Store And Access Your Files In The Cloud with Gladinet

have you ever wanted to be able to access your files from any device, regardless of where you are or how much storage or processing power that device has?  You are probably using cloud services already without realising it – webmail is a classic example.

For a few months now I’ve been using SugarSync to sync and backup all the files on my PCs, as well as allowing me to access them remotely.  However, to view many files with SugarSync you need to have the necessary applications installed so that files can be stored.

Gladinet who have purchased this review offer a potential solution to this problem.  Gladinet’s Cloud Desktop program allows users to not only store documents and files in the cloud, but to also use applications stored in the cloud to open the files i.e you don’t need to have a spreadsheet program installed on your PC to be able to open a spreadsheet stored in your Gladinet Cloud Storage.  Currently file formats supported by Google Apps are supported, although Zoho Suite integration is promised in the future.

Main features of Gladinet Cloud Desktop:

• Backup Google Docs™ to Local and/or Cloud Storage
• Map Cloud Storage As a Virtual Drive
• Incremental Backup to One or More Cloud Storage Service
• Manage Tasks with a Versatile and Powerful Task Manager
• Enjoy Enterprise Level Scalability for Large Transfers
• Transfer Files 10x Faster with Advanced Acceleration Technology
• Protect your online credentials with Profile Encryption
• Gladinet Cloud File Type Association
• Open local file using cloud applications such as Google Docs

Missing in the list of features is how much online storage Gladinet provide – for instance with SugarSync I get 250GB for $250/pa.  I searched for a while and couldn’t find the answer and then it dawned on me that Gladinet doesn’t offer any online storage in its pricing, instead letting customers choose their own online backup service provider:

Gladinet let’s you decide where to backup your data. Other online service providers want to lock you into their backend. With Gladinet, you can use Amazon S3, EMC Atmos Online, Box.net and many others. The current list of supported providers is available in the Gladinet Cloud Storage Directory. This list is continually growing as plugins are added by Gladinet or 3rd party users of the Gladinet SDK.

At first glance this may seem ok particularly as Gladinet include built-in support, but using these services can significantly drive up costs.  Gladinet itself may only cost only $39.99, but if I were to buy 250GB of storage from Amazon S3 it would cost me $540/pa ($450 in the US) alone.  On top of this Amazon charge for data transfer in ($0.1/GB) and out at $0.17/GB so if I wanted to play a 10 track (5MB track size average) music album it would cost me $8.5 to listen to the album.

For this reason, if you need online backup storage you should always go with a provider like Sugarsync who offer 2GB of storage for free, that are running their own online backup service.  Services that rely on 3rd party providers like Amazon S3 are just too expensive to use.

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