Complete Review

CloudBerry Online Backup is a slightly different solution from other services we've tried before. CloudBerry sells their backup software for a flat $29.99, which is used to schedule backups to Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3).

Installation

Installation of CloudBerry Online Backup is simple - after downloading, the software was installed in just 3 clicks. After installation, we got started in creating a backup set, scheduling it, and running the initial backup.

There are three pre-defined backup plans: My Pictures, My Internet Bookmarks, and My Documents. However, you can create any backup plan you'd like. Using the Backup Plan Wizard, we went through, step-by-step, to backup our “Amazon MP3” music folder.

Probably the most confusing part of this set-up is specifying your Amazon S3 Access key, Secret key, and Bucket name. If you don't know ahead of time that this is required, it may come as a surprise.

Once you Create an Amazon S3 Account, you'll need to generate an S3 Access key and Secret Key from your account's Security Credentials page. Then, copy & paste the keys from Amazon's site into CloudBerry Storage. This part is a bit tricky, and the product could be made more user-friendly if the end-user could simply enter their Amazon email address and password and automatically sign-up for S3, generate the keys, and import them into CloudBerry Online Backup.

Moving along, you must select the files / folders you'd like to backup. Again, this portion could be made to be more user-friendly if the common folders (My Documents, Desktop) were readily accessible. Instead, you must navigate to C:\Users\Your Username\ to find these folders. Once you chose the folders, you can specify to backup all files, only files of a certain extension, or all except files of a certain extension. The configuration options with CloudBerry Online Backup are extensive.

Before the Backup Plan Wizard is complete, you can choose whether or not to compress files before transferring them, and what type of encryption to use. Because I was uploading MP3 files, I skipped the encryption and compression; however, if I were backing up financial documents, I would definitely encrypt them before uploading to Amazon S3.

Finally, specify how many versions of a file to retain and how long to keep them, and set the schedule for the Backup Plan and it's ready to go!

Backup

At first it seemed that transfers were moving slowly, but then I realized that CloudBerry Online Backup measures data transfer in KB per second, not Kb per second like most others. I was able to transfer 2.72 GB in a little over an hour at a rate of 658 KB per second (compared to IDrive, the fastest online backup I've previously used, at 403 KB per second).

As mentioned before, pricing for Amazon S3 Storage can be a bit confusing... backing up 2.72 GB cost me $0.45 for storage, and $0.30 to transfer it. Since these files rarely change (I don't modify my MP3s, only add to them) there shouldn't be a lot of data transfer charges after the initial upload.

If I were to backup my entire PC (79 GB), it would cost $11.85 / month in storage fees, and $7.90 to initially upload the data, followed by $0.30 per month for daily uploads. More than double what I'd pay with Mozy or Backblaze, but my data is saved in a format which would be accessible via other applications.

Restore

With CloudBerry Online Backup, there's no right-click restore option built into Windows, so I had to use the Restore Wizard to test getting my data back out (again, with Amazon S3, you pay to restore your data, too! $0.17 per GB).

When restoring, I was able to select the version of the file to restore (the latest, or specified point in time) and was then able to pick which files to restore. Pulling up the file list was surprising quick, I'm pleased to say. As with most backup solutions, you can choose to overwrite the existing file, or save the files to another location. If the files were encrypted when uploaded, you had to enter the same password to decrypt them when downloaded. This could be a problem, if you forgot the password or were restoring from multiple backup plans with different encryption methods and / or passwords.

6 seconds later, I had my MP3 file restored from Amazon S3.

Other Features

One of the nice things about CloudBerry Online Backup is there are no other features! It provides a highly customizable interface to backup your data to Amazon S3, and that's it. When running backups, CloudBerry uses about 100 MB of memory and virtually no CPU usage, meaning it doesn't slow down your computer.

Summary

If you're worried about not being able to get to your data if an online backup company fails, CloudBerry Online Backup is a great option for your online backups. You buy the software once, and your data will reside on Amazon's data center.

However, CloudBerry isn't as user-friendly as Mozy or Backblaze; users should have some experience configuring software and pay close attention to which files are backed up, and which are not. The level of customization that CloudBerry Online Backup provides can be both a blessing and a curse.

Also, keep in mind that the more you backup with Amazon S3, the more you're going to pay. If you have more than 33 GB to backup, a $5 / month unlimited plan will be cheaper than backing up to Amazon S3.

• Try CloudBerry Online Backup free for 30 days
• Buy CloudBerry Online Backup for $29.99