There are a lot of online storage and services being offered to the public these days. And frankly, at times it can be confusing. What with offerings of 5GB free here, or 25GB free there. How does the average person know what to choose from, or how do they make the right decision? The old adage more is better might be deceiving to some when it comes to online storage or services.
A good example is Microsoft’s SkyDrive which offers 25GB of online storage for new customers; while Apple is offering 5GB of online storage through their iCloud service. In addition, both of these companies are offering these capacities for free. So you would say to yourself, “This is a no brainer, Microsoft has the better offering.” That is where you would be mistaken. Microsoft is offering you 25GB of online storage, and that’s it, just storage. You are basically getting a hard drive in the Cloud. While with Apple’s iCloud service you are receiving Cloud services, in addition to a hard drive in the Cloud.
Let me explain. With iCloud all “Your purchased music, apps, books, and TV shows, as well as your Photo Stream, don’t count against your free storage.” So basically you are receiving more than 25GB of online storage in addition to the 5GB of free storage being offered to you by Apple. In a sense Apple is doing what Amazon has done with their Cloud initiative. Any media you purchase on Amazon does not count toward the amount of storage that they are offering for free. Which I believe is 5GB as well, I might be wrong, but I believe that is the limit on a free account.
Now if you simply want online storage; then, Microsoft’s SkyDrive is the way to go. You have your 25GB hard drive in the Cloud, and your data is accessible to you wherever you are. This includes music, documents, photos, and videos. However, if your media is what is important to you, and you already have content with Apple or even Amazon; then the 25GB of SkyDrive might seem more like 5GB in the long run.
Just got my Skydrive configured this weekend. Haven’t put any data out there yet, but it’ll be my backup to Dropbox. Great post gerard lagana
@jameshicksgerard lagana I still like my Dropbox. What’s nice about it is that every time I add someone new I get additional storage space. That’s a win, win in my book.