Review of Carbonite Online Backup
When was the last time you backed up your computer? If you are like most people, you know you SHOULD backup but there's always tomorrow, or this week, or soon... The procrastination is mainly due to the fact that it can be a bit of a pain. You have to remind yourself to do it and then get the right hardware and software etc. The bottom line is that most people don't back up nearly as often as they should. That can be a tremendous mistake. I know quite a few people who were devastated when their files, photos and programs were gone in an instant.
Is There An Easy Solution?I recently came across an online backup service that caught my eye. Carbonite has an automated backup service that appeared to remove the obstacles which prevented me from trying such as service in the past. In particular: Cost - It is less than $5 per monthAmount of storage - unlimitedEasy of use - Beautifully explained in their tagline: "Backup. Simple."Turns out it is very simple.
How It Works
There is a 15 day free trial which doesn't require a credit card to try. (Smart marketing by the way). They know that when you try it for free, you will be hooked. I am. Cabonite's software sits in the background on your computer with a minimal amount of resources used. It waits for periods of inactivity and then it gets to work. It starts backing up the directories that you have asked it to. I started by only have it backup certain folders (My Documents specifically) which is where I keep the essential things. A status window shows you how the backup is coming:
Once those essential files were backed up, I then choose other less important folders to be backed up. It was easy to do. I simply opened up my explorer window, right clicked and choose the "Back this up" option from the Carbonite menu item. They were then automatically backed up when my computer was idle. Carbonite shows you while files have been backed up with little dots on the files as shown here:
Drawbacks
The biggest drawback is that you will need a high speed connection. That last thing you want is to try and backup several gigs of data over a slow internet connection. As it is, it can take several days for everything to be backed up that you want. Yes, I did say days. If your hard drive is dying, you don't want to suddenly jump on this as a backup option. BUT... once the back up is complete, then it only backups files which have changed. In other words after the initial backup, everything else happens very quickly and automatically.
Recommended?
Yes, I highly recommend checking out Carbonite's backup service. I liked it so much that I bought my wife Kathleen a subscription to it as well for her computer. Why not? It is inexpensive and works great! Try it out with their free trial. I bet you end up staying with it. When your computer crashes one day and this saves your sanity, feel free to send me a thank you email!
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