Posted on 09/11/2011 9:49:27 AM PDT by FromTheSidelines
When Windows Live SkyDrive first launched in 2007 (known as Windows Live Folders beta back then), it offered a mere 500 MB of free storage. Later on when the service got out of beta in early 2008, this free storage space increased from 500 MB to 5 GB.
SNIP
LiveSide recently learnt that Microsoft will soon offer unlimited photos and Office documents storage on SkyDrive Wave 5, and this is how it will work:
Unlimited storage space for all Office documents
Unlimited storage space for all photos
25 GB of free storage for everything else
(Excerpt) Read more at liveside.net ...
Well, if you consider it, unlimited office documents probably isn’t all that much space for most people, unlimited photos - again, probably not all that much space, and then the real meat, a 25gb space in the cloud, which is pretty much making it the new standard for free space in the cloud.
I don’t think it’ll eliminate any caps, but it might raise some. I’d just like to see Microsoft do something similar to Apple’s upcoming music archive.
bump for later
Microsoft already does it - it’s called SkyDrive. You have 25 GB now, and they’re eliminating pictures and Office docs from that amount.
SkyDrive is natively integrated with Windows Phone 7, and on your desktop is just another drive - except it auto-syncs with the cloud server and any other devices you have synced to that same drive (meaning it’ll replicate files across multiple computers).
There’s also Zune, where Zune-purchased music doesn’t count against your storage - just like Amazon with its storage and music server. But with Zune and Amazon you can stream your media from the cloud - no need to download copies to your local device to play (like required with the Apple solution). So it really does extend the size of your local media player by your cloud storage (since you can navigate and stream instantly) - and with the Microsoft and Amazon solutions having unlimited storage of music you have, in essence, and infinite capacity for that music.
In this space, Apple is the Johnny-come-lately, as Microsoft, Google, and even Amazon have had this kind of service available for a long time.
Uhh, am I missing something? This is all well and good but when did the “cloud” become an unlimited, always renewable and expandable resource like “green” energy resources? The cloud is made up of finite, physical servers that carry a cost. While that cost might be financially feasible for those companies to bear right now, I doubt that it will remain that way forever and expand. Somewhere down the line the break-even point will be passed and then someone other than the owners/maintainers of the cloud physical resources will be forced to pay. Forced to pay? Yes, because once a person, business, or organization has moved it’s data storage to the cloud they will be invested deeply enough to make it painful to try to take it back and maintain it on their own. This is like outsourcing your critical processes and operations that are essential to survival. Once the outsourcers have you they can then ask any price they want or put whatever restrictions they want on THEIR services because they know your operation no longer has the people and infrastructure to take it back. The cloud can be a great resource but there are big and potentially painful risks involved as well.
25 whole gigs - color me ‘underwhelmed’.
That is about 3 8Gig USB ‘thumb drives. And, for that price I keep control of my data.
Color me:
Private
Suspicious of anything “free”.
25 GB is what you get with Apple’s iCloud, Amazon, and Google. Microsoft is pushing beyond, making it unlimited for photos and documents - and if you have a Zune pass (their streaming music solution) then you get unlimited music as well.
My guess is we’ll see continuing unlimited offers coming. You can get a 1 TB disk for $50 retail; in bulk, probably less than $40 each. That 25 GB storage is just $1 cost for HDD.
They’ll make money on ads or selling you services - like Microsoft offering unlimited storage for their music and productivity tools. Use their tools (pay money), they’ll toss in storage online for free.
Google music is 20.000 tracks, not 25gbs. That’s roughly 250gb for me, more as I convert whole albums into single files. Fantastic for those storing audio books. By the way, mail me if anyone wants an invite. Got seven extras.
But Google doesn’t have a general purpose storage offering, like SkyDrive. That’s the difference.
That's for the average desktop hard drive. I don't know whether cloud storage uses that or the more expensive (but reliable and faster) high availability drives.
That’s also retail prices; you can bet that Google can buy 100,000 hard disks for a little less than you and I can get them for! :)
Even going to RAID1 (for 100% redundant data) you’re still at $2 per account, and that price is falling daily.
I wonder if there is a place to place bets on how long it will take for China to break into it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.