50GB Of Storage Space With ADrive (Online Storage Series)
As part of our online storage series we will take a look at most services available. I am going to focus on the free services, taking a look at what they offer or do not, which should help you decide if one is appropriate for you. Using online storage services as a supplemental step is beneficial in a well rounded backup plan.
So far we have taken a look at Microsoft’s Live SkyDrive and i also briefly covered Mozy Home a while back. Today lets take a look at ADrive which offers a whopping 50GB of free online storage. There are also a couple of premium plans they offer as well. Before signing up for any "pay for" service it is definitely a great idea to test the free versions before spending money.
After setting up your account you will need to download Java if you have not already. If not there is a link which points you to the download site. If you’re using Vista check the “always trust…” box and then Run.
You then get a nice Java file explorer to navigate and find the files or directories you want to upload to ADrive.
The files are then added to the ADrive upload manager on the site also.
Once you have the files in place to upload, simply click the Upload button. While files are uploading a Java progress window will be displayed.
If you don’t want to install Java on your machine there is a very basic uploader you can use.
When logged in to your account you will have access to your files through an explorer type interface.
Go to the download section to browse through your files and select which ones to grab.
Another cool feature of ADrive is the Backup Client. This is a small utility you can download after signing up for a Basic Account. This allows you to schedule full and incremental backups. This application is only free for 30 days then you have to pay to keep using it.
While you're first getting used to operating the Backup Client you can enable the “Tip of the Day” which pops up with a new tip every time you launch the application.
Another interesting feature is the ability to modify Microsoft Office documents online in ADrive with Zoho Online Document Editor. To do this go into your drive and right click on an office document (from what I have tested, Office 2007 documents saved in XML format are not recognized by Zoho) and from the popup menu choose “Edit in Zoho”.
The document will then open in a separate window with Zoho Document Editor and you can make edits and save changes to the document on the drive. All of this for free … not bad.
As with most of the online drives you have the option to share documents in a public folder.
You are given the direct link to the document and choose to not share, download, or email to another person.
The email will send who the file is coming from and also provide the direct link so that person can download it.
So far I have been pretty impressed with ADrive as a storage option and they are regularly adding additional features. 50GB of free storage with a maximum upload file size of 2GB. After using this service more I am seriously considering an upgrade to one of the pay options which offer more space and other features. Though ADrive may not be the most well known online storage company they are definitely worth a closer look.
As of this writing they offer 3 plans which are Basic, Signature, and Premium. You can read more about and compare each service on their site.
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I have been using ADrive for a few months and could not be happier. Very nice interface and good features. Lots of storage.
Is there anything that will let me use such service under Linux ? I'm a big fan of Linux, and am for the freedom of choice. Such services should not limit themselves to Windows clients. I am sure that since this service uses a Java client, it should be easily transportable to Linux, using a mountpoint instead of a drive letter.
Have a great day !
JF
I want to say that I have spent the better part of three months trying to get the ADrive team to tell me why access from my town is either blocked or non-existent.
I loaded several files up to test back when ADrive was first reviewed (by some other blog), and since then I have yet to get in via Firefox, IE, and Opera to retrieve and delete those files so I can upload more.
All I get every time is connection errors, server errors, and most times I have to kill my other logged in sessions so I can try to login again.
I've been around and around with their tech support, going so far as to try OperaTor and Kproxy.com both of which got me almost logged in, then failed.
Yes, I have tried other computers, and other locations, but nothing works for me.
It MUST be me…
Thank you for mentioning ADrive on your blog. We would like to address the issue of the registration of the ADrive Backup Client. We are working on a fix for this. Our plan is to continue to offer that service as part of each of our storage plans at no extra charge. We will have a fix for this in the very near future.
Also, right now, our backup client only runs on Windows machines. We are working on a backup client that will run on Windows, Mac and Unix.
-ADrive Team
What about information security. Or should I only consider that an option for the pay plans.
@cypher:
With a subscription you get SSL secure transfers. I have been researching some other services and will have an article on which ones offer more security. There are a few free ones for limited space, but for a good amount of space and security your going to need to look at subscription services.
At the bottom it says "50BG of free storage". As BG is not a unit of storage you may want to fix that
ElephantDrive (www.elephantdrive.com) is in the process of releasing their Linux Client. I talked to support and they gave me a link to their Linux client which is in private beta. Works pretty well.
When I added my WMA audio files from Skydrive I was not able to stream them via windows media player. Any clues?
Thans, Bob
@Kansas Bob:
According to Adrive FAQ streaming audio is not yet possible.
Thanks Geek!! Know any free disk-type services that offer streaming audio capabilities?
Interesting to note in their terms, section 7:
"…Adrive may, but shall not be required to, delete Your Storage Data after the termination of this Agreement."
That basically means if you decide you don't want to use their service anymore, and you have 30 Gb of music on their site, you just made them the proud owners of your collection. Now, that may be fine and good for you music, after all you still have your own copy locally. What about your family pics? Personal papers, etc? I would definitely think twice about putting anything irreplaceable or "for your eyes only" on the site.
This is a trend I have noticed with a couple of the services I have tried, and I always find it unsettling. I guess that's the price you pay for free storage! That being said, I just signed up. Will be uploading my music when I get home tonight. hehe
Thanks for the review!
I started using ADrive to store my Linux distros. It frees up space on my server and it is easily accessible from anywhere on the web. I am still iffy about sending personal stuff, but hey, it's free!
I just signed up for ADrive on your recommendation. Sweet! It will be great to use with my new NetBook while traveling. Thanks a bunch…..Jake
Combined with truecrypt this might make a good, and secure tool. You cuold set up a truecrypt vault for each major area on your PC you want to archive, (You'd need to keep them under the 2Gb ADrive file size limit). Then on your PC you use the vault like a drive, then you close it and archive the whole vault.
The only disadvantage would be that you would have to back-up the whole vault each time, even if only one file had changed.
I was drastically low on space, anxiously awaiting the day when my new hard drive would get here, but then I found out about ADrive and got a huge 50GB of free space. I can't transfer a lot of my stuff because I have a lot of big huge >2GB zip files, ISO's, etc, but for all of the smaller stuff, ADrive makes it easy to back up and offload some of these files. The biggest issue I have with it is that the uploader only lets you upload 1000 files at a time. I have folders with thousands of tiny files (programming stuff) that I have to sit here and upload part by part, browsing into subdirectories and queuing up new uploads rather than just upload the whole thing at once. The 2GB limit isn't bad, but I wish it could be higher. I guess I could split stuff up using RAR or 7zip but that becomes a real pain after a while.