Cloud storage - what are you using?

[Harrison]

What do you use (if anything) for cloud storage?

One of the first cloud storage solutions everyone used was Dropbox. I hadn't used it in years so thought my old account must be long gone, but I recovered my account and logged in and all the files were still there, which is great for file retention and peace of mind. But I've not actually used Dropbox for anything in years so most of the files were no longer of any importance.

I checked the account types and they do still provide a basic free account with 2 GB of storage, automatic file syncing across up to three devices, and the ability to share files and folders. It is a permanent, no-cost plan. So that's good. More than enough storage space for general files.

I used to use if for automatic photo backup from my phone years ago, but then Google came out with Google Drive and started offering unlimited Image backup for Android users so I didn't need it any more for thar.

And Microsoft insist on forcing you to have a OneDrive account these days just by logging into Windows. So I have that because it was forced on me. And it bugs me all the time how Windows defaults to trying to make you save every file from any program in OneDrive. I don't want all my files in the cloud!

What other reliable alternatives are there at the moment for cloud storage?

One issue that is still a problem is media storage, Images are bigger than they used to me so take up much more storage. And if you also need to store video footage this becomes a backup problem.

You can buy/rent dedicated file storage servers from hosting companies but they are not that cheap and don't offer any more storage than cloud services unless you start spending serious month each month.

The advantage of cloud storage over the traditional method of FTP accounts on a normal server is ease of use. With most they have apps for most devices, making it easy to access files anywhere. They auto backup new files if set to do so, and they tend to just work. But with the insistence of more and more services and devices to want to save all your files in the cloud there comes the question of where all your files actually are and what happens to them, We are just trusting remote services with them after all,

[Harrison]

I started thinking about this as I'm working on migrating these forums and then will start to think how I can remake the main site to bring it up to date (as the existing site isn't actually compatible with current server versions). And with that I would be looking to try and get contributors on board again to work on new content, For that we would need online storage for collaboration to upload files and work on content. Plus share files with site users,

I also have a wish to share more Amiga file content. I have a lot of Amiga disks that I am archiving and it would be great to be able to offer them all on the site. But I also have a lot of Amiga CDs that might be harder for Amiga users to get hold of these days, so was considering ISOs, but obviously these could end up being 650MB each, so would quickly eat into server storage and also take up bandwidth when being downloaded. One option could be Torrent links to them, but that would mean someone would still need to be sharing the files all the time. Any solutions for seed boxes these days? Or there is the option of Cloud storage that would offload the downloads and storage away from the main server,

[Stephen Coates]

I don't use cloud storage at all. Why would I need to? I usually only need to access things from one place, and my internet connections aren't 100% reliable.

The only issue is sharing things with other people. Usually I can do this by putting something on my web server, but if it was too big, its easier just to post/give someone a memory card.

I've been shooting lots of video in recent years and that has been chewing up my HDD space. There's no way I'd use cloud storage for that. I'd have to upgrade my internet connections and then pay fees for storing data that I might not even need to keep. Last year I bought a second hand LTO-4 drive. Works perfectly, and is pretty much plug and play on Linux.

[Tiago]

I use Google drive. I have a family account with close friends, we have a 2 TB space.
I use it for photos and other documents. For me major advantage is auto backup of photos with google photos and the easy use of google docs and sheets were i use with android and windows

[Harrison]

Google Docs has always been really useful. And actually Microsoft's online Office 365 free cloud version is actually very good these days using free OneDrive 5GB account for file storage. For many they don't actually need a locally installed copy of Office or any other such software if they have a good internet connection.