Time is such a precious commodity. I do everything I can to ensure that my time is spent wisely and that I can be as effective and efficient as possible. That’s why I choose my technology tools really carefully.
Paperless Office
Evernote and a ScanSnap scanner have allowed me to virtually eliminate all the paper in my life, OutOfMilk lets me organise my various to do lists (as well as going grocery shopping without scraps of paper) and Google Docs mean I can create and share my documents instantly without worrying about backing up. There’re no usb sticks, external hard drives or having to email files to people.
Across The Board
All of these are cloud based applications and it’s not going too far to say that the cloud has changed my life! In addition to these easy to use programmes I employ Gmail as my email client and Google Calendar has replaced paper diaries because it synchs so nicely with friends and family (plus I always know where my wife is now!). All of these save me time because they work across all my devices – whether I’m on my home PC, laptop or Android mobile I can work any and all of these applications. Dropbox is another fantastic tool allowing me to store yet more of my life in the cloud.
All this got me thinking – wouldn’t it be great if I could put ALL of my stuff on the cloud and rid myself of these troublesome external hard drives. They’re meant to be back ups to protect files in times of peril but in my experience they are less reliable than the internal hard-drives themselves and I’m now on my 4th external hard drive in as many years!
One cheap option was to utilise the free accounts that the various online backup providers give away hoping that you’ll upgrade to the paid version. Many people do this and it seems to work well but I don’t like the idea of fragmenting my digital life across the internet like so many different separate files in different cabinets across town. I decided that I’d go for a paid service so that I could keep all my stuff in one (ethereal) place.
Cloud Nine?
Easily the best value was the KnowHow backup and share service from Currys and PC World. These well known high street retailers are offering a huge 1 terabyte of storage for 5 years for a one off payment that is less than the annual cost of their competitors’ annual fee for a smaller amount of storage!
“Outstanding, sign me up!” I cried.
In the adverts the service promised to sing and dance but sadly once I’d got the product out of the box so to speak, it was delivering more of a croak and a crawl.
I won’t go into massive detail about the slow speeds of back up, the inability to see what has backed up and what hasn’t, the inconsistencies with support, the lack of cohesion between KnowHow and Livedrive, (the firm that actually runs the service), the buggy nature of the software provided and the hours I have now spent trying to get this time saving product working. No, I won’t mention any of that. But apropos of nothing I will use the word fiasco. There, I’ve said it. Fiasco.
It’s Good To Be Free
I cancelled my KnowHow/Livedrive Cloud Back up and Share Service today and am feeling pretty liberated. I’m still deliberating about which service to trust with my online life for the future, but the KnowHow Livedrive Fiasco has reminded me of a certain phrase – False Economy.
Every now and again you can find a genuine bargain but when that price is so much lower than anyone else’s you’d better have your eyes peeled to see in which other way you might be paying. This time around although I got a cash bargain I’ve paid with the most valuable currency of all – my time. Whatever benefits the cloud will give me in the future I won’t get that time back again.
I totally agree, going to take it back to currys and see if i can get my money back.
Its a con/
Hi Connor
I’m glad it wasn’t just me. Looking at the various message boards it certainly wasn’t.
Did you get things sorted? And what do you use now?
What exactly was the issue?
I use the service, and you can adjust the bandwidth speed according to your broadband.
Files that are not fully uploaded are shown on the website and the livedrive program on your computer
Livedrive provides 24/7 phone line, FAQ and forums plus tutorial pages.
To me it sounds like you could not use the software and decided to blame the number one online backup vendor in the world.
whos right? you or 500,000 other people that use the service successfully.
Dont blame the tools, blame your intelligence.
Hi Marc
Thanks for your comment and I’m glad Knowhow is the right service for you. I would blame myself in these areas where my expertise is limited, so that’s why I get the expert help. Sadly the expert help wasn’t up to scratch – (they passed me around from the Livedrive to Currys Knowhow team with wild abandon) – I envy the lucky 500,000 who use the service successfully. Or at least I did until I moved on with . . . the premium services of Evernote, Google and Dropbox. These have proved to be fantastic replacement services. Watch out for blog posts on each of these and tips on how they can help you use your time wisely.
Take care
Iain
The fact that the ‘know more’ link on the PC World website brings up ‘Sorry – we couldn’t find the page you requested’ told me everything I needed to know about this product.
Probably saved yourself a good few hours Sid. What did you go for instead by the way? I’m using the Pro version of Evernote for more and more.
Just got cloud from PCWorld and it seems to do all the things I need it to do ie store my files on the cloud and gives me the ability to access it on any machine or mobile device? Cant see what the problem is
That’s great news Stuart. It’s great when things work just as they’re meant to. I’m sure it’s a great service, just not for me. The problem I had was that it wasn’t functioning in the way you describe. Files would hang forever whilst uploading, regardless of all the different settings I was advised to amend. I’d been using the free Dropbox service seamlessly and expected the Livedrive Briefcase to function in the same way – sadly it didn’t and the service team couldn’t solve the ongoing uncertainty about what had synched and what hadn’t. Not a good situation.
The original reason for trying out the service was to save time and create greater access to my folders and media files. Trust me, I really wanted the service to work as the Cloud is an awesome concept. Sadly the problems I experienced created the opposite effect and cost me time and created confusion.
In the end though the experience has had a positive effect because I deleted an enormous amount of files that were past their sell by date and I have since bought premium Dropbox, Evernote alongside the free Google services, all of which I use to great effect.
All the best, Iain
Reading this particular I believed it was very informative. We appreciate you taking the time to put this blog patch together. I remember when i once again find myself spending way to enough time both reading and leaving comments. What ever, it had been still worth it
I have a Desktop, a ThinkPad and a Motorola Photon Android phone. I also have two external hds I’m using for additional storage. Right now I am using Carbonite on the two computers and have a fair amount of data being backed up. The subscription is about to run out so I am thinking about another service. Basically I would like to backup/store my data on all three. At the same time I would like to do some syncing of the machines to the phone. I’m paying Carbonite $59 yr for each machine so I don’t mind doing the same for another service.