Cloud Storages Compared - Part 3

  In Part 1 and Part 2 I look at the pros and cons of a handful of cloud providers. I dive into the nitty gritty to discover the practical differences, annoying behaviors, and other details that can make the experience enjoyable or unpleasant.

 Read on for more info as I continue my test drive. At some point I will do a recap / wrap-up and decide which provider I prefer for my own usage.

JOTTACLOUD UPDATE

 First off, I need to correct myself re. Jottacloud Selective sync capabilities.

Jottacloud does selective sync! - I updated my Part 1 post to reflet that.

In the Jottacloud settings you can select which folders get synced. Great!

JOTTACLOUD FUNCTIONS

Jottacloud has three distinct functions: Backup, Sync and Archives.

Backup looks at folders your device and backup any new file or updated file to the cloud. Backup is also selective as you can select which folders get backed up in the settings. Very cool. You can backup multiple devices. If something happens to your computer, you have a backup in the cloud of the data you've selected to backup.

Sync is for files and folders you wish to share between devices. You can select any folder on your device that you want Jotta to keep in sync. As mentioned earlier, you can select which files and folders get synced within the main sync folder. That's very flexible. 

Archive is self explanatory, and is where files and folders you occasionally use get stored. Archive is in the cloud, but is accessible - not searchable unfortunately - via the desktop app. It is fully searchable on the web app and iOS app, so hopefully Jotta will add the feature in a subsequent update of the macOS app.

I'm liking Jotta more and more. It is accessible in iOS Files as a Location, like kDrive and Drime.

DRIME DRAMA

As I continue testing Drime, something happened on my Mac: For some reason now, only the top folder shows on the local folder and it is empty. The sync of files and folders seem to work, as files I put in the local folder get uploaded to the could just fine, but they disappear from the local folder as soon as that's done.

The other issue I have with Drime, it uploads every single .DS_Store from my Mac, and it gets in the way of the experience.

I wrote to the people at Drime, let see if they come up with a solution to both of these roadblocks.

AND NOW, REAL WORLD SPEED TEST

Cloud Provider	1GB file web app upload speed	Web app drag and drop to upload	Max file size	Web app drag and drop between folders	macOS app
iCloud	12 min	Yes	50 GB	Yes	Yes
OneDrive	18 min	Yes	250GB	Yes	Yes
Mega	12 min (*)	Yes	Unlimited	Yes	Yes
GoogleDrive	12 min	Yes	5TB	Yes	Yes
Internxt	12 min	Yes	40GB	Yes	Yes
kDrive	13 min	Yes	50GB	Yes	Yes
DropBox	11 min	Yes	2TB	Yes	Yes
Drime	11 min	Yes	Unlimited	Yes	Yes
JottaCloud	14 min	Yes	Unlimited	No	Yes
PCloud	12 min	Yes	Unlimited	No	Yes
FolderFort	13 min	Yes	100GB	Yes	No

(*) Mega failed repeatedly on Safari as I was trying to upload the 1GB test file (using drag and drop, and using the upload button.) It uploaded fine on Firefox.

Microsoft OneDrive is the slowest of the bunch. Jottacloud, kDrive, FolderFort are a tad slower than the rest, all clocking around 11-12 min.

I've added FolderFort to this speed test, it looks like a stripped down version of Drime. It has no macOS app, so not interesting to me at the moment. Hopefully they will have one soon.

WEB APP DRAG AND DROP TO UPLOAD

Al providers have this function, which is fast and convenient. On the other hand, not all providers show upload progress clearly. Here is some fun comparison with screen grabs below.

UPLOADING WINDOWS VISUALS

In perfect unreadable Microsoft fashion, I give you OneDrive.

Black progress bar over dark gray line, fantastic.

No info whatsoever except the name of the file and where it's being uploaded.

Plus a useless spinning wheel.

When you click on the expand button, you get a version with improved readability.

Why? Can't we just get that version upfront? Really, Microsoft?...

Jottacloud large contrasty progress bar with data size progress.

Practical, not very beautiful to look at. Does the job.

The Expanded version is really only useful when uploading multiple files.

Drime really good snapshot of the action.

Data size counter, timer. Good job there.

kDrive, not so great display, at least it's contrasty enough.

The progress is shown in the small circle.

The better, larger progress line is actually not one! It just zips endlessly there.

Data size progress indicator wins a point. But overall bad UI from kDrive. 

iCloud clean, unencumbered display.

With the right amount of info, as one would expect from Apple.

Data size counter, no timer though.

Although the progress bar and the wheel are kind of redundant.

Internxt clean, stripped down display, taking after Apple.

Percentage uploaded instead of actual data size.

Except I'm not sure "Processing" is the right word to use here.

DropBox has been at the game for a while and it shows.

Excellent progress bar, extended file info.

Counter, expected time of completion, and more. A winner.

Icedrive minimalistic high visibility "gadget".

Different for sure, not bad actually.

Sync.com not great window.

No progress bar, useless spinning upper wheel.

At least it's readable, with some data counting info.

pCloud clean, stripped down window.

Missing some real time data size and time counter.

Mega excellent panel, another winner.

FolderFort better than Microsoft.

No progress bar, but high contrast UI, and data size upload progress, nice.

Inspired by Google, no doubt.

And finally GoogleDrive clean panel.

Missing size counter, with expected time of completion.

MAX FILE SIZE UPLOAD

Even though some providers have unlimited file size, in practice they have some kind of limitation that kick in, like slower upload speeds, daily data upload cap, or limitations to the apps themselves.

WEB APP DRAG AND DROP BETWEEN FOLDERS

This is a very intuitive, convenient and fast way to move files and folders around. Most providers do it well, DropBox does it best. Unfortunately JottaCloud nor pCloud have that feature, which makes them very passé. I hope they both implement full drag and drop in the near future.

macOS APP

Being an Apple Mac (and iPhone) user, this is a must for me. All providers on my list, except ForderFort, have a macOS app. As mentioned into Part 1,  the location of the cloud drive differ among providers. They do behave differently, and the available functions are different. I will look into user experience more in details in incoming Part 4.

I will also look into the providers iOS apps, and how they behave. They all have one, including FolderFort, which make the lack of macOS app on their part all the more disappointing.

Stay tuned!