250GB) libraries are getting unruly. Unfortunately, I haven’t broken down to get a Drobo yet… damn, do I want one of those.
So currently I am tied to my old G5 Mac Pro with two 1TB Firewire drives (one each) to provide storage for those growing file spaces. And, of course, an additional set for backups. What a pain. What would make this whole solution easy would be an Apple data solution (Media Server w/ storage) that would operate with the Apple Extreme Router via Gigabit Ethernet, and then stream the content over 802.11n. But, since that doesn’t exist now, I need an offsite solution just in case.
Unfortunately, many services do not support 1) non-intel Mac’s, and 2) external HD’s. As usual, it is all trial and error.
JungleDisk had a ridiculous interface, a very hokey feel, and didn’t really like attached storage. Also, you have to go through a whole procedure with Amazon S3. It just didn’t allow for a smooth experience.
Next came Mozy. It got great reviews, looks nice, and seemed like the support was there. I paid for the unlimited product and thought that was it. We were headed to Florida for 11 days, so I thought to let it run while I was gone. I checked in on it, and it seems so freaking slow (I have Optimum Online Boost), so I let it run. I had problems, as I did before I left, and it never seemed to work properly. 
The errors that I got were on the FAQ’s as “reboot and the problem will most likely go away.” Yeah, that didn’t sit right with me. This is definitely a Beta product. The backup status window was VERY vague. And when selecting my external iPhoto “file”, there was no ability to see the files that were inside of it, and it took a very long time for it to calculate the size of the “file”, which it never seemed to accurately calculate (250GB was 175GB)… strange. Anyway, it never fully backed up properly. Nisht Good. I canceled my account, and they very nicely refunded my $103.95.
Well, I decided to try iDrive. It also got good reviews, seemed to be relatively inexpensive at $49.50 for 150GB personal account (*more on this later) I downloaded the software, setup everything, and boom, off to the races. As of last night at 11pm, started at 6pm, I was 8% done with 250GB. Nice! Software runs well, everything was fantastic… until i decided to write this blog post praising iDrive and re-read the pricing. First, ($.50/GB overage charge… but I read per YEAR, NOT as it is, per MONTH) That’s $250 /year above and beyond. Not only that but the overage only for Business accounts, which offers a 100GB for $199.50/yr OR $499.50/yr for 500GB. Well, this caused me much pain because I finally found a service that I liked. So I just canceled my account with them. 
Now, back to the drawing board. I called Carbonite, because they are intel-only, just to make sure they don’t have a Universal Application. No luck there. I found a company called Safe Copy. it looks like they will be my new service to try out. The site looks good, reviews are equally supportive, and they support PPC with a good pricing plan (250GB for 75/yr.) .
We’ll see how it goes and I will let you know.
