Is EaseUS Cloud Back Up Software a Saver or a Waster of Time?
As a potential new subscriber to EaseUS Back up software, I had quite long chats B4 subscribing, as I had a nightmare experience with iDrive! In the end I was confident and took the 1Tb cloud storage and a years subscription. I was assured that I would be fully assisted for the setting up. So .. Setting Up. I immediately hit a language problem. Tech-Talk Goggledegook is a new language created by Technocrats to keep us Technophobics at a distance from their guarded, exalted towers! (my opinion of course) But, the online Help, to me, should be renamed Fogonline. Basically I didn't understand much of the types of Back-up, let alone how to achieve it (or why). I was soon in touch with their Chat Line. which is, thankfully, staffed by knowledgeable Humans! .. well partially Human. Technobabble continued to the point of frustration (for both of us!) as it was like trying to learn the Polish language in half an hour! Finally I acquiesced (gave in) and agreed to a Remote Session, where They controlled my mouse and PC and did the setting up for me! I must say, they do know what's what over there .. so long as 'You Know What You Want To Achieve' So the mouse was flying around my screen like a demented gnat in a click frenzied Amphetamine Rush and 20 minutes later I was told Done!.. but was it? Well, yes it was I thought. Now backing almost 250 Gb of stuff onto my HDD took less than an hour! Yippee me thinks.. But .. putting that amount of data on their cloud was, well, somewhat of a different matter. Uploading onto the cloud took approx 20 hours to install 16%, as I had not asked for the encryption! Oerr.. So, working out that this backup is going to take 120 hours (5 Days @24 hrs/day) I stopped it and started another chat to ask 'Can I change the Cloud B-Up to be encrypted?' 'Yes you can' was the answer - 'Get on with it!' OK .. errr How? 'It sounds like you'll need the Premium Help' he says $100 - $200 or $300, which would you like?' 'Hmm Set is free Help.. isn't it?' A long pause and a bit of verbal ping-pong later, (the nameless) He impatiently sighed and decided to redo it for me, as I had convinced him I had taken notice - and heart - at the point of purchase, that the set-up was assisted and I had accepted advice at the set-up stage that I now found unsuitable. So after he had changed both B-Ups to be encrypted, where as I only wanted one (the cloud B-up) as a non-encrypted copy of my data on site was preferable, in case I unsubscribed in the future and could not use their app to undo the encryption! 'All you have to do .. is what I have just done!' he says.. but at the speed he did it, I couldn't see what or where! 'Make notes and copy the settings, leaving out the encryption bit' he tells me 'So if there's nothing else ..' This scared me, but 4 hours later I managed to change it! Yay, I thought! Now I can back-up an encrypted version onto the cloud. Start. Now, at this moment in time, it is 24 hours since it started this 'Much Faster' back up .. but, it has achieved only 24% (less than 60Gb) of the upload! So, 4 days for encrypted B-Up plays 5 days for an un-encrypted B-Up. Hmmm. So in the end .. My advice would be, If you have a 5 day holiday coming up, start the back-up to the cloud and go! -or- Don't bother with the cloud and back up onto 1 or maybe 2 Hard Disc Drives, and keep them, or at least one of them, away from your work place, in another building just in case there's a fire, flood, loss etc because their time saving encryption and cloud are somewhat of a waste of time – a drag if you will .. and although it does offer an extra layer of safety, it steels your time. Now I am assured that after the 1st 'Full Back-Up' is complete an Incremental back-up will update the original with any changes done since the last B-Up, and so it is MUCH quicker .. but it Really Needs To Be! In essence, Backing-Up is an essential procedure many of us do not do, until you get caught out and lose all your data, archives, contracts, forms, templates, photographs, scans, e-mails and the will to live, following a catastrophic failure of your beloved (or hated) computer system! ... So, just bite the bullet and Do It! Disappointed David