We all know how important the data backups are. At the same time many of would eventually end up loosing data at any point. It happened to me twice within the last 15 years. Fortunately I had back up of the important documents and the information lost was insignificant. At the time I have started writing this article I did not have a cloud backup of my data, expect the free iCloud account where I use to store my contacts and some pictures I used to keep on my phone device. I had image of my Mac in my Time Machine and some files backed up on an external hard drive. Shortly before I got this text published I already signed up for backup hosting service and I considered iCloud paid service as well.

The purpose of this article is to point your attention to a number of backup services – both free and paid. I have obviously did not test those (unless specified for any particular service), so if you choose any, you’d better search for some consumer reviews.

Non-Paid To Paid Backup Services

iDrive.com

It offers 5 GB of free backup storage as most other backup services do. IBackup, the company that operates IDrive has been operating for more than 16 years and I guess that speaks for itself. Account holders can use pre file transfer encryption thought a private key. This offers some security as as other should not be able to read your files. One TB (1TB) Personal backup plan (plus 1TB sync space, as advertised) costs $59.50. I haven’t tested it so I’d not recommend it, which doesn’t mean it is not a good service.

iCloud

Mac addicted know what iCloud is and how it works. it is easy, reasonably priced. iCloud is probably the easiest online backup and restore service I have ever seen. It really worths to be used. However, although I really like Apple’s products, I’m not one of those who’d try to “convert” and Windows or Linux users to Apple/Mac OS. Apple are big enough and I’m not driving them more business. It is a free world and anyone would better decide on ones own. There are other Apple / Mac OS backup services, so why don’t you test any of them and compare with iCloud before purchasing.

OpenDrive

I have decided to give more visibility to OpenDrive due to the simple fact that it has a custom backup service plan that allow one to calculate the storage capacity in gigabytes or terabytes, download bandwidth daily rate as well las a number of user accounts. Online other providers who design their websites in a way that a prospective customers has to go through a lot of insignificant self-promotional and marketing information, OpenDrive’s pricing and features are explained very clear which saves time.

Carbonite

This is another popular backup service provider. They have 3 different “Personal” service plans which look to be reasonably priced. Unlike the Personal ones, the Business plans look unrealistically expensive, considering the monthly costs of Colocation or dedicated servers with RAID 1 or even RAID 10 redundant array of independent drives.

Those above are commercial backup service providers. Let me now point your attention to some services that would help you to organize your own data backups.

Backupmaker

Backupmaker.com is a software which allow Windows and Windows users users to back up their data themselves. This software has 2 versions – “Personal” and “Professional”.  The “Personal” one is free for download, while the “Professional” one is available at low cost fife of $27 (€25). In order to use it one needs to secure an external storage, either local or online (Cloud storage).

Data Backup 3

Data Backup 3 is a software of company called Prosoft Engineering. It allows Mac uses to organize backups themselves without a need to purchase a subscription based service. The software costs $49 one time fee. It  allows a Mac user to make few times of backup copies: Simple backup copy, Clone backup, Versioned and Synchronized backup copies. The software has a Schedule” option, which allows users to choose specific dates, time and days.

There are many other good backup services, one would use on subscription basis. There are also many software applications to be downloaded and used on a personal computer. The purpose of this Daw blog article is not to feature the “best of them” or “most of them”. I hope that at least one of those services and software apps featured above would work for you. If they don’t, just go to any comparison website where you’d find plenty of services and providers. Some of these websites are just marketing web pages that display ads and most of the information you’d find there is either outdated or misleading. However some might might be useful. Good luck in finding solution and do not loose data.