Cloud Services

[Coss]

Hellodio,

 

those who may know, could help me please.

 

I am considering making the move to the cloud. I've been a steadfast, back 'em up to a hard drive, kind a guy up until now. Which strategy, has curiously, failed twice over the years.

 

First time was when the USB controllers in the all the external hard drives I was using, failed catastrophically, on account of them being cheap drives and the controller software being written by a Chinese guy with a fag hanging out of his mouth in the backroom of a duck slaughterhouse south east of Kunming.

 

Second time, was when the thieving scum who don't subscribe to the Gloriousness of the People's Republic, came round and stole all my external drives on Xmas day a couple of years ago.

 

So I don't need to be convinced of the benefits of the Cloud. What I'd like to ask, is what do people think of the 'Hive'. Specifically are they reputable and will they be around for long?

 

Here is a comparison I found, http://freebies.about.com/od/free-cloud-storage/fl/free-cloud-storage-comparison.htm

 

I could hazard a guess that Google and Apple will be around for a while, what about the Hive?

 

Cheers

[Flashermac]

[Mekong]

Coss

 

Even though I use Clouds (Dropbox, iCloud, Just Cloud etc) I would never trust them 100% for secure back up for that I have my 3 TB Apple Time Capsule at home in Bangkok with irreplaceable files also backed up onto rewritable DVD's (9.4 GB per disc on 2S/1L Ver 2 Discs).

 

When away from home, which is most of the time for the past 18 Months I basically just back up work files, on the server is automatic, daily onto a non Chinese external HDD (Western Digital) and monthly onto rewritable DVD's

 

So why use clouds you my ask, for project related documentation, Contract, Project Requirements, International Standards, Procedures, Specifications, Drawings etc all indexed and well filed in the cloud. When in meetings I don't have to lug a laptop around just my iPad Air and all info is available at my fingertips without utilising storage on it, even if at an offsite facility still accessible on 3G from iPhone, like nobody goes anywhere without their phone do they.

 

Also good for coworkers in different locations, previously I was the Thailand Operations of a small company with people in Singapore, Indonesia, Australia, UK and Canada (there were only 6 of us) and our "Works Server" was cloud based, any one of us was able to access and modify documents held in the cloud from any location.

 

IMHO Cloud Backups are just another line of protection against data loss, such as external HDD, DVD, etc but SHOULD NOT BE relied upon as ones only means of backup.

 

Give Just Cloud http://www.justcloud.com and hive both a go and see how you feel after a few months, the reason I use multiple Clouds is because of the reason you stated "How Long Will they be around" but also how do I access my information if the server is down.

 

My Worth

 

Kong

[Guest]

Just an idea ....

 

My website host gives cloud storage for free of any files, within the package, with over 2 million users I assume they will be around a long time, and as secure as any available. With free hosting for a year, then after only something like 500 baht a year, you might as well park up any old template or not use and have a website and the cloud storage. Effectively having cloud storage for 2 years for around 500 baht. Of course being able to terminate whenever you want.

[baa99]

Be sure to encrypt all personal/sensitive files before uploading to the cloud. Once it is in the cloud you have lost all control of your data. How many GBs are you transferring? Check your upload rate to see how long it will take to do the backup.

[Coss]

I had a look at Hive and it's pernickety, you have to copy and paste each file individually to move and organise them.

 

Since I'm thinking of storing clones of my HDDs, I think I'll forget the cloud as a back up solution. One HDD backup on site and one, off site will have to be the answer.

 

The cloud seems suitable for document management and more feckless uses, like sharing photos of my breakfast.

[The_Munchmaster]

Haven't tried the cloud yet and not really planning to as don't trust it.

 

I have 500GB of photos and over 4TB of movies and TV to back up but I doubt the cloud handles these sort of volumes or else would be very expensive.

[radioman]

Haven't tried the cloud yet and not really planning to as don't trust it.

 

I have 500GB of photos and over 4TB of movies and TV to back up but I doubt the cloud handles these sort of volumes or else would be very expensive.

 

That's quite a haul by any standard. I hope you have them shared across multiple devices. Many of the consumer grade hard disks do not have wonderful life expectancy, I've had 3 fail in a 6 or 7 year period if I'm remembering right. In any case you might want to keep them in different places.

 

It's got me thinking what might be the best solution for large data storage of this kind. Cost no object I would think two physically well separated, maybe in different countries, storage servers with some 50-100Mbps broadband connection to each from wherever you happen to be. The storage servers presumably RAID as well and a nice secure vpn tunnel to the servers.

[The_Munchmaster]

The 4+TB of movies/TV is an issue as obviously I can't keep them on my laptop and then back them up. They are currently stored on 3 x 2TB WD portable HD's but these in turn need to be backed up. So planning to get and store them all on a 6TB WD desktop HD which can then be plugged directly into a smart TV and then the 3 x 2 TB's will act as back up to this. Unless anyone has any better suggestions?

[radioman]

Sounds like a plan. Copying 4TB from one drive to the other will be quite a task in itself mind.