Gone are the days of having to back up your computer to an expensive external hard drive – or even a floppy disc.
In the modern world more and more of us are backing up our computers to the cloud.
The only problem here are the monthly fees that are typically involved which, whilst cheap, can still add up over time.
If you’ve considered an online backup solution but baulked at the cost then you may be surprised to hear that there are actually a number of cloud storage providers that actually offer accounts free of charge.
Right now you may be thinking that this sounds too good to be true – after all there’s no such thing as a free lunch, right?
Well the truth of course is that the providers of free online backup accounts are hoping that you’ll eventually need more storage space than they offer on their free accounts and will pay for the privilege of upgrading. For the mean time they’re perfectly happy to give you some free storage space.
What’s more, with a little insider knowledge you can actually get even more storage space than is initially being advertised. You see it should come as no real surprise that the majority of the free online backup accounts on offer aren’t overly generous on space. Many computer users will rapidly find themselves filling up their free account.
However there is a rather clever way to increase the amount of storage space available to you – without actually having to pay for it; namely through the use of referral programs.
A growing number of online backup companies now offer extra free storage space as a reward for encouraging your friends to sign up.
Where To Get Free Cloud Storage
While there are all manner of companies ready and willing to sell you online backup services you might be surprised to hear that if you know where to look it’s possible to actually get free online backups.
Sugarsync
Sugarsync offers all free account users 5gb of storage space. Simply download their file manager software and you’ll be able to automatically back up and sync your files, knowing that the information on your hard drive is always kept safe and sound incase of any problems.
Whilst many users will rapidly eat their way through 5gb of free storage space it’s actually possible to expand this up to an impressive 40gb by referring your friends to the service. Every time one of your friends signs up for a paid account thanks to your actions you’ll gain access to an extra 10gb of storage space for the lifetime of your account.
SpiderOak
SpiderOak’s basic free account isn’t quite as generous as that of Sugarsync; rather than 5gb they offer only 2gb of free storage space. That said, if you have a good number of friends it’s a lot easier to expand your free account than it is with Sugarsync. The reason for this simplicity is that your friends don’t need to sign up for a paid account; you’ll get extra storage space even if they only opt for a free account.
For every friend that you refer to the service they’ll current gift you with an addition 1gb of storage space up to a maximum limit of 10gb. So while the total storage space on offer is smaller than that offered by Sugarsync you could argue that it’s probably easier to achieve than needing to sign up all manner of paid accounts in order to receive your extra backup space.
Dropbox
Dropbox is one of the best known cloud storage companies though it’s not really a fully-featured online backup provider. Unlike Sugarsync and SpiderOak their software won’t automatically and regularly back up your hard drive. Instead you’ll need to manually drag the files you want to back up into your Dropbox folder, making this arguably a far less satisfactory backup solution.
That said, thanks to their ease of use Dropbox is still one of the most popular and well-known cloud storage companies in the world. Their free accounts offer 2gb of free storage rather like SpiderOak but if you’re willing to complete a variety of easy tasks this can be expanded up to almost 20gb.
For example you’ll gain extra storage space for refering your friends to the service, sending feedback about your experiences with the software, testing out other software packages and even taking their video tour. None of these are especially hard or time-consuming and the end result is one of the most generous offers for free cloud storage available anywhere.
Google Drive & OneDrive
Google Drive and Microsoft’s equivalent service known as OneDrive both suffer from the same problem as Dropbox in that they won’t automatically back up your computer files; instead you’ll need to manually add them to your backup account. But on the other hand both of these services offer an impressive 15gb of free storage for every customer.
Conclusion
It’s entirely possible to make use of a number of different cloud storage services. You might, for example, opt to manually store copies of all your photos split across your free Google Drive and OneDrive accounts. All your music could be uploaded to your free Dropbox account while SpiderOak is left to regularly back up all the other files on your computer.
It might be a little less practical than signing up for a single giant paid account which will manage all your backup needs – but it’s also an ingenious way to save money if you’re willing to spend a little bit of extra time referring your friends and setting up where each of your files will be stored.
And with a total of almost 100gb of storage space (something that would cost you $100 a year with Sugarsync at the time of writing (or over $400 a year with Mozy) on offer for free it’s clear that there are bargains to be had.
What service do you use to back up your computer? Please leave a short review in the comments section below with your experiences…
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