Reviewing Carbonite

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Online Storage Update For November 2011

It’s been almost 5 years since I wrote this post – reviewing Carbonite’s online back up service. Since 5 years is like an eternity in the technology world I wanted to take a moment to review the best online storage services for 2011.

The interesting thing is that Carbonite is still the market leader in this space, but they have a lot more competition. OnlineStorage.com has over 20 online backup services listed on their online backup comparison chart alone.

What I determined is that Carbonite is still the best of breed in the personal online storage space, but that SugarSync is a better alternative for business users. They have important features that are must haves for businesses, such as sub accounts, file syncing, and file sharing.

Original Post

I recently signed up to be an agent at BzzAgent.   BzzAgent is very, very cool.

Part of becoming a BzzAgent is that companies who have products or services that are interested in creating “Buzz” are matched with their target demographic.  The BzzAgents, then, receive free products to try out.  After some time, the BzzAgent creates an honest report of the service or product.   Several months ago, I intereviewed Sam Clemens of BzzAgent, and this is his explanation of their service:

Marketers (either product companies or their ad agencies) tell us who they are targeting and give us samples of the new product. We send those samples to the slice of our user “agent” base that matches the target demographic. Our deal with the agents is that if they like the product and talk about it, they need to tell us in a report so we can pass the feedback to the advertiser. They also need to say that they got the product from us (we get a lot of new agents this way). The agent gets a cool new product to try, the advertiser gets measurable word-of-mouth distribution, and everyone’s happy.

Pretty simple.

My first campaign was to test Carbonite.  Through BzzAgent, I was given a 3 month free subscription to Carbonite.  Carbonite is an online PC backup service that, for a flat yearly fee, provides unlimited backups of your machine. Recommended by PC World and CNET.com, it works automatically in the background without slowing your computer or Internet connection (this is their claim).  If you’re interested in trying it out, I’m able to give free trials with no credit cards involved — so it’s totally risk-free.  Here’s the shpeal they provide me:

I just learned about a new service called Carbonite Online Backup that gives me peace of mind by automatically backing up all of the data on my PC, including my photos, documents, emails, financial records and music. Once I started thinking about how bad it would be to lose all of that stuff, I signed up for the service. Actually, it really wasn’t a tough decision, because thanks to BzzAgent, I’m trying it for free! You can try it free, too, with this special offer that I can send to my friends and family.  If you have a PC running Windows XP or Vista, and a high-speed Internet connection like DSL or cable, you can try a one-month free trial subscription. It takes most people only a few minutes to download the software and it starts working immediately to securely backup files over the Internet. You don’t have to put in your credit card to try it, so it’s really risk-free.  Be sure to enter offer code BZZ after you click on this link to sign up:  I’ll be interested to hear what you think!

• Recommended by technology experts at PC World, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and CNET
• Simplicity and peace of mind for pennies a day
• “Set and forget” automatic and secure online backup service
• Automatically protects your all your data against crashes, theft, loss or damage
• Risk-free trial – no credit card required
• Only $49.95/year, for unlimited data backup
• Works with PCs running Windows XP or Vista
• Available online at carbonite.com or at major retailers nationwide including Staples and Comp USA

Moreover, Carbonite claims the following statistics on data loss:

• 31% of PC users have lost all of their files due to events beyond their control
• 40% of data loss is caused by hard drive failure; 29% is caused by human error
• The average lifespan of a hard drive is 3-5 years, but all hard drives will eventually fail
• Each year, 2 million notebook computers are reported stolen
• 97% of stolen PCs are never recovered

So, on to my honest review.

The Review

I downloaded the Carbonite installer and it installed pretty seamlessly.  I was then prompted to backup folders or files and I selected two critical directories that I wanted to backup.  The data that I decided to backup amounted to 3.2 Gigabytes.  I started the backup and ~19 hours later, the backup was complete.  All during the backup, my system performance was not impacted at all.

To identify the items you want to backup, you just have to right-click on the directory and a blue mark is made on the directory.  Here is an image of that process:

Below is the look-and-feel of the Carbonite control panel:

All in all, the service is really easy to use.  I just selected the items that need to be backed-up, then I move on with life.  It was easy to use; responsive; and, seemed reliable based on my short testing of the system.

Creating Buzz

I am friends with the guys at Mozy, a competitor to Carbonite.   I’m also familiar with Omnidrive, Nik’s company, another competitor in the backup space.  So, I have experience with 3 services in this very competetive market.   I created buzz by blogging about my honest experience and by emailing the guys at Mozy and at Omnidrive and 9 other friends also.

Would I Recommend Carbonite?

Based on the service alone, sure.  It was super easy to use, with an attractive and usable interface.  Because this was a free-trial for me, I wasn’t concerned about the price.  But, given the competitors and the wide-range of prices, I imagine that some would be price-sensitive.  So, yes, I recommend Carbonite, but check out their fees and compare their fees with the other players in this space.

Personal Note: After reviewing Omnidrive, Carbonite, and Mozy, and other Online Storage, I can comfotably say that I Dropbox.

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