14 October 2008
Data Deposit Box
While looking for software to help my brother set up a blog for his real estate business, I got lost in a cascade of tasks and never got back to address his request. First, I decided to try out Drupal for him by setting it up on my server. Ah, but to set that up, I want to first perform some database (MySQL) and scripting (PHP) upgrades that were long overdue. And before I do any upgrades, I need to fix the sorry state of backup that exists on the ether network. At this point, I've bottomed out in my spelunking adventure and can begin.
I was using Mozy for backup, but it wouldn't install on Windows server, wouldn't grab data from network shares, and would only allow backups from one machine. To get it to kindof work, I had a Windows backup scheduled and then had Mozy (attempt to) backup the bakup file. Being ~1.5 GIG, it usually failed to upload. Several coworkers use Carbonite and several others use DropBox. I'd heard Carbonite was like Mozy, but saw that it doesn't support my older Window machines (XP and Vista only). DropBox works with a specific folder structure and doesn't allow you to "assign" folders as DropBox folders. Their interface is beatiful and simple, but if they won't grab my pst files or my database files it's of little use.
I did a quick search and found Sanjay Parekh's article from two years ago comparing various services. He has different requirements than me, but provides a good overview. From those services reviewed, Data Deposit Box ended up working the best: any number of machines, network shares, and $2/GB/month. The only downside is that it's currently Windows-only. I've been using it for maybe two weeks and--although I haven't had a restore emergency--have been completely satisfied.
(three machines from the network show up in DDB's web browser admin interface, files are shareable and retrievable anywhere)
[ updated 2 Mar 2009 ]
Reddit points to the article "Online storage, five of the best.." They compare Mozy, Humyo, Livedrive, Box.net, and GMail drive.
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