Carbonite
Every small business has important customer information that they need to protect. You also have a wide range of materials that help you do business, from your website design to invoices, portfolios and more. As your business grows, storing all of those things on a dedicated hard drive is going to be hard to do. It’s also a lot less secure than other methods.
That’s why many businesses of all sizes are turning to cloud-based backup services. When you use a cloud-based service, you no longer have to pay for storage in the form of hard drives that will then take up valuable office space. If you do still use hard drives, you’ll simply be giving yourself another layer of security in case anything gets lost, crashes or disappears.
Carbonite, known for their accessibility, is an extremely popular online cloud-based backup service. Are they the perfect option for your growing business though? Use this review to learn more about using Carbonite for business. The History of Carbonite
Founded in 2005 by David Friend and Jeff Flowers in Boston, Massachusetts, Carbonite was named after the fictional substance used to freeze Han Solo in the Star Wars movies. Known today as the preeminent cloud backup service, Carbonite revolutionized the industry by offering unlimited backups for a set price.
Today, Carbonite has grown into a very large company with over 100 billion files backed up. The company has since acquired Mozy, helping them expand and reach even more users in the cloud backup sector.
Carbonite Pros
Carbonite is an extremely popular online backup service that millions of individual customers and small business owners use. When you search reviews or talk to business owners you’ll typically hear pros like:
• Carbonite offers clear, up-front pricing. Depending on the plan that you choose you’ll be asked to pay a set rate each year. You’ll also see what that plan includes right away since the sign-up interface is open, honest and easy to understand.
• They offer plans for single devices, multiple devices and special situations like businesses that have to comply with HIPAA regulations. This makes finding the ideal backup plan for your company considerably easier from the start. They also have backup plans for companies that have servers full of data, which not all backup services offer.
• The interface is easy to use. Carbonite typically runs in the background without being detected, uploading data to the system as it becomes available. This helps to keep your computer moving and avoid major updates that could take hours. It also ensures that you always have the most recent data backed up in the Carbonite system.
• You can easily try different plans and upgrade or downgrade as needed. This makes it easy to try multiple plan levels to see what is the ideal fit for you.
Carbonite Cons
Just because Carbonite is one of the most popular cloud-based backup services out there doesn’t mean it doesn’t have its detractors. Here are some of the most common cons you’ll hear when discussing Carbonite with small and medium-sized business owners who choose to use it:
• Carbonite can be slow. Some business users with a lot of data report that uploads take much longer than they’d initially hoped. However, Carbonite is designed to run in the background without overloading your CPU or slowing you down, so this is the best option for most users.
• Carbonite has a tendency to crash or require regular user updates. In some cases, users had to uninstall Carbonite and re-install it to see what data they had backed up or to continue backing up data. This can be a slow, bothersome process for small business owners.
• It takes too long to get data back after a crash. While it should be easy to recover data with a cloud backup service, some users report that the process is slow. Users that requested physically drives with their data on them also claimed that they did not receive them for some time, making it hard to get up and running again as quickly as they would have liked.
Carbonite Bottom Line
Carbonite is one of the most popular backup services in the world because it’s affordable and easy to use. They also do quite a bit of marketing, boosting their numbers even higher. Just because they’re big doesn’t mean they’re right for you.
If ease of use and a simple interface are important, Carbonite could be an ideal option. However, if you have very complex data and computers systems or are concerned about upload and download speeds, you may want to give Carbonite a try before committing to a year-long plan.
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