Save Your Music Online; Recover It Anywhere
If you haven’t experienced the nightmare scenario of catastrophic hard drive failure before a gig or even worse, equipment theft, then count yourself lucky. And while you’re counting, you can also count on disaster striking eventually. The problem of data loss through theft or hard drive failure is likely to happen eventually and is compounded if you’re on the road and away from whatever back-up drive you may (and should) have at home.
One way to be prepared is to store all of your critical digital assests for DJing — software applications and their license/authorization numbers, digital music files, Stripes folders, settings and MIDI mappings files, etc. — using an online file storage service that will let you download your precious data from anywhere you can access the Internet. Read on for a breakdown of some free online storage services where you can backup your files and gain some peace of mind.
YOU GOT FILE SERVED
There are dozens of sites that offer some level of free online file storage. Most of them have starter memberships that are free of charge and then higher-level memberships with better features that cost a monthly or yearly fee. Often, the free service seems good enough, but there may be restrictions on the maximum file size, the amount you can download per day or other rules that might prohibit a smooth recovery of your backup data.
We tried out three online file storage services — FileFactory, ADrive and MediaFire — compared their attributes and user experiences and then made some judgments and suggestions on how you might proceed to backup your digital DJ data.
VERDICTS
Free service: MediaFire
MediaFire’s free service gives you unlimited storage capacity; no limits to the number or transfer speed of your uploads or downloads; and the most user-friendly online interface and file transfer tool, which helps make up for MediaFire’s lack of FTP support.
FileFactory Basic scored the lowest on usability for a free service because it does not support FTP and the online upload feature only lets you upload 25 files at a time, compared to ADrive Basic’s 1,000 at a time.
Pay service: FileFactory Premium
While MediaFire Pro claims to give you unlimited file storage capacity and is less expensive, FileFactory Premium steals the show for one essential reason; it’s 1 TB limit on file size means that you could clone your hard drive using something like Bombich Carbon Copy Cloner for Macs or DriveImage XML for Windows and use FTP to upload the cloned disk image to FileFactory. In an emergency, you could then download that disk image to a hard drive and have a bootable copy of your old computer should it fizzle out or get stolen. No other file storage service that we found advertised maximum file size higher than 10 GB.
ADrive’s two paid service plans are unique in that they include ADrive Desktop, a software utility for Mac/Windows/Linux that helps you upload, download and manage your ADrive stored files.
Whether you opt for a free service just to store your most essential music or go for the gusto and get a deluxe package that will let you store a back-up disk image of your entire hard drive, we highly recommend doing something to prepare yourself for the nightmare digital DJ scenario of data loss.
October 19th, 2009 at 1:36 am Quote
Great services, mediafire is so fast it’s ridiculous. These sites are definitely really handy, but I never had problems with drive failure until the past few years, weird coincidence.
October 19th, 2009 at 1:53 am Quote
If online storage is feasible, another option is using GMail’s 3 GB mailbox size limit to your advantage:
Welcome to the world of Gmail Space As Google Drive:
http://www.sizlopedia.com/2007/08/11/utilities-to-use-gmail-space-as-google-drive/
If fast internet connection is not feasible, one of these methods may help:
One-time, FULL/PERFECT BACKUP
1. Use a partition copy program to backup your entire disk or partition to another physical disk (usb/firewire/etc). (for Windows: Symantec Ghost or Acronis True Image) (for Mac, OOTB available Disk Utility -insert system/OS DVD, hold down ‘c’ while rebooting-)
Regular, FULL/PERFECT BACKUPS (same technique as incremental copying)
2.a. [Windows] Now use “robocopy.exe /mir” to keep folders/files in perfect synch (only different files get copied over to desination). Frequent (and much less time consuming) backups are possible.
2.b. [Mac] I’m sure there’a folder sunchronization utility/service in OS X.
3. Now, store the new hard drive in another physical location (today a fire alarm forced an immediate evacuation of the apartment, and both my primary and backup disks were left home – big mistake).
October 19th, 2009 at 2:12 am Quote
the problem with this article is that you are breaking the Terms and Conditions of the hosting sites by uploading copyrighted material (ie your mp3 files)….
therefore I dont see this as a valid way of backing up your files
maybe mozy.com is better, but that has limitations too
October 19th, 2009 at 2:32 am Quote
Why not Megaupload? No limits at all,with ftp and 200$ lifetime membership.
any cons on that…
October 19th, 2009 at 3:36 am Quote
uploading your mp3 files to an online service for *personal* backup doesn’t violate any copyright laws. that’s called “fair use”.
October 19th, 2009 at 3:45 am Quote
…
For me this technology is great but “digital cloud” has its own danger: centralizate media = easy culture control.
As any “tool” use makes the good/bad…
Maybe a solution with shared harddisk (not p2p) with people control instead “majors/corps” control (real control of telecomunications) will be more reasonable in my opinion.
Just my2cents.
Great Article, DJTT.
…
October 19th, 2009 at 3:55 am Quote
if your uploading an image of your hard drive its not breaking the terms and conditions. or you guys could pack all your tracks and apps onto a compressed format like rar or zip and upload that. as long as you dont share your tracks you aren’t breaking TOC.
October 19th, 2009 at 4:49 am Quote
@celosdedma; @ian3dge; @gfocus
You guys are just wondering about the Terms and Conditions or you’r sure of what are you saying?
@Ean
I think that this type of legal information is missing in your article Ean, I would be glad if you upload this legal info about the services too.
Great Article indeed DJTT!
October 19th, 2009 at 4:51 am Quote
It’s not a Ean’s post, sorry for that markkus, the credit is yours but the question stills..
Thanks in advance :)
October 19th, 2009 at 5:02 am Quote
I use Dropbox for syncing all of my music and its meta content. That makes me able to set up all of my music on any computer in just a coule of minutes.
Here´s a quick how to: http://carlj.se/index.php/tech/3-music/11-sharing-itunes-library-between-two-computers-using-dropbox
October 19th, 2009 at 6:02 am Quote
Use Dropbox or iDisk (me.com)
October 19th, 2009 at 6:59 am Quote
I just use a Windows Home Server device (Acer easyStore H340) as a back-up and media sharing device for all my data in mu home network, including my 300 Gig music collection.
Windows Home Server allows me to retrieve my music from everywhere around the world, just using a browser. Highly recommendable.
October 19th, 2009 at 7:03 am Quote
i read the terms and conditions and it says specifically you cannot post content that violates copyright, theres no ‘fair usage’ in an online service for storing files.
‘fair usage’ comes into play when your incorporating someones content for education purposes (as an example – its more complicated than that), it certainly cannot be justified in storing someone elses copyright on an online storage website.
October 19th, 2009 at 7:14 am Quote
We use Dropbox to collaborate on Ableton Live projects. It works amazingly well. Here’s our write-up:
http://knobjockeys.org/blog/collaborating-on-ableton-music-projects-in-the-cloud-with-dropbox/
October 19th, 2009 at 8:21 am Quote
i read the terms and conditions and it says specifically you cannot post content that violates copyright, theres no ‘fair usage’ in an online service for storing files.
afaik it’s not a violation of copyright to store your personal backup wherever you want. As long as nobody else than you is able to access the files..
October 19th, 2009 at 8:33 am Quote
Why not get a Pogoplug and an external hard drive.
http://www.pogoplug.com
I have it, love it.
October 19th, 2009 at 8:34 am Quote
October 19th, 2009 at 10:37 am Quote
$65 a year? A 500GB, 5400rpm SATA drive is $45. (SAMSUNG HD502HI). A USB2.0 to IDE/SATA interface is $20 (Sabrent USB-DSC5, the best $20 you will ever spend on your computer!) Uploading 100GB on my current DSL connection would take… (100*1024*1024) / (150 * 60 * 60 * 24) = 8.09 days of solid upload.
No thank you.
October 19th, 2009 at 12:06 pm Quote
Thanks to everyone who has suggested alternate services and backup solutions. There are far too many online storage options to cover them all, and purpose of this was to get people thinking about and more importantly, ACTING to develop their own remote data recovery solutions.
These services and technologies are progressing rapidly, so it will be an ongoing conversation as to what type of solution and what service providers are best to use.
Regarding copyright law, it’s true that most of these services tell you outright or imply that you should not upload material that you don’t own the copyright for. However, they don’t really attempt to describe what constitutes copyright violation, and in the case of ADrive, it doesn’t say your account will be terminated unless “Adrive is advised of a court order, subpoena or notice under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (”DMCA”) requiring removal of the Storage Data or any similar rule or regular of any other jurisdiction…”
Let’s be honest; no one is going to subpoena you or request that your data be removed if you are only using it for personal backup and not sharing it with anyone, which is what I would recommend. And how many customers would these companies have left if they actually expunged every client they had who was storing a commercially available music file?
I don’t want to expound too much on my own philosophy, but in the United States, anyone who has given a mixed tape or CD with copyrighted material on it to a friend is in violation of copyright law. So we’re dealing with a policy that is so bloated and unenforceable that it has made “criminals” of us all. Do you feel guilty for giving someone a mix CD? I don’t. And I don’t feel guilty about using online storage for a personal backup of copyrighted music either.
It’s everyone’s own choice to make, and I don’t advocate that anyone do anything they’re uncomfortable with. But to me, the risk of losing my music and other data without any remote backup possibilities is far greater than the miniscule risk of running into trouble for storing copyrighted material online for personal backup use.
October 19th, 2009 at 12:27 pm Quote
Excelent article, I’ve been looking for something like this, so far I was using hotmail for my tracks but it’s only 25GB storage and the upload is quite slow, will use Mediafire free to back-up my collection, is more than enough. Thanks.
October 19th, 2009 at 1:05 pm Quote
I have to agree. You can get a thumb drive with 16GB of storage that can fit on your keychain. That is more than enough storage to back up your essential files and music and its fits in your pocket. No upload, download, or need for an internet connection. I personally feel more secure with that.
October 19th, 2009 at 3:13 pm Quote
Leo Laporte like carbonite. I haven’t used it, but I like Leo and, generally, the things he likes.
http://www.carbonite.com/
October 19th, 2009 at 3:53 pm Quote
i just bookmarked this one today:
http://www.wuala.com/
You start with 1 GB of storage for free… then.
* 10 GB for 25 $
* 50 GB for 95 $
* 100 GB for 160 $
* 500 GB for 630 $
* 1 TB for 1000 $
October 19th, 2009 at 4:40 pm Quote
Not to forget the possibility of trading storage. I am giving 20gb of my harddrive for wuala to store crypted fileparts on and in return i get 20gb x my Online time % for free.
Which means….whoever has got a pc running all day anway, its easy to ern thtat storage.
Been using this for over a year an its been working fine for me.
Another plus is that you can join together in groups so any projects can be stored on there.
Files can also be directly executed while beeing on Wuala (just for good internet connections)
October 19th, 2009 at 4:54 pm Quote
so in reality even though u bought the music spend your own money …. eh u still don’t own that song ?? just doesn’t make sense damn laws.. just hope one of this days they don’t start charging you every time you play a song..hmmmm aren’t they doing that already ??
just buy a hard drive and save all your music there..
October 19th, 2009 at 5:21 pm Quote
do these support hosting files or just storing files? i.e. if i upload to the site can i link to it and have people access them or is it mainly just storage?
October 19th, 2009 at 9:04 pm Quote
While we are on the topic, if you purchase all your tracks from Beatport they will allow you to re-download them if you email them telling them that your hard drive has failed on you and that you have lost the tracks.
I wouldn’t rely on this as a backup, but it is very handy to know !
October 19th, 2009 at 10:51 pm Quote
Some random input…
My sister spilled wine on my DJ rig. The only thing in the entire computer that got wrecked was the disk with my tunes on it. Luckily Beatport etc let me download the tunes again for free but setting up all those warp markers and re-remixing everything sucked. Obviously lots of my original stuff is gone forever.
USB sticks are great but diligence is required, they can loose data (yes they can) and they are easy to loose.
I started backing up the whole lot to Sugarsync mainly because it does a good job of uploading everything automatically. I tested downloading the backup the other day. A 60GB file took 19 minutes to download. At that rate 20GB would take 4.5 days download.
October 20th, 2009 at 11:28 am Quote
my setup.
I have a mac desktop at home and a macbook pro for mobile, my desktop is my main source so basically everything that my laptop has my desktop will have and my desktop is backed up 2 ways.
1. using time machine, i’ve overwritten crap time and time again with my design work so knowing that I can go back and just rescue that one file very quickly and easily is well worth it. Plus is it’s free with a mac.
2. I have another firewire drive where I keep archived backups of my stuff. So that I can go way back and get my stuff, plus I have my music files for production, vsts, software, settings, and of course and additional backup of my tunes.
I also use dropbox which is primo with the desktop app, and I drop in my track collection files that way if i update some beat markers or cue points on one it will update on the other machine.
Best of all my backup solutions are free, the only require HDD’s. As for storing stuff on the go, I just use my idisk, or flash drives, I have one clipped to my car keys, so there is no way I can get to a party without one. Diligence yes, but hey a good DJ is diligent.
My last bit of advice, BUY A GOOD HDD, don’t buy crap that is cheaper because it will die on you.
October 20th, 2009 at 3:21 pm Quote
hey why not even buy a pogo plug, it gives u access to a backup of a hard drive anywhere, so buy the hard drive for on the road traveling and one for even further protection. you leave one at home connected to the pogoplug and always have access to it even though your not right next to it.
October 20th, 2009 at 10:51 pm Quote
Here is an interesting thing : http://www.zumodrive.com has a feature that lets you have your itunes library in “the cloud”. The scenario shows netbook users with limited storage streaming their itunes collection. I was wondering if traktor would pickup this library information and show it under the itunes folder inside traktor.
check the demo link on their front page.
worth a try.
October 22nd, 2009 at 2:28 am Quote
Rapidshare anyone?
October 22nd, 2009 at 3:53 pm Quote
+1 for Rapidshare…
October 23rd, 2009 at 6:16 am Quote
I’m surprised Dropbox wasn’t mentioned. I’ve been using it for a few days now, and it’s quite spectacular. Speed is really fast too on the uploads and downloads!
October 23rd, 2009 at 9:31 am Quote
Here’s a night mare story: finishing a gig, going with friends to restaurant because you know after a hard rocking night, you need to fill your stomach, 2 hours later getting back to my car, where I left my macbookpro, external hard drives, audio card, dongle key (with nexus), everything was in case cover so no body could know what was inside, my car trunk glass was smashed and they took everything. +4000 songs (legally bought), latest worked studios songs and 7 years of archived emails.
You can be sure that now I will get a NAS at home backing up all my files weekly + I’m installing an anti-theft device!
October 23rd, 2009 at 10:47 am Quote
I find it mind boggling that at this day and age people STILL don’t physically backup their data and pay thousands of dollars for computer and music yet don’t spare a hundred to back it up. Online storage is an overall great idea, but, as it is, it unfortunately does not apply to my country due to the very limited speed of broadband connection.
Kinda off-topic, but here’s a little tip: I very often back up 1 GB of music + software to the microSD Card on my cellphone just in case.
November 30th, 2009 at 8:34 am Quote
well, I guggest u try DropBox.com.
basically, u create a folder on your computer and put everything u want in it and it will show up in other computers u have the DropBox application on.
2 GB is free and a 100GB is 19.99$ a month.
worth checking out
December 20th, 2009 at 12:46 pm Quote
Mideafire is now 200 MB max file size :D