I have recently been looking at using online services to see if they would ‘enhance’ my workflow, back up strategy etc. I have written already about MobileMe and the total mess that Apple have made of it (and still are doing by the way!) but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel in terms of adding value. Having recently upgraded, jailbroken, and handed over my iPhone to Sands I am starting to figure out how we will benefit from it.
As an aside I was talking to a Estate Agent friend here in Almerimar this week about his business and some stuff we are thinking of doing together, and the more he talked the more I could see a genuine benefit of MobileMe for him ….. so much so that he is ordering an iMac, MBA and probably a MBP for the business as well as a iPhone, and I am going to set it all up for him.
So moving away from a desktop driven data solution to a online driven solution (which it sort of is) can make sense. By way of example, Sands and I have been using Evernote a lot more recently, and the iPhone application is proving to be really useful.
So what has all this got to do with Online Storage then, which is what Memopal offers? Well in many ways nothing, but writing about online storage isn’t exactly going to fill a post is it? I mean:
Q. What does on line storage do?
A. It stores your data online!
Q. How does it work?
A. You say which files you want to backup and sit back and wait ………… for a (very) long time!
Actually it is the very long time part that makes Memopal as attractive an online backup solution as you are likely to come across. They offer a lot of space:
- You can select either 150GB or 250GB of storage
- You can select a one year, two year (25% discount) or three year (50% discount) contract
- You can select a Individual or Business (10 users) license
Prices for one year Personal are 49€ (150GB) and 69€ (250GB). The 150GB option for Business is 600€.
Memopal is online backup and online storage software that archives your files in real-time to a remote server. It doesn’t matter how many times you change computers: You will always know where your data is. You can browse all your files from any internet location or internet-ready cell phone. You can share with friends and co-workers files that are too big to send through email.
Tempting as it may be, think long and hard about how much data you want to store on line though – transferring 250GB is no joke, in fact much of your data will be out of date and not in need of backing up by the time you have backed it all up.
Memopal gives you three options regarding what you back up; a) My Documents (which is what it recommends, b) One Folder (which you can set), or c) My Mac (i.e. everything)
Once you have uploaded your files you can Search for them from any computer, Share them by dragging a file into the Dock icon to activate secure file sharing, or Browse the files online.
I must admit that while on the surface some of the features seem neat, I am pretty much in the camp that thinks that backups exist for an emergency! Once I have backed something up I don’t even touch it unless disaster (or incompetence) strikes. A lot naturally depends on your personal back up strategy but as I have a combination of Time Machine, Super Duper and off site hard copies (DVD’s) in place, for me the equation is basically – would I be better off with an online storage option than an off site DVD option, and specifically would I use 69€ of DVD’s during a year? No way!!
Now of course I do use MobileMe as well and that gives a paltry 20GB of storage but for storing and accessing my current files on line that is proving to be enough.
Memopal go to great lengths to provide confidence in the security of your data but to be perfectly frank I wouldn’t trust anybody but myself with my important data. Now that is my preference, and would be the same of any online service, so it isn’t a negative against Memopal, which does a great job. I am a little confused about their comment that the cost is no more than a external drive though. Sure it is, IF you intend to buy a external drive every year!!! If I was you I would buy 2 external drives, run two back ups and keep one of site – more work for sure but way cheaper over the next 5 years or so.
Memopal is easier that that though with its automated scheduling, and the 448 bit encryption will keep your data secure, and once you have run your initial back up incremental back ups are quick, primarily because they are saved as soon as they are modified, or created if new.
If you are in the online back up camp Memopal is well worth a look, as the price to GB ratio is impressive, but as for me I don’t think I would be comfortable with an online solution for my data.
As an aside, I’m the main backup person at work. Over a normal weekend, ie the Saturday and Sunday backups, we’ll be backing up somewhere in the region of, if I remember correctly, about 5TB of data. This goes to a combination of LTO3 tape and hard disk. When it all works properly.
I have about 2TB of data that I back up 🙂
Just use a number of external drives and some DVD’s (2 copies) to archive really important stuff.
Just thought I say about MobileMe that the speed of the service has greatly improved since launching. Although it is not as quick as a desktop app, it is doing pretty well. Haven’t tried idisk as of yet to check on speed.
How you finding it now? I still think it is slow and unreliable!
> I have about 2TB of data that I back up
I made a mistake with my figure. That was the regular week-end backup figure, while it was the month-end backup that weekend, so it was actually a bit over 8TB. And that’s just the primary backups (which remain onsite). There’s quite a bit of auxiliary copies made which are stored offsite (and quite a bit more still to be set up!).
Yeah, you win that one then!!!!!! 🙂
🙂
I use memopal, I have approx 25gigs of photos, it took a while for it to backup( 3 days on my wireless connection) but all the backups since are quick and you don’t even have to think about it, as soon as something is added or changed it immeadiately gets backed up. I think it is a good choice for someone who has a lot of digital images they don’t want to dissapear, and does not have time or space for another dvd! I had two external drives and both took just as long and one of them crashed and lost all my data! So it may not be for everyone but so far for me it seems to be working quite well.
hope that helps someone.
Q~
Always good to hear when things do a good job for someone!
3 days though 🙂
External storage are unreliable. I lost 120Gb of movies and photos…just with Memopal I recovered all my files.
@Mike – you were lucky. Read this story from earlier this week where the TidBITS team had serious issues with restoring data from both local and remote backups.
The simple moral of the story, and widely accepted amongst “backup professionals” (even if not widely implemented 🙂 ), is to regularly test the integrity of your backups – whether local or remote.
It’s terribly slow, probably due to the poor upload speeds of most ADSL connections. it takes many hours just to upload a few gig. A full back up of say 200GB takes weeks unless my PC is on all the time.
To be honest I came to the same conclusion pretty quickly, but I also figure that storing 200GB+ online isn’t at all necessary!!
I have been looking at other options recently (watch out for a post soon) and the only real benefit to me of online storage is files that I am actually working on, or reference frequently.
Cool website..keeper! (screamed with a lisp) LOL