In our last blog post we compared the maximum upload speeds of some of the most popular online backup services. The results showed a distinct advantage in upload bandwidth to the pay-for-what-you-use services from Mozy and KeepVault vs. the ‘unlimited’ plans from iDrive and Carbonite (Carbonite took 575% longer to upload the same file as KeepVault).

But what does it mean to have a fast upload speed vs. a slow speed?

Risk Index

The whole point of offsite/online backup is to reduce the risk of data loss due to some unforeseen incident/disaster at your location. Now, consider this: during the time it takes to back-up a file, it is still unprotected, eg it is still at risk.  The larger the amount of data you have, and the slower your connection, the more at-risk your data.

We can express this as:

Risk Index = (amount of data to be protected x time to protect)/2

Visually, the Risk Index (Ri) is the area under a time-to-protect graph:

The table below shows the Ri values for KeepVault, KeepVault Pro, Mozy, Carbonite and iDrive (based on the results of the earlier test).  Indices were normalized against the leading solution (KeepVault Pro).

iDrive is five (5) times more risky that KeepVault Pro, while Carbonite is seven (7) times more risky!

Reduce Risk Further – A Hybrid Approach

The Ri values above are only part of the story, it actually gets worse for iDrive and Carbonite. Neither service offers hybrid local and online backup.  KeepVault Pro, KeepVault, and Mozy all allow the user to backup data to both a local hard drive (KeepVault Pro also supports network drives like a NAS). The main advantage of a local backup is speed; your data will be protected quickly, preventing loss due to things like accidental data deletion and equipment failure on the protected device.

If we were to compare Ri values and factor in local protection then KeepVault, KeepVault Pro and Mozy would be tens, if not hundreds of times LESS risky.  KeepVault also has true Continuous Data Protection (CDP), files are protected the moment they change. Some services batch-up changed files and protect them when it's convenient for THEM.

Summary

Don’t be deceived, just because you slapped down some $$ and purchased ‘unlimited backup’, doesn’t mean you are magically and instantly protected.  Speed of backup is vital in reducing your exposure to data loss. Next time, choose a hybrid backup solution with fast upload speeds and CDP; otherwise you’re risking the very files you want to protect.

Most providers frame the comparison of online backup entirely in terms of storage provided. There is some merit to this approach considering it’s easy to become lost in the menagerie of technical details regarding online backup. Unfortunately, comparing only storage space leaves out important aspects that affect performance, and hence your ability to protect valuable data. In addition to storage, bandwidth is the most important factor to consider. We’ve conducted a series of tests to illustrate this point.

First, I’d like to provide a quick note about how the tests were completed. Several factors that affect performance were held constant: data set, test system, Internet connection, and even time of day. New accounts were used to minimize, or eliminate altogether, the effects of caching algorithms and so on. In short, to the extent possible, we isolated raw upload speed for evaluation.

KeepVault Online Backup Speed Test

This graph displays the time (in minutes) to upload a single 2.27 gigabyte file.  Carbonite was intentionally left out of this display it skewed the graph (demonstrated below) and made differences less obvious.  Viewing the graph in this state, however, we can see that KeepVault Pro, at 3.1 Mbps, is 395% faster than iDrive, at 0.646 Mbps.  You may be editing photos and videos, or you may be storing patient records.  Either way, this speed translates directly into your ability to protect the files that you value.

Our final graph really illustrates our main point: Bandwidth Matters.  This graph displays the same data as above, but includes Carbonite, whose measured average speeds came to 0.4592.  As the graph demonstrates, Carbonite took 575% longer than KeepVault to upload the same file.  Are you really protected if it takes almost 12 hours to upload just over two gigabytes?  What good is an online data protection plan if (through throttling) you cannot protect your data?  In the spirit of fairness, Carbonite is open regarding their throttling policy, which can be viewed here.

KeepVault Online Backup Speed Test Including Carbonite

Many of our customers come to us after being frustrated by the empty promises of our competitors. We love what we do and, here at KeepVault, we believe in providing a superlative service at an honest price. We offer a range of plans, so you can pay for only what you need. Moreover, you can add storage as you need it. If you’re not already a customer, go ahead … give KeepVault a try.

Last week we learned that online backup provider, and KeepVault competitor, Carbonite had filed a form S-1 with the SEC, a proposal for an Initial Public Offering (IPO) of their stock. Estimates have them looking to raise USD$100m. But it was the content of the filing that generated most of the emails/calls to my desk; over 1m customers, losses of USD$25m in 2010, and last quarter revenues of USD$12.8m.

Acceptance

We're hugely excited to see an IPO in our industry; a hopeful sign of acceptance and maturity in a business where KeepVault's 5-year track record makes us elder statesmen! As fear of cloud based backup continues to dissipate and services improve, so the market is consolidating (mostly) around strong companies with solid business plans.  Carbonite's ~1m users makes them one of the largest online backup services, and to paraphrase 'things are just getting going'!  Their last quarter revenue of $12.8m is certainly impressive and again talks to the increasing rate of acceptance. KeepVault has seen approximately 70% yearly growth, almost entirely through word-of-mouth 'advertising' (BIG thank you to our loyal customers!).

Similarities and Differences

While KeepVault and Carbonite are both in the Online Backup business there are significant differences in the two services.  An article today in The Register asks why now and why Carbonite? Why isn't Nirvanix (an online storage provider) filing for an IPO?

The Register proposes that Carbonite needs money to sustain their current business model, e.g. the 'land grab' approach reminiscent of Web 1.0: give the service away and spend any revenues on attracting the next customer.  Carbonite and some other services (livedrive, Backblaze et al) offer 'unlimited' storage, for one computer, for a low monthly fee.  The downside for Carbonite? Significant $ loss each quarter and for the foreseeable future (according to the Carbonite IPO filing).

As Mozy recently announced, 'unlimited' storage is not sustainable; the growth in customer storage is fast outpacing any reductions in storage costs.  Hence, Mozy has adopted a pay-for-use model similar to that offered by KeepVault for the past ~3 years. Not to toot our own horn, but it didn't take a rocket scientist to see that unlimited plans, while an easy way to attract new customers, were not the key to long term success.

Summary

Many companies offer online backup, but how many are in it for the long term? Do you want to re-upload your data every time your provider runs out of money? KeepVault's pricing is, we believe, walking the fine line between feeding our families and protecting the digital memories/files etc you entrust to us; there are no investors looking to cash-out or reap huge returns on investment, and no questionable business models.  Backup is about conserving, and we're taking a conservative approach!

Looking for a really thorough review of KeepVault?  Check out this review on SeanDaniel.com

The conclusion?

If you’re still debating having a Cloud Backup solution for your most prized data, you should approach it like an insurance plan.  You have one for your house, you have one for your car.  You cross your fingers every day that you don’t need to use it, but when you do, it’s there for you.  If your hard-drive fails, recovery of such drives can often cost $1,000s, with no guarantee you can get your data back.  If you’re house burns down, like my uncle’s, this sort of thing is priceless.

I’m using KeepVault, what are you using?

Vail, Aurora, and Breckenridge (collectively known as 'Colorado') were the codenames given to Microsoft's new Windows Home Server and Small Business Server (SBS) platforms.  Here are some preview screenshots of KeepVault v4.0 running in the new SBS Essentials 2011 environment.

Easily installed and configured, KeepVault for SBS supports backup to both a local or network device and simultaneously to secure online storage.

KeepVault supports simultaneous local and online backup

The console has been completely re-written from KeepVault v3.x for Windows Home Server, to take advantage of the new layout with the 'Colorado' platform.  Users are able to enable/disable protection of the built-in 'shares' and also specify specific folders for protection.  Backups can be encrypted and compressed; encryption always occurs before sending the data over the Internet. A full discussion on the new features in KeepVault v4 will be forthcoming, shortly before its release in mid March.

KeepVault Online Backup running in SBS 2011

The popular KeepVault Connector functionality will continue to be available.  KeepVault Connector installs a lightweight client on your Mac + PC computers.  This client then automatically and in real-time archives new and changed files in monitored folders to your WHS or SBS.  KeepVault Connector functionality is available over both your local area network and via the Internet (requires you enable remote access).  It is a great way to ensure that company or personal files are always backed up.

KeepVault Connector archives files to SBS 2011 over your local network or Internet

Don't let the name fool you, Windows Home Server (WHS) is a viable and affordable server solution for small businesses. We're big fans of this platform, both for Microsoft's intended home users and for business use.  All our employees have at least one, friends and family have been encouraged to buy them, and we've also worked on custom KeepVault deployments using WHS as a base.  KeepVault was in-fact originally written for the WHS platform and is recommended by Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft. WHS has been so popular with business that the upcoming new Small Business Server platforms (codenamed Breckenridge and Aurora) will incorporate many of the WHS features and a slick new user console.  KeepVault will of course support these new platforms (more on that in a later post).

This interesting post (Mozy Online Backup: RTFM) by Michael Horowitz of Computerworld asks the question 'should a backup service delete files that the user has deleted from their backup set?'.  In a word 'NO'!

We concur with his findings that there is no way to determine if the user meant to delete the file or if they accidentally deleted the file from their computer. Thus, the file should not automatically be deleted from the online backup; as he says 'automatic deletion' is not a 'Defensive Computing' scheme. Always err on the side of caution.

This is why KeepVault does not delete files from your backup that you have deleted on the computer.  We force users to delete files from their backup via the KeepVault user interface. Perhaps this a a bit tedious, BUT we believe it is the only way to truly protect users against accidental deletion.

It is becoming increasingly common for small businesses, especially startups, to have no central or physical office location. Residential high speed Internet connections mean employees can work from home (of the coffee shop!), work flexible hours, and remain continuously connected to each other via SMS, IM, social media, email etc etc.  But without a central network, server, or backup system all of the data these employees create sits unprotected on their laptops/PCs, vulnerable to accidental data loss, or device failure/theft. Numerous studies have shown the catastrophic impacts of data loss on the long term longevity of companies.  PowerPoints, contact lists, projections, art, and other intellectual property.  What data is unprotected on your employee's computers?

Many companies are turning to web based productivity solutions like Google Docs for an affordable means of creating and sharing information.  While this protects the items created there it does nothing for all the other data an employee creates/owns.  Backing up that PC/laptop is still very important if you want to own your data. Here's how to quickly protect your company data to our secure online servers:

4 Step Program

1. Purchase one 40GB KeepVaultPro account for only $15/month (we have a free trial too). You can easily buy more storage later as your needs grow.
2. Install the software on all the computers to protect, entering your account credentials.  There are no additional fees for each computer!
3. The setup wizard helps you identify the locations you want to protect.  By default we recommend protecting all the data in the 'User' folder; this includes things like their 'Desktop' and 'Documents/My Documents' folders.
4. Choose the real-time / always-on protection option (as a file is changed or created in the monitored folders it will be backed-up in real time), close the wizard and you're all set!

Optional Steps

1. KeepVault will also simultaneously backup data to an attached USB drive. You can very cheaply outfit your staff with USB keys; this can be their first line of defense against data loss.  You can choose whether KeepVault encrypts the data stored on the USB. Restoring files from a local drive is typically faster.
2. Worried about employees changing or stopping the backup? With KeepVault Pro you can set an administrator password (learn more in the user manual) which locks the KeepVault user interface to prevent changes.
3. Looking to limit access to backed-up data? KeepVault Pro has a 'sub-user' feature.  Use this to segment your storage; perhaps 20GB for 'managers', 50GB for 'art department', 20GB for 'marketing'. Each of those 'sub accounts' will have different credentials, prohibiting access to the other sub accounts. It's also a great way to track usage by department.

One More Thing

Securing your data is very important.  KeepVault does this by encrypting your data BEFORE it ever leaves the computer.  Also, you have the option of choosing the encryption key/code used.  This way, only you will ever be able to retrieve/read the data! Just make sure you keep that key in a secure place!

Our next post on Small Business Backup will look at ways to protect networked computers, including the Windows Home Server platform which is gaining popularity in the business world.

Many of you have probably read of Mozy's recent decision to cancel their unlimited online backup service for consumers. If not here are a few interesting takes on their decision:

• David Neal at The Inquirer
• Keir Thomas at PC World
• Stephen Shankland at CNET
• Barry Collins at PCPro

Obviously this must have been a very hard decision for Mozy to make. They were the pioneers in the space; providing drop-dead simple backup for consumers by removing the worry of ever running out of space.  For them to pull the plug on the very foundation of the service points to the seriousness and very real nature of the problem they are dealing with; an explosion in data storage.  As one of our prior blog articles mentioned we are fully aware of this too; KeepVault has seen triple digit growth in the last 12 months.  Not only are more people backing up, but more people are backing up a lot more data.

Not Sustainable

Unlimited plans rely on the average consumption of all users being profitable, eg the few users who gobble up lots of storage space will be balanced by users with very little data.  They also factor continuing drops in storage price through economies of scale and a flow of new customers. Many also throttle/restrict upload and download speeds to reduce costs still further.  Profits rely on making pennies per customer, but having millions of customers. Even a small shift in customer behavior can quickly turn those profits into large and growing losses. That's what seems to have happened to Mozy's all-you-can-eat data-backup-buffet in the sky.

Back(up) to Reality

Many of Mozy's competitors in the unlimited backup space have been quick to jump on the news; advertising their own unlimited programs and hoping to lure existing Mozy customers.  Certainly we don't hold any judgement on them doing this; this is business after all and everyone has to make money.

However, if you're a consumer and you've just seen the largest unlimited backup provider, the pioneer in the space, leave the game shouldn't you be asking yourself "who's next to fold?". Surely if anyone could have made it work it would have been Mozy?  Answer these questions honestly:

• What am I willing to pay to protect irreplaceable memories and what level of service do I expect in return?
• Do I really want to re-upload everything to another unlimited provider only to risk them going-under or changing their pricing plans?
• What is the value of peace-of-mind and stability?
• How much risk am I willing to take?

Each to Their Own and Maturity

What were your answers? For many of you the pure simplicity of unlimited online backup will outweigh any of the associated risks and service issues. That's fine; it's a personal decision after all.  For others we hope you start to weigh your options; did you know that with a little planning you can protect the really important data for just a few $ per month?

We encourage you to read our data protection strategies guide and review our flexible pricing plans (for about $4/month you get 40GB to use across all your devices. Plans go up to 5TB for consumers. Pennies per GB/month!).  Download our free data risk analysis tool to see how much data you have to protect.

• Consider backing everything up to a local/network hard drive and just the most important files online; this can help to reduce costs and provides you with two levels of protection.

We welcome Mozy's decision. It shows courage and, we believe, helps move online backup into a more mature and trustworthy position. In the long run, consumers will be better served by profitable online backup providers, happy to protect your data as if it were their own.

The definition of what makes a 'small business' small varies based on who you ask. Is it, for example, defined by the number of employees? Or maybe it is the gross revenue? Or perhaps it is the amount of data it produces?  Does any of that matter when it comes to determining a good backup strategy?

The answer is 'no' ..... and 'yes'!  For example, I often see small businesses defined as having 10-99 employees. That does not, however, necessarily define the backup needs of the company - for example there might be 99 employees and only a handful of computers in a central office with very little data being created. On the flip side, a few graphic artists or photographers producing lots of data, working in multiple mobile locations could present a much more taxing backup environment.

The other day I read a post about new smart switches from Cisco targeting small business and wondered who exactly Cisco was targeting and what metrics they used to determine small?  Perhaps 'small' refers to the amount of money the company wants to spend, or their IT expertise?

The truth is your backup strategy will depend on many factors; budget, number of devices, location of devices, security, types of data ... At this point many companies give up and hire an IT professional, and certainly for a lot of companies that is the right approach to take.  The IT professional will, or should, have the experience to design a backup strategy to your specific needs.

However, in many instances you can design your own backup strategy and system to match your needs and budget.  Over the next few posts we'll try to demystify backup for truly small companies, those with small budgets, or only a handful of computers or locations to backup. We'll provide setup instructions and real world examples. Stay tuned!