The number of online backup providers is constantly growing to accommodate the increasing popularity of web backup services. Recommendations for best choices become obsolete in a matter of months. In order to find and configure the online data backup solution that is best for your needs, you need to know what to look for in the myriad of features. It is really not that complicated. Here are five things you should be paying attention to when choosing web backup and configuring it for safe and worry-free use.
One. Reliability
This is the hardest to quantify but important to keep in mind. Your online file backup will not do you any good if the online backup company goes out of business or loses your data. There are two precautions you can take. First, go with a reputable company that has a reliability record. Check customer reviews and look specifically for complaints about lost data. Second, test your backup. Move some of the backed up files to a different location or a flash drive, and test the recovery component of your online backup solution. If your test fails, figure out what went wrong. Did you make a mistake when configuring your backup application, or is it the provider’s fault? If so, change to a different web backup service and ask for a refund. How often should you test? A good practice is to test your backup as soon as it completes for the first time, and then test again after about a month. If everything works well on both occasions then you can check less frequently.
Two. Price
Let’s face it, extra cost is the number one reason why people don’t backup their files (along with the bad habit of procrastinating on important but not urgent decisions). Most backup companies charge per year per gigabyte stored. To figure out your yearly cost, multiply by the number of gigabytes that you plan to store. Most backup providers now have unlimited plans. Compare them also since they can be a better deal if you plan to store a lot of data. Also, estimate the price of a similar size external hard drive. While online remote backup gives many advantages, it would be wise to compare the cost of both solutions.
Three. Privacy
A web backup company is not likely to steal your data. A company employee is a different story. If you plan to store any type of sensitive data then you want to go with a backup service provider that lets you use encryption and never sends unencrypted data over the Web. Most companies that have this extra security are eager to advertise it. Which means that if encryption is not mentioned in the summary of features, you can assume that this particular backup plan does not have it. Keep in mind though that unless you took precautions to secure your home computer with antivirus, firewall, and anti-spyware tools, the chances are greater for your information to be stolen directly from it than from a web backup location.
Four. Scheduling and incremental backup
Your online backup is only useful if it is up-to-date. How frequently do you make major changes to your information? This should be the determining factor of the web backup schedule. The backup software should also be able to figure out the list of updated files and only backup them. This is known as an incremental backup. It is especially important for web backup because it is done via your Internet connection, and full backup can take many days to complete. Do you often move the files around your hard drives? In this case, you need software that is smart enough to realize that and update the location of the file, rather than backup the moved file all over again.
Five. Versioning – keep more than just the latest copy
Neglecting this feature is the frequent cause of data loss, and the reason why many on-the-fly data backup solutions (such as RAID arrays) are not adequate to protect you fully. The reason is as follows: data loss is often a result of either a file corruption, or an accidental overwrite of a useful document with wrong information. You might not realize that your data has been long gone until much later, at which point your only hope of recovery is a backup that stores old versions of the files. This often overlooked feature is absolutely critical for safe online backup!
Final Remarks
You can get an overall idea about different backup service providers from their websites and customer reviews. But you will not know for sure that you found what you’ve been looking for until you try the backup software yourself. Free trials come handy for that. Most web backup providers offer them now. Another point to consider is your internet connection speed and the effect that running backup will have on your web browsing experience and other network intensive activities. Once again, no review will be as good as your own test. Download and run a trial version of software, and see if web backup is the best solution for your data protection needs.
