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Checking Out Free (And Cheap) Online Storage And Content Sharing Alternatives To .Mac [Updated]
•Hot Topics •News •Reviews •Internet Reviews •MooresViews •Comments •Tell-a-Friend
Seven years ago, Apple announced a suite of free Internet services called iTools, featuring Mac.com - an email service run by Apple, iDisk - 20 megabytes of Internet-based storage on Apple’s Servers to store, transfer and share files over the Internet, HomePage - to build your own website and host it on Apple’s servers, plus KidSafe, iReview and iCards. Membership to iTools was free to Macintosh users running Mac OS 9. iReview and iCards were free to all computer users. iTools was pretty cool, but unhappily it didn't last - at least as a free service.
At Macworld Expo, New York on July 17, 2002, Apple announced the termination of iTools as of September 30, 2002, and replaced it with an enhanced service called .Mac. The punch line was that .Mac would not be free, but have a hefty annual subscription fee of $99.95. Like many other former iTools account-holders, I bailed. While it's arguable that .Mac subscribers get reasonable value for their money, I was mainly interested in email and online backups at the time, and there are a passel of other good choices in free email services, and several alternatives for online storage as we shall see. I don't have broadband, and many of the .Mac features are just haertbreakingly slow over dial-up. Even the homepage takes forever to load. For dial-up users (still some 40 percent of Internet users in the U.S. and Canada), the usable value just isn't there.
If you have broadband, .Mac offers:
Publishing with iWeb
Makes it easy to publish your websites with a single click of a button
iDisk
.Mac iDisk makes it easy to exchange files with friends or centralize your documents so that you can access them anywhere, at any time.
Groups
Communicate, coordinate, and stay in sync with your club, team, or organization. .Mac Groups includes a group email address and website
Sync
.Mac Sync keeps up-to-date information at your fingertips, whether you use multiple Macs or whether you’re on the road without your Mac.
Member Benefits
Exclusive member benefits include free software downloads as well as special product discounts — all available through Member Central.
Photocasting
Let your friends and family subscribe to your shared iPhoto albums and view your full-resolution photos on their own computers.
Backup 3
Powerful upgrade to .Mac Backup. Scheduled automatic backups are as easy
.Mac Mail is ad-free and elegant, with virus protection built right in. And you can access it through Mac OS X Mail or through new .Mac webmail.
Learning Center
The Learning Center offers step-by-step tutorials on the applications you use most, including iLife, iWork, Mac OS X, and .Mac.
No flies on any of this, and if you have broadband and think you would be getting your money's worth, cough up the US$99.95/CAN$139.00/€99.00/£68.99 and go for it.
For more information, visit:
http://www.apple.com/dotmac/
For the rest of us, check out my Omnbus Guide to Free Email Services for email, while basic online storage and not-so-basic photocasting and content sharing are available from a variety of services for free or not vary much money. I checked several of the latter out this week, and found that some even work decently well over my slow-as-molasses-in-February dialup connection. Here's what I discovered.
Omnidrive File Storage and Zoho Web-Based Office Suite
Omnidrive is an online storage platform that can be accessed with a Web browser, the Omnidrive client tools, or with applications built using the Omnidrive API. Omnidrive requires a user account and registration is free. Omnidrive allows you to store all your files online without sacrificing the speed, availability and security of local desktop files. Omnidrive is an open platform, meaning you are able to access your data from any application - not just the Omnidrive client applications.
The Omnidrive Web Interface allows you to access, share and publish your files from most modern web browsers. The web interface acts and performs in a similar fashion to the desktop clients, except that there is no software to install. The web interface also includes the ability to edit and share office documents, a music player and an image viewer.
Zoho, the web application provider, and Omnidrive have announced a technology partnership that provides users of the Omnidrive platform the ability to view, edit, share and publish office and other types of documents from directly within Omnidrive using Zoho products.
Users of Omnidrive will be able to double-click on any supported document from within the Omnidrive web interface to directly edit documents using Zoho applications. Omnidrive allows a user to securely store all their files online, and with this partnership users are no longer required to download their documents to view or edit them. The supported Zoho applications include Zoho Write, a word processor, Zoho Sheet, an online spreadsheet and Zoho Show, a web-based presentation editor. The supported document types range from Word documents and HTML pages through to PowerPoint presentations.
Omnidrive offers or plans to offer a number of different interfaces to access your Omnidrive. Currently these are:
* Windows Client - The Omnidrive desktop client will install a drive under ‘My Computer’ from where you can drag and drop and access your files. Omnidrive also adds a number of options to your right-click menu so that you can click on any folder or file and publish it, share it or link it to Omnidrive.
* Mac Client (still in private beta) - In the Mac world Omnidrive integrates into Finder giving you fast an easy access. The Mac client also gives you extra options in your context menu to easily share, publish and link files to Omnidrive. Mac Client is currently in Private Beta.
* Web Interface - Take advantage of Omnidrive’s desktop-like experience from any web browser. Simply visit the Omnidrive homepage and click ‘login’ or visit the ‘Web Interface’ page in the menu to the right to find out more.
The Omnidrive Mac client will allow you to access your Omnidrive the same way you access other documents stored on your PC or another device. It is the best and fastest way to access, share and publish files. You can find Omnidrive under 'My Computer'
Currently the Mac client is in private beta testing and the release has been delayed. However the web interface is still available for Mac users.
To try out Omnidrive, go to: http://www.omnidrive.com and click 'Signup'. To test out the integration with Zoho upload or create a new Word or OpenOffice document using either the web interface or the Windows client and then double-click on it.
OmniDrive's user interface has a definite Windowsy flavor to it, reminding me a bit of Mozilla's ThunderBird email client. It operates on the three-window, folder list metaphor, and is more oriented toward storage than sharing or publishing (although both of the latter are certainly supported).
The upload progress readout was also poky compared with some of the others. In general the interface was very slow and sluggish on my dialup connection, but I'll give it credit for working without any glitches, and this should not be a problem for the now majority on broadband.
The Omnidrive web interface can be found at:
http://web.omnidrive.com
DivShare Offers Free, Unlimited File Storage Online
DivShare is another new virtual hard drive service, offering a free, unlimited place to store and share photos, documents, and almost every other type of file.
DivShare allows users to upload an unlimited number of files and serve unlimited downloads, and every file stays online forever. This approach gives users the freedom to share their work with the world, and DivShare's privacy features also provide a safe, password-protected place to store backups and personal files.
DivShare opened its doors for live testing on December 18, 2006, and in the site's first month more than 10,000 registered users have uploaded more than 50,000 files.
"The response to DivShare has been amazing, both from the tech media and thousands of happy users," says Rob Howard, president of Diversion Web Publishing and co-founder of DivShare. "And based on all those comments, we've spent the last month adding new features and making DivShare the best file host online."
DivShare's simple, easy-to-use sharing options allow users to email a link to their files to anyone in the world, create elegant photo galleries, and keep their sensitive files private. And from the sleek online dashboard, DivShare users can search their files, make privacy changes, and co-brand their download pages with their name, logo and a link to their own Web site.
DivShare features:
* Track all your files on the member dashboard.
* Keep your files private or share them with the world.
* Add your name, link and logo to your downloads.
* We'll never sell your info or send you spam, and your account will always be free.
* Upload as many files as you want,
up to 200 MB at a time.
* Track your files on the dashboard.
* To create a gallery, upload the first images here, then add as many as you want on the next screen.
* You can upload any safe file type, and we'll create thumbnails for your JPG, GIF and PNG images.
* Your files stay online forever — there's no expiration date, no matter what.
With co-branding, you can add your name, logo and link to your download pages. It gives your visitors a more seamless experience when they check out your files, and it keeps your name in the limelight the whole time.
Adding a name or logo turns co-branding on. Logos will be resized to a max width of 450 pixels, or a max height of 60.
Thanks to DivShare, storing and sharing files online has never been easier. To sign up for a free account and start sharing today, point your browser to:
http://www.divshare.com
You can also:
Finally, set your files free
Upload as many files as you want,
up to 200 MB at a time.
Track your files on the dashboard.
To create a gallery, upload the first images here, then add as many as you want on the next screen.
You can upload any safe file type, and we'll create thumbnails for your JPG, GIF and PNG images.
Your files stay online forever — there's no expiration date, no matter what.
It's as easy as they say it is. It took me all of 30 seconds to sign up for a free account.
DivShare has a cheerful-looking, user-friendly and quick user interface too, and offers the option of sending an email notification to a friend with the image URL.
It doesn't show your transfer speed, but does give you a readout of how much time is left along with the progress bar. When the upload is complete, a screen appears showing various URL options for the uploaded file, as well as links to Facebook, AIM, DIGG, and del.icio.us.
Very nice. I like this service.
For more information, visit:
http://www.divshare.com/login
Badongo.com Free Web Storage
Badongo.com is a free file hosting site that enables you to upload an unlimited amount of files, photos, videos, music, to store for personal use and access, or to send to friends, family and colleagues. Users have access to all of Badongo's free widgets like the music player, file widget, flash slideshows and Badongo Buddy (Windows) for fun and easy access to all of their files. Badongo's servers are connected to the Internet via several fast gigabit connections spread out across multiple datacenters in the U.S. to insure that the site is always up and running.
To meet the growing demand Badongo.com has just doubled its online storage capacity from 50 terabytes to 100 terabytes of redundant storage. Since Badongo's creation just over a year ago the number of users has and continues to grow exponentially.
"With over 1,000,000 unique visitors every day our storage capacity was starting to fill up pretty quickly," says Badongo CEO Patrick Boden. "At the rate we're going we will have to double our storage capacity in only a few months from now, which is great because it means we've created something that continues to be useful to people around the world."
Badongo.com uses redundant storage, a method that insures user files are always secure. When files are uploaded to the site, they are stored on multiple hard drives. Should one hard drive happen to go down for unforeseen reasons, the user's files will always be safely stored in another location. This way no files are lost.
Badongo.com was created in late 2005 as the brainchild of web wunderkind Patrick Boden. Beginning as a simple favor for friends who wished to send large files easily, requests soon arrived for similar services. One year later, Badongo now serves over a million unique visitors each day! Patrick Boden is the CEO of ICL Ltd. based in Santa Monica, California and utilizes developers, designers and programmers on four different continents to keep the site up to date and efficient. Mr. Boden is a frequent guest commentator on Fox News Channel and has been quoted in countless news articles.
Signing up was pretty quick and straightforward, after a couple of failures with the multi-font authentication key (is it a lower-case l, a a 1, or what?).
The Badongo site definitely works well. I encountered no dialup related difficulties, and got the usual 2.4 - 2.8 Kb/sec transfer speeds that I'm obliged to live with here in the backwoods. There is a nice progress bar that keeps you informed as to how uploads are proceeding, and you can flag uploaded material as to whether it is suitable for minors or not. I would personally prefer a default "Yes" option for that.
When the transfer is complete, a screen appears with a variety of URL addresses for the uploaded file.
Unfortunately, Badongo singificantly cripples its free accounts. Here is a chart comparing levels of service between their free accounts and the "Turbo" accounts at $5.99 - $9.99 per month (depending on length of membership signed on for).
For more information, visit:
http://www.badongo.com
Box.net Free/Cheap Online Storage Alternative To .Mac
Box.net is a virtual storage space for your files. With packages starting at $4.99 per month for 5GB, you will have enough space to hold thousands of Documents, Photos, Music Files, and Video Clips. Try it out out for as long as you'd like by signing up for a 1GB free account. Whether you want to move files among multiple computers, backup important data in the event of a computer crash, or share documents and photos with friends and colleagues, Box.net is for you.
Box.net features:
- Save backup copies of important files
- Always have a backup plan to prevent data loss in case of computer failure
- Move documents between your computers
- Use your Box to transfer files so that you can work on them in any location
- Setup sub-accounts for multiple user access
- A perfect solution for small businesses and workgroups requiring collaboration
- Store photos and other important memories
- Relax! Your priceless files and photos are always safe
- Share files or create online photo galleries
- Hassle-free sharing; show off your vacation photos or send a file to a friend!
- Online File Storage Access important files from any computer
- Share photos, and files too big for email
- Host media on your blog or website Sub-accounts and RSS feeds for groups
- Website is easy to use
- Nothing to lose or break, really.
- Unlike physical storage, your Box won't break, get lost, or become obsolete
- Security, Security, Security
- Servers are secure and redundant, so your files are always protected
- Responsive Technical Support to call or email 24 hours a day
- No banner ads, spam, or annoying popups
- Box.net's zero-ad policy means nothing will get in between you and your files
- Try 1GB account for free, for as long as you want
Friendly user interface makes storing and retrieving your files easy
Premium and Pro users can share files with anyone via a public link (which can be password protected). Basic account users can only share their files with any other Box.net user.
When you make a file or folder public, you'll be provided with a unique website address which can be accessed by anyone you give the link to. For additional security, you can even add a required password for access, chosen by you. Best of all, RSS feeds can be automatically created for certain folders, letting your subscribers receive instant updates of your files.
Box.net's public sharing:
Post a file on a website or blog for public download
Box.net lets you post photos, music clips, and files directly to your Blog
Photo galleries, accessible anytime and anywhere
Group pictures in one location for easy sharing, viewing, and downloading
Privacy, just the way you like it
When shared, each file and folder is provided with a unique address
Box.net Widget
If you want to add files to your blog, share files with your friends on your Myspace page, or whatever, you might consider trying the Box.net Widget. Within your Box account, you can generate a widget by clicking on the menu for your folder, and selecting "Get a widget".
If you don't have a box.net account, you can get started with the widget quickly by visiting:
http://www.Box.net/lite
- Quick and easy setup
- Just click on any folder in your box, and add it to your site.
- Compatible
- Add to your blog, website, or Myspace page.
- Complete administrative control
- No hard work, no coding, no mess. Just copy and paste.
- Stream Live
- Instant gratification, just click the music file and listen!
I found Box.net's interface a bit slower than DivShare and Badongo, but it does have the advantage of supporting drag & drop uploads. Again, the relative sluggishness probably wouldn't even be a noteworthy issue on broadband. However, remember that you only get 1GB space for free on Box.net.
The Box.net upload progress dialog shows both the amount of kilobytes transferred/still to transfer, and the transfer speed. However, Box.net does not supply you with a readout of URL links for the uploaded file like DivShare and Badongo do.
System requirements:
All you need is an active internet connection and Windows 2000 or higher, or Mac OSX. The following browsers are supported: Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, Netscape, Opera, and AOL.
For more information, visit:
http://www.box.net/
MyOtherDrive.com Free On-line File Storage and Sharing Site
MyOtherDrive.com is a free 5GB hard drive with an Internet Explorer-style interface that provides storage anywhere Internet access is available and the ability to allow access selectively to others. In addition to offering the same benefits as other photo-sharing sites, such as Yahoo, Flikr, and SmugMugPress
ByteRocket, a start-up firm located in Dayton, Ohio, has just released a major upgrade to MyOtherDrive.com.
Although ( http://myotherdrive.com ) MyOtherDrive.com handles photo-sharing especially well (pictures can be uploaded in batches and rotated after uploading), any file type can be stored on the site: office documents, PDFs, videos, music, and photos.
Features
* Store up to 5GB of any digital media for Free
* Store files larger than 1GB
* Create an online photo and video album.
* Create an online portfolio.
* Link back to your photos from auctions and blogs.
* Share your videos and pictures with anyone.
* Backup your important files.
In addition to offering the same benefits as other photo-sharing sites, such as Yahoo, Flikr, and SmugMug, MyOtherDrive.com competes with broader file-sharing sites Kazaa and eDonkey, and even YouTube. However, MyOtherDrive.com users can specify who can access the files on their site--a significant advantage over other "public" sites.
The distinction between private and public content is an important one: because MyOtherDrive.com permits adding groups, such as family, friends, and coworkers, you can share your personal/family photographs with family only, and your public photographs and files with others. You control how to share your content: you can make everything public or you can create multiple groups and be selective about which group sees what content.
In addition, the email (invite) feature builds a "Friends" list out of your social network. You can invite anyone to view the pictures or files that define you. You can also email out a hyperlink to others that lets them view your pictures, even if they are not a member of MyOtherDrive.com--an important distinction from sites such as MySpace.com, which require visitors to be members as well.
The site runs as a Java applet similar to the Microsoft Windows Explorer or ACDSee, permitting the user to create a folder "hierarchy" on the left side of the screen with a list of files on the right. Images conveniently display as thumbnails. Future enhancements to MyOtherDrive.com include more "social networking" features, such as blogging, photo/video tagging, and friends search.
Unfortunately, I found MyOtherDrive's not very attractive, very Windows-homely user interface essentially unusable via my dialup connection, or at least that is my guess as to the difficulty. It could also be compatibility issues with the Mac Java implementation and/or non-Microsoft browsers. The service has many potentially convenient features, and perhaps broadband users will have better luck.
For more information, visit:
http://myotherdrive.com
gDisk 0.6.1 For Data Storage On Gmail
If you're just looking for convenient, free online storage, gDisk is Open Source software that turns your GMail account into a portable hard drive so you can always have your important files accessible across the Internet.
gDisk is a cool little Open Source software utility that turns your Gmail account into a virtual "portable hard drive" so you can always have your important files available anywhere yo have access to an Internet connected computer.
Gmail offers a whopping 2.7 GB of storage space - a capacity that few users will ever come close to filling with archived email messages. For example, I have more than nine years of email archives from some two dozen email accounts archived in my Eudora Mail Folder, and it's still a relatively minuscule 257 MB (which is one of the reasons why I just love Eudora) - less than 10 percent of the free space on my Gmail account.
The gDisk utility lets you put that unused Gmail space to work for storing stuff that you might find useful to have available online, or just for backup purposes.
gDisk is a 1 GB and change download, and I found using it simplicity itself. You simply type in the username and password for your Gmail account, and you're in (much faster than Gmail comes up in a browser), with an intuitive interface for transferring files to and from the Gmail archive, where they are stored in virtual "folders" called "labels," of which you can create as many as you like.
The Upload button opens a generic OS X Finder navigation dialog, from which you can make your selection. Note that one limitation is that gDisk only supports transfer of actual data files - not folders, for instance. The workaround for that is to compress a folder using OS X's Zip compression or Stuffit.
Selected files show up in the Queue window and are automatically uploaded to the Gmail server. Retrieval is just a reverse process activated by a toolbar button, or you can just drag and drop.
Clicking on a label icon reveals the contents of that label.
gDisk Features:
• Auto detects Mac OS X Proxy Server Settings
• Access multiple GMail account at the same time (MAY NOT WORK IF YOU ARE BEHIND A PROXY)
• Create / Delete gDisk-specific labels.
• Upload / Download any file.
• Drag n' Drop files from / to Finder.
• gDisk can automatically check for software updates.
Known Issues :
- When a gDisk label is deleted, its content is not moved to the trash bin.
- You cannot empty the trash bin from gDisk, you have to log into
your Gmail account with a browser and do it manually.
- Only regular files can be uploaded. Folders and bundles directories
are not yet supported. A workaround is to archive them in a Zip file
before uploading.
New in version 0.6.1:
- Support for large files (files bigger than 10 MB)
- Improved label content listing. - If you used gDisk 0.1 to 0.5, I suggest you download and upload back every file you put on your account in order to enjoy faster listing.
- Improved transfer speed and overall CPU Usage
- Several bugs have been fixed when accessing multiple accounts at the same time
- gDisk is now compiled as a Universal Binary so it runs natively on all Mac.
System requirements:
* A Mac with Mac OS X (10.3 or above)
* A Google GMail account. To get a GMail account your currently need to be invited by a someone who is already a member of GMail. Check http://www.gmailtools.com/ , they often have invitations available.
System support:
PPC/Intel
Free
For more information, visit:
http://gdisk.sourceforge.net/
OrbitFiles Offers n 50 Gigs Online File Storage Space for $20 per Year
If you need a lot of online storage space, Orbitfiles.com, a leading online file storage service provider, recently launched its new pricing plans for Zeus Plan and, the newly established, Apollo Plan. With Orbitfiles.com new pricing plans, users can now enjoy enormous storage space starting from as low as $10 per year
Zeus Plan now offers 50 Gigs of space for $20 per year, and Apollo Plan gives out 20 Gigs of space for only $10 per year. Platon Plan that comes with 1 Gig of storage and unlimited bandwidth, remains free.
ALL Plans come with unlimited bandwidth usage and superior features.
Payments can now be processed via Paypal.com and Egold.com. It also allows users to change plan quickly and securely.
Orbitfiles.com, a Liverpool UK, web2.0 based company, has over 40,000 users today. Members can store files (such as pictures, documents, movies, MP3s, etc), access them from any computer and share them securely with friends and peers.
For more information, you may log on to:
http://www.orbitfiles.com
The verdict?
My favorite among these services is DivShare which has an attractive, user-friendly and informative user interface that works speedily and without any bugginess even on a Mac over a dial-up connection. Box.net is nearly as good, but not quite as fast, and you only get 1 GB of capacity for free. Need more and there is a fee.
Omnidrive works well too, although not quite as slickly, but has a depth of features and of course the Zoho web applications if that is of interest, and will be worth revisiting once the promised Mac software client is available.
MyOtherDrive was a disappointment, especially after its very attractive signup home page. Too Windows-esque, an unattractive user interface, and hobbled by Java sluggishness (presumably).
Badongo has a nice interface, but the limitations on their free accounts make them unattractive by comparison with DivShare and Box.net.
gDisk works well within its circumscriptions. I didn't try out the for-fee-only OrbitFiles, but I would be surprised if it didn't work nicely too if you need the extra capacity.
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Charles W. Moore
•Hot Topics •News •Reviews •Internet Reviews •MooresViews •Comments •Tell-a-Friend
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