Best Cloud Storage

[sootshe]

Looking to find the best & simplest cloud storage for my music collection.

 

I have 260G of WAV music files that I have backed up on 2 seperate external USB drives, but I'd like to also store them in the cloud just in case. They are stored in folders as per attached screenshot.

 

 

I have tried DropBox, but that will not let me upload the files as an artist folder - I have to manually create the folder in DropBox & then save all the individual tracks in the relevant folder, meaning I can only save 1 album at a time & it takes forever to upload (approx. 30 mins per album).

 

I then tried iCloud & that will let me upload about 10 albums at a time & I can upload them as "artist" folders & it will put all the relevant tracks in each "album". This is a lot quicker than with DropBox as well. I just have some concerns with iCloud in that when I go to turn iCloud off it says it is going to delete all the files???

 

Surely there must be a better way to simply copy all my files & send them to a cloud based system for safe keeping in case I ever need to retrieve them.

 

Does anyone know what these symbols mean in the iCloud directory? This is after I have uploaded the files & some show as they normally appear & others show with the little arrow symbol.

 

 

Any help appreciated,

 

John

[cixel]

Have you tried Google Drive?

The easiest way would be to install Google Drive sync to establish your folder structure.

[joelha]

Have you tried Google Drive?

The easiest way would be to install Google Drive sync to establish your folder structure.

 

I've been using Amazon Cloud.

 

$60.00 a year, unlimited storage. Really.

 

I have over 11TB's uploaded.

 

Drag and drop a folder and all of the subfolders upload.

 

Good luck.

 

Joel

[rn701]

Crashplan works great for me.

[skolis]

Crashplan works great for me.

 

+1; easiest to use; automatic; about $60.

I've tested at least 8 - 10, this is best.

 

just fyi, while other's have had different experiences, there are

flaws with Amazon, primarily dealing with folder structure and naming - which they know and are trying to correct - so in the meantime, if you go in that direction, just be aware.

[astrotoy]

I've been using Amazon Cloud.

 

$60.00 a year, unlimited storage. Really.

 

I have over 11TB's uploaded.

 

Drag and drop a folder and all of the subfolders upload.

 

Good luck.

 

Joel

 

Joel, sounds very interesting. How fast is your upload speed? Does Amazon choke down your upload speed? My Comcast business internet gets me about 12 Mb/sec upload speed = 1.5MB/sec. 1 TB would take about 8 days to upload? Am I correct. I have close of 40 TB, so that would take about 10 months to upload. Right now I have Crashplan, but don't use it for my music files.

 

Thanks, Larry

[joelha]

Hey Larry,

 

I'm getting between 3-4 MB/sec but that limit might have more to do with my broadband speed than with Amazon Cloud. I'm not sure.

 

Joel

[jtwrace]

Joel, sounds very interesting. How fast is your upload speed? Does Amazon choke down your upload speed? My Comcast business internet gets me about 12 Mb/sec upload speed = 1.5MB/sec. 1 TB would take about 8 days to upload? Am I correct. I have close of 40 TB, so that would take about 10 months to upload. Right now I have Crashplan, but don't use it for my music files.

 

Thanks, Larry

 

You have 40TB of music?

[sootshe]

Thanks for all the feedback.

After doing some more research in the archives, I understand that the upload speed may not be as fast as I imagined.

 

Been in touch with DropBox support & they have sorted being able to upload the files & still preserve the structure of the original file structure. You are able to put a file system in your home page & just drag the albums to there. You can treat this like any other folder.

 

They have also shown me how to increase the upload speed by adjusting the preferences settings, so all in all a win win situation. Now that I am familiar with the DropBox operation it seems like a great solution & doesn't interfere with my system the way iCloud does. I can't believe Apple has a system that is so intrusive - that in itself is a real no no for me.

 

By the way, no affiliation with DropBox at all, but have just found there program to suit my needs & their support was excellent.

 

Thanks again for all your input.

[skolis]

Thanks for all the feedback.

 

 

Been in touch with DropBox support & they have sorted being able to upload the files & still preserve the structure of the original file structure. You are able to put a file system in your home page & just drag the albums to there. You can treat this like any other folder.

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]23142[/ATTACH]

They have also shown me how to increase the upload speed by adjusting the preferences settings, so all in all a win win situation. Now that I am familiar with the DropBox operation it seems like a great solution ...

 

Please advise: cost of Dropbox for 40TB of data?

thx

[bmoura]

+1; easiest to use; automatic; about $60.

I've tested at least 8 - 10, this is best.

 

just fyi, while other's have had different experiences, there are

flaws with Amazon, primarily dealing with folder structure and naming - which they know and are trying to correct - so in the meantime, if you go in that direction, just be aware.

 

Crashplan is a new one to me. It looks like their $60/year individual plan offers Unlimited Cloud Storage.

So it appears to be very comparable to Amazon's Unlimited $60/year option. Hmm.....

[skolis]

Crashplan is a new one to me. It looks like their $60/year individual plan offers Unlimited Cloud Storage.

So it appears to be very comparable to Amazon's Unlimited $60/year option. Hmm.....

 

Yep and no issues with file structure if you make changes, nor nomenclature.

YMMV

 

I'm still curious about Dropbox - I use that too. However, for large files, it seems prohibitively expensive, so I

use it for data only - no music. Waiting to hear what Sootshe says about his costs.

[EdmontonCanuck]

I went with Google. I have my own custom domain with "Google Apps for Business", and adding unlimited storage to my main user account there seemed to be a no-brainer. I was able to simply enter my Google credentials into my Synology's Cloud Backup app and it moved all my music (currently just north of 6 terabytes) up to Google Drive. That took about a month to complete.

 

And just to be clear, this is not my *main* backup....but I wanted an off-site backup solution "as a backup" lol.

[tboooe]

I was about to go with Amazon but your post made me hesitate. Can you please explain more about the folder structure and naming issues?

 

+1; easiest to use; automatic; about $60.

I've tested at least 8 - 10, this is best.

 

just fyi, while other's have had different experiences, there are

flaws with Amazon, primarily dealing with folder structure and naming - which they know and are trying to correct - so in the meantime, if you go in that direction, just be aware.

[Jud]

I was about to go with Amazon but your post made me hesitate. Can you please explain more about the folder structure and naming issues?

 

Makes it easier:

 

http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f3-article-comments/article-amazon-offers-unlimited-cloud-storage-%2459-99-year-23921/index3.html#post482719

[skolis]

I was about to go with Amazon but your post made me hesitate. Can you please explain more about the folder structure and naming issues?

 

There have been essentially 3 issues over the last year - I have spent some time on several occasions trying to sort through these w/ Amazon. They recognize the issues and are working on them.

btw - I will also say upfront: if you have a small number of files, this may not be relevant - but with multiple TB's of music, these are substantive issues. I've spent time trying to find solution with Amazon because tech companies come and go and, not saying Crashplan or anyone else is "at risk", but Amazon is like to be around for awhile.....

 

Issues:

1. incompatible characters/ file names: used to be a long list, it's being whittled down, check Amazon for latest status. PITA if you have to go rename a bunch of files ( not an issue with Crashplan, timemachine, others)

2. Folder structure: an example is easiest. If you have a folder called "Music" and

then rename it "My Music" Amazon thinks it's different and "starts over".

Others ( timemachine for MAC; crashplan etc) figure out it's the same content with a different name. The Amazon "start over" process can run days/weeks/months with large files.

3. With a single folder that is very large file, part way through the upload process Amazon will slow to a crawl and often freeze. ( many hours spent on this one with them trying to sort out why.... and how to fix. no solution as of November)

 

Anyway, YMMV; others have had good results.

And as a further example, some swear by BackBlaze, which,

because it has been know to lose files, I think is POS.

I've had luck with CrashPlan, and others, not so much.

I think dropbox is great - but too expensive for large files.

No silver bullet here - just go in with eyes open.

[sootshe]

Please advise: cost of Dropbox for 40TB of data?

thx

 

Sorry, but I don't work for DropBox....have no idea what that amount of storage would cost.

FWIW I pay $120 Aust. per year for 1Tb of storage.