Dropbox has a war criminal, Condoleeza Rice, on their board and has been known to eagerly cooperate with the NSA. This should be mentioned in every article about Dropbox anywhere.
Don't expect any level of privacy for your data in the cloud, if you need to store important data, then secure the data with good encryption. Or don't store that stuff in the cloud. Doesn't matter what cloud service you choose.
Linux compatibility, better algorithm to deal with mutiple copies of the same data, which many users end up doing, streaming sync, actually works pretty well? Hmm... I can't see any reasons... oh, yeah, and integration with many, many websites, etc.
Doesn't Onedrive have the smallest file size limit of the big three too? I think I read it's 2GB, whereas it's something like 5 & 15GB for Dropbox & Drive.
Probably not a big deal for free accounts but if I'm paying for a TB you better believe I'll wanna be able to dump some big video files on there.
Personally I use all three since I have 22-25GB for free on each (grandfathered on One from the Mesh days, referral bonuses on Dropbox, and Quickoffice promo on Drive).
Dropbox's my most used because they have sync down pat, just works more reliably under certain scenarios. Drive's nice for photos tho... Using Onedrive for backups myself.
No, I don't believe others havn't, or don't, but not all. And we are talking about one of the worst offenders here, so it is important to point this out to anyone whom might me interested in this company. If it was Microsoft One Drive, I would have chipred in similarly.
"Microsoft offers 1TB (defined as 1024GB) of storage plus a Microsoft Office subscription for a fee of $6.99 per month for a single user, or $9.99 per month for a family of up to five people to share plus 5 Microsoft Office installs."
Sorry, meant to also include that you can get a year of the 5-user sub for around $100 or sometimes less if you look in the right places. That's up to 5 TB for much less than $10 a month. Same with the Personal sub, $70 or less per year, so it's actually less than $6 a month.
S3 is still insanely expensive. 1TB of storage on S3 at the largest quantities still costs ~$28 per month (before even talking about transaction or bandwidth fees), so Dropbox has to bet on the average user consuming substantially less than their maximum.
Of course, this could be resolved by Dropbox investing in their own infrastructure like BackBlaze has, but they don't seem interested in that.
The 1TB tier pricing is a step in the right direction, but they're still not doing anything to compete with the lower price tiers (like Google's 100GB-for-$2 tier).
That lower tier on Drive is the one thing that might eventually convince me away from using all three services (since I currently have about 25GB free on each)... It's cheap enough that sheer convenience might override any of the particular benefits on the other services and the redundancy factor.
free cloud storage is the least secure possible - at some point they either go out of business or cancel the service or start charging you for it. You want to pick a provider who is at least breaking even, since it takes a very long time to upload a terabyte of data.
As someone who has spent a considerable amount of time and energy investigating the various cloud services, I've come to appreciate Dropbox above the other commercial solutions. For my secure cloud storage needs I've resorted to either Bittorrent Sync (free) and the Transporter Go. The issue with using your own hardware for clouds functionality is that you are limited by your broadband connection. My upload speed will be the same across my own solution and that of DropBox or Onedrive. The place where a commercial entity shines is the remote download aspect. If you have a lot of files that need to be synced, this will be done the fastest across the board on local hardware, but when you are remote and must sync, your upload becomes your weakest link. Commercial services are able to fill your download bandwidth while out and about. What I've found though that really helps with this is block level syncing. This is where only portions of a file are uploaded and downloaded versus the entire file. Transporters don't support this just yet, but BT Sync does. So does Dropbox. I'm not sure if OneDrive does. This significantly helps with syncing. It works so well with Dropbox's desktop client that it almost made it useable in my case. The problem with all commericial cloud services is that the server has to first upload everything before any local lan sync functionality can be affected. This is a shame. If Dropbox could permit computers on a LAN to realize the most current version of the files are present on that network and sync via the network WHILE the cloud server is being updated it would greatly improve performance across the board, and would actually, at least in my case, make having a local hardware based cloud not necessary. (Not that I would ever get ride of it.) All that said Dropbox's client and backend has always impressed me. They really have the best client and backend in my opinion. I sincerely hope Dropbox could survive the now saturated cloud market.
I just noticed that Dropbox partially improved their upload performance with what they call streaming sync. I suppose the problem with what I'm asking is that it works if you are sure all of your computers are on one network, but if you are geographically separated you run into problems with collaboration use.
Here's what kills DropBox for me: They double and triple count data. This prevents me from sharing large DropBox folders with my collaborators who not have enough storage space left in their accounts (particularly 'free' users).
The person who "owns" the folder should be the only person who has the data count against their quota. Google got this right. It is the reason I will probably be switching to Google Drive, despite Dropbox's increased storage allowance and many years of using their service. It's become more and more problematic as the size of my shared data increases. Sure, it looks like both now offer "1 TB" of data to Pro users, but DropBox does not let me share my folders with my collaborators unless they have enough free space on their accounts for MY FILES AND THEIR FILES. That's a serious problem.
My other major issue is that "Selective Sync" is broken by design. If I add a new folder to Dropbox, it will sync across all of my machines, despite enabling 'selective sync'. There is no way to turn off that hazard. Again, the larger my folders grow on DropBox the more deadly this problem becomes.
The shared folder issue seems like a truly easy fix for Dropbox. Certainly sounds like something they should give some attention too. I've not had any problems with Selective Sync. It appears to work in my use case. Of course I'm using all of 4 gb of space on mine.
Personally I think Dropbox should bite the bullet, get a bunch of capital investment and purchase their own storage space that they own. It would be expensive and take some time to pay down, but in the long run will be the only way they can compete with the like of Google and Microsoft.
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darwinosx - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Dropbox has a war criminal, Condoleeza Rice, on their board and has been known to eagerly cooperate with the NSA.This should be mentioned in every article about Dropbox anywhere.
hammer256 - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Don't expect any level of privacy for your data in the cloud, if you need to store important data, then secure the data with good encryption. Or don't store that stuff in the cloud. Doesn't matter what cloud service you choose.Nuno Simões - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Please don't turn this comment section into YouTube.Artuk - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Drop box has the best record of defending user's privacy and providing transparency.https://www.eff.org/who-has-your-back-2014
But hey, don't let facts get in the way of your rant.
Samus - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
I honestly don't know why anybody would use Dropbox over Onedrive...andrebrait - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Linux compatibility, better algorithm to deal with mutiple copies of the same data, which many users end up doing, streaming sync, actually works pretty well? Hmm... I can't see any reasons... oh, yeah, and integration with many, many websites, etc.krutou - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Dropbox via browser leaves much to be desired though. Dropbox sharing costs storage for the recipient.Plus, MS Office.
Impulses - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Doesn't Onedrive have the smallest file size limit of the big three too? I think I read it's 2GB, whereas it's something like 5 & 15GB for Dropbox & Drive.Probably not a big deal for free accounts but if I'm paying for a TB you better believe I'll wanna be able to dump some big video files on there.
Personally I use all three since I have 22-25GB for free on each (grandfathered on One from the Mesh days, referral bonuses on Dropbox, and Quickoffice promo on Drive).
Dropbox's my most used because they have sync down pat, just works more reliably under certain scenarios. Drive's nice for photos tho... Using Onedrive for backups myself.
Notmyusualid - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Dam, beat me to it.I also wanted to comment on Dropbox as handing over your data too....
I actually read the small print, and closed my account.
Marthisdil - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
And if you think that other people at the other providers don't, or haven't, provided info...you're an idiotNotmyusualid - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Well then, thanks for the insult!No, I don't believe others havn't, or don't, but not all. And we are talking about one of the worst offenders here, so it is important to point this out to anyone whom might me interested in this company. If it was Microsoft One Drive, I would have chipred in similarly.
Now get back under your bridge.
jontech - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
So you hate black folks and want everyone to know. Now we knowHisDivineOrder - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
$6.99 per month and $9.99 per month are "essentially the same pricing?"Ehhhh...
$84 per year and $120 per year are essentially the same?
No, they are not.
maecenas - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
True, they're not the same, but they're at least within the same order of magnitude nowrainking430 - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
"Microsoft offers 1TB (defined as 1024GB) of storage plus a Microsoft Office subscription for a fee of $6.99 per month for a single user, or $9.99 per month for a family of up to five people to share plus 5 Microsoft Office installs."Not exactly accurate. The $9.99 Family Office 365 subscription gives 1 TB for each user, not to share. Source: my own subscription used by my family, plus https://blog.onedrive.com/new-onedrive-storage-pla...
rainking430 - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Sorry, meant to also include that you can get a year of the 5-user sub for around $100 or sometimes less if you look in the right places. That's up to 5 TB for much less than $10 a month. Same with the Personal sub, $70 or less per year, so it's actually less than $6 a month.steven75 - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
That Microsoft price is really good until you realize it doesn't work with anywhere near the 300,000 third-party apps that Dropbox does.bryanb - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Because Dropbox used Amazon S3 to store data, their plan price had to encompass the cost of the Amazon service.I guess they found a cheaper storage alternative now.
MikhailT - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
They're still using S3, they're simply reacting to the lower prices of S3 that Amazon have dropped a few times in the past year.Guspaz - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
S3 is still insanely expensive. 1TB of storage on S3 at the largest quantities still costs ~$28 per month (before even talking about transaction or bandwidth fees), so Dropbox has to bet on the average user consuming substantially less than their maximum.Of course, this could be resolved by Dropbox investing in their own infrastructure like BackBlaze has, but they don't seem interested in that.
The 1TB tier pricing is a step in the right direction, but they're still not doing anything to compete with the lower price tiers (like Google's 100GB-for-$2 tier).
Impulses - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
That lower tier on Drive is the one thing that might eventually convince me away from using all three services (since I currently have about 25GB free on each)... It's cheap enough that sheer convenience might override any of the particular benefits on the other services and the redundancy factor.nerd1 - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Baidu already gives away 3TB of cloud storage for free. Yes it won't be secure, but no cloud storage is anyway...bsd228 - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
free cloud storage is the least secure possible - at some point they either go out of business or cancel the service or start charging you for it. You want to pick a provider who is at least breaking even, since it takes a very long time to upload a terabyte of data.2disbetter - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
As someone who has spent a considerable amount of time and energy investigating the various cloud services, I've come to appreciate Dropbox above the other commercial solutions. For my secure cloud storage needs I've resorted to either Bittorrent Sync (free) and the Transporter Go. The issue with using your own hardware for clouds functionality is that you are limited by your broadband connection. My upload speed will be the same across my own solution and that of DropBox or Onedrive. The place where a commercial entity shines is the remote download aspect. If you have a lot of files that need to be synced, this will be done the fastest across the board on local hardware, but when you are remote and must sync, your upload becomes your weakest link. Commercial services are able to fill your download bandwidth while out and about. What I've found though that really helps with this is block level syncing. This is where only portions of a file are uploaded and downloaded versus the entire file. Transporters don't support this just yet, but BT Sync does. So does Dropbox. I'm not sure if OneDrive does. This significantly helps with syncing. It works so well with Dropbox's desktop client that it almost made it useable in my case. The problem with all commericial cloud services is that the server has to first upload everything before any local lan sync functionality can be affected. This is a shame. If Dropbox could permit computers on a LAN to realize the most current version of the files are present on that network and sync via the network WHILE the cloud server is being updated it would greatly improve performance across the board, and would actually, at least in my case, make having a local hardware based cloud not necessary. (Not that I would ever get ride of it.) All that said Dropbox's client and backend has always impressed me. They really have the best client and backend in my opinion. I sincerely hope Dropbox could survive the now saturated cloud market.2disbetter - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
I just noticed that Dropbox partially improved their upload performance with what they call streaming sync. I suppose the problem with what I'm asking is that it works if you are sure all of your computers are on one network, but if you are geographically separated you run into problems with collaboration use.TrackSmart - Wednesday, August 27, 2014 - link
Here's what kills DropBox for me: They double and triple count data. This prevents me from sharing large DropBox folders with my collaborators who not have enough storage space left in their accounts (particularly 'free' users).The person who "owns" the folder should be the only person who has the data count against their quota. Google got this right. It is the reason I will probably be switching to Google Drive, despite Dropbox's increased storage allowance and many years of using their service. It's become more and more problematic as the size of my shared data increases. Sure, it looks like both now offer "1 TB" of data to Pro users, but DropBox does not let me share my folders with my collaborators unless they have enough free space on their accounts for MY FILES AND THEIR FILES. That's a serious problem.
My other major issue is that "Selective Sync" is broken by design. If I add a new folder to Dropbox, it will sync across all of my machines, despite enabling 'selective sync'. There is no way to turn off that hazard. Again, the larger my folders grow on DropBox the more deadly this problem becomes.
2disbetter - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
The shared folder issue seems like a truly easy fix for Dropbox. Certainly sounds like something they should give some attention too. I've not had any problems with Selective Sync. It appears to work in my use case. Of course I'm using all of 4 gb of space on mine.Personally I think Dropbox should bite the bullet, get a bunch of capital investment and purchase their own storage space that they own. It would be expensive and take some time to pay down, but in the long run will be the only way they can compete with the like of Google and Microsoft.
icebox - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Why is it more expensive for europe? The price is 9.99eur (~13$) instead of the 9.99$Drazick - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Nothing beats Microsoft OneDrive's integration with Windows / Office and price.I see no reason for Windows 7 / 8 users to chose something else, really.