Windows 8 May Feature Cloud Backup

[hannibal]

Well the MS has made the same mistake many times, but in reality it is hard to know untill the win8 is out
It allmost like Moores law - Good os, bad os, good os, bad os...
But ofcourse the reality is not so simple... Bad driver support from hardware manufactures etc... Big change is allways hard.

 

[razor512]

If one of the goals is to reduce piracy then that mean your data wont be secure as they will have access to what is being backed up.

Most companies that focus on the "cloud" generally do it to have more control in order to get more money. If you can make your product cloud reliant then when you make a new product, you can force customers to upgrade by simply dropping or degrading the cloud for the old product.

And if they cant access the backup data, they may be planning on creating a authentication system kinda like the DRM with many PC games where if you don't sign online within a certain period, your game expires and you cant play it until you go on line even if it is a single player game.

Also most cloud based things are not reliable.

Hey pay us a monthly fee and we will keep your data safe on our servers but don't you dare miss a payment or we will lose your data.

Which is more likely to happen, you to miss a due date for a payment for a service, or your house burning down, while you are not home thus you cant grab your 1 or 2 TB drive and run out the house with it.

For the cost of cloud storage, you can buy a new 1-2TB hard drive 1-5 times a year

Microsoft cant give a large amount of cloud storage for windows 8 users for free for as long as you use the OS.

Cloud is unreliable. The only time that is is ever more reliable than local storage is if a disaster happens that causes your local to be wiped off the map. If you fail to pay the cloud, your data is lost, with local storage, you buy once and have a set amount of storage that you can use as much as you want for the next 100+ years depending on how much wear and tear you put on the drive.

 

[extremepcs]

[citation][nom]damianrobertjones[/nom]How do you know? MS won't make the same mistake again[/citation]

ME and Vista - That makes 2 so far.

 

[waethorn]

[citation][nom]extremepcs[/nom]ME and Vista - That makes 2 so far.[/citation]

The biggest problem with ME was that Microsoft deprecated VXD support for hardware made by crappy companies that didn't want to make WDM drivers for consumer hardware, which use more 32-bit instructions over VXD's which include codeing practices that date back to Windows 3. Hardware manufacturers pushed back, but thankfully, Microsoft pushed back again even harder with XP. Hardware compatibility was equally brutal with XP when it first came out, but many good hardware manufacturers already saw the cards and were actively developing WDM's for Windows 2000 for their business hardware, so developing WDM drivers for consumer hardware used the same skills, and since XP was unifying the consumer and business codebase, it made it easier for hardware manufacturers to move forward.

Since you didn't include Windows 7 in your list, I would bet that you feel that it is a "good" version. The thing is, if Windows Vista wasn't made, you'd be complaining about 7. Windows 7 isn't anything more than Vista-refined. There is absolutely nothing wrong with Windows Vista, and what WAS wrong was hardware manufacturers and software developers that got complacent with XP and didn't update. After a year or so of having Windows Vista on the market, most developers had already cleaned up their act and resolved issues, and Vista today is just fine. Performance on Windows 7 isn't incredibly faster than Vista, as benchmarks will show, but it has had a few optimizations. Tweaks to the UI were made. Nothing dramatically different, but still different nonetheless. UAC is tuned down by default, which I, and anyone else in security and IT, think is a mistake. Both OS X and Linux are more "annoying" in that they ask for passwords for privilege escalation, even if the logged in user is an admin, whereas Windows doesn't, even at the highest UAC setting. However, *nix allows software to be installed in the user context without admin rights, whereas Microsoft doesn't consider this an acceptable practice due to security issues that can affect the user account, which is a common tactic of recent malware even if it doesn't affect the overall system context, such as viruses that insert themselves in the users Application Data folder and load at login (disclosure: Microsoft doesn't outright block software that only installs in the user context).

I equate Windows 7 to Windows 98. People thought both were "major" revisions, but in reality, they aren't really that different from their predecessors codebase. The biggest problem with bringing out new codebases, like how ME tried to improve the consumer base by using a driver format that was introduced by Windows 2000 (and drivers were and still are one of, if not the most common cause of system stability issues), and how Vista was to have a new security and vastly improved deployment model (you have to admit that the max 15-minute install time for Vista had to be a pleasant surprise over installing XP), remains to be the potential lack of readiness of the partner ecosystem.

If Windows 8 tries to do too much over 7, we may see another release that isn't widely accepted. I do like the idea of a client-side hypervisor to take care of legacy compatibility though (rumored new feature). That means no more virtualized OS environments ala Virtual PC just to run that old Win 95 program that you can't give up. We'll see though.

 

[razor512]

ME and Vista - That makes 2 so far.

Many companies do this, beta testing is not profitable, but releasing a product, then have paying customers buy it and complain about the problems then fix the problems in the second generation is a profitable way to beta test. many companies do this.

For example, look at the multitude of new media set top boxes that have come out for a high cost then have a constant stream of complaints and patches, it is basically paying to beta test, while traditionally companies would pay you to beta test their products.

 

[damianrobertjones]

[citation][nom]extremepcs[/nom]ME and Vista - That makes 2 so far.[/citation]

ME was the only mistake. The Vista mistake arrived from oems sgipping machines with only 512mb memory and the complaints. Of course, MS got shot, hence, you'll be hard pressed to find many machines shipping with under 1Gb memory these days.

P.s. Vista was far more secure than XP and had it's many strengths as well as faults.

 

[Vladislaus]

[citation][nom]Razor512[/nom]Cloud is unreliable. The only time that is is ever more reliable than local storage is if a disaster happens that causes your local to be wiped off the map.[/citation]
The problem is that disasters happen to HDD more often than people think. I work for IT and I've seen tons of HDDs failing. Then there's the ridiculous price of sending it to a lab to recover data, which they force you to pay whether they are able to recover the lost data or not. Cloud failure is almost non existent. Unless you don't have a good connection to the web, but that isn't really the cloud failing. For a cloud to fail completely it would take a disaster at a world scale.

 

[damianrobertjones]

P.s. As above, Vista introduced a really great option with UAC which nearly all PLEBS instantly disabled. Well done general public, you asked for more security amd turned it off.

Also, if you're running as admin, then you really are quite silly.

 

[choirbass]

[citation][nom]godnodog[/nom]Well, I´m not joinnig this trend for cloud, I like privacy and staying offline.1 question (this is the case of begginers):if "a possible scenario could require customers to set up a Live account (or use an existing one), purchase an access key (or register if Windows 8 came pre-installed on a new PC), and download the OS when needed later, similar to purchasing games from Steam. There would be no need for discs or permanently storing installation files on the HDD." What if I don´t have an SO installed, how will I download the OS when needed if I have no SO to start from.[/citation]

I personally don't see cloud computing having a tremendous effect on the way most people use computers in the short or near term. You'll still have physical medium to restore, install, etc. Look how many decades it took the floppy to start dying off; you do need legacy support, for awhile at least.. or your screwed in most cases.

 

[damianrobertjones]

[citation][nom]Vladislaus[/nom]I work for IT and I've seen tons of HDDs failing. Then there's the ridiculous price of sending it to a lab [/citation]

In nine years, I can count the hard drives that I've seen fail on one hand. Then again, I only look after 100ish pcs along with all the people that work on then.

 

[cletus_slackjawd]

My comment was only to help stimulate the conversation BTW. I bought every since Microsoft OS since WIndows 3.1 multiple times for the many household computers. I have every version of Windows Vista (basic thru Ultimate) and Windows 7 Starter and Home Premium. After all the Service Packs, Vista is pretty good. I think it was pretty crappy at first though, for reasons already listed. Well have to try windows 7 speach control. I'd like to have some AI built in to the OS were it can learn how to interact with you and become better at letting you control what is going on over time, like Does Windows 7 work like the SYNC software in the Fords to dial someone (via Skype) by saying "Call Joe" or play music by naming the song or artist?

 

[reggieray]

Ah, good old Microsuck.

 

[damianrobertjones]

[citation][nom]reggieray[/nom]Ah, good old Microsuck.[/citation]

Stupid Apple owner or Smug linux user? (P.s. All of them do what they do and none of them are really better than the other)

 

[razor512]

For where I work, we keep multiple backups, it is cheaper cloud storage because for the cost of backing up multiple TB of data, we can simply purchase multiple hard drives and backup the data.

With with cloud storage while the data is kept safe, there are more factors which can cause the data to be lost. eg forgetting to pay the cloud storage bill, not having a connection at the time you need the data. downtime for maintenance or other crap on their end. those are more likely to happen than a fire or natural disaster taking out your your local backups.

Hard drives fail but what are the odds of your main drives and your backups failing at the same time.

For the cost of cloud storage, you can afford to buy enough hard drives to backup your backups multiple times a year.

What do you feel is better spending $300 a month to backup 499GB of data at carbonite pro, or spending that same amount of money for for 3, 2TB hard drives then backup all of your data to it, then the next month, but 3 more 2TB drives and backup your backups for redundancy, then not worry about more fees until you need more storage

 

[damianrobertjones]

The standard user will go for the CLoud when presented a different way. Just think if the data people give away on Facebook

 

[Vladislaus]

[citation][nom]Razor512[/nom]With with cloud storage while the data is kept safe, there are more factors which can cause the data to be lost. eg forgetting to pay the cloud storage bill, not having a connection at the time you need the data. downtime for maintenance or other crap on their end.[/citation]These factors will not result in lost data, only unavailability.
[citation][nom]Razor512[/nom]Hard drives fail but what are the odds of your main drives and your backups failing at the same time.[/citation]Like I stated here a client of mine lost all data in a fire, including the backups.
[citation][nom]Razor512[/nom]For the cost of cloud storage, you can afford to buy enough hard drives to backup your backups multiple times a year.What do you feel is better spending $300 a month to backup 499GB of data at carbonite pro, or spending that same amount of money for for 3, 2TB hard drives then backup all of your data to it, then the next month, but 3 more 2TB drives and backup your backups for redundancy, then not worry about more fees until you need more storage[/citation]Cloud is still very expensive but perhaps in the future it will have an acceptable price.

 

[razor512]

@Vladislaus While there it a little bit of a grace period, the companies will not keep your data for very long, they will still get their money each month. If they allowed a really long grace period then people will only pay once every few months or pay once to backup then again to access the backup when they need it.

I know many people who used those random backup services that some store bought computers come with a trial of, generally they will pay for a few months then stop, and if they start paying again like a few months later, their data will be gone.

If I owned my own company, I would buy extra storage for local backups, then set up an additional at my house and through a VPN, backup at a remote location.

A large scale backup service is not so expensive to run that they would need $300 a month just to hold 499GB of data, if it did cost that much, sites like youtube would require 4-5 trillion dollars a year just to stay running.


The cost of cloud storage is just extremely inflated. Also why it that some web hosting sites can offer 1+TB of storage for around $20-30 a month?

While local backups can be at risk of being lost if some kind of disaster wipes your home or business off the face of the planet, which do you trust more, a company that can also have their facilities destroyed and on top of that, just like the mafia, you have to pay them for protection of your data and if you miss a payment, just like the mafia, bad things will happen (to your data)

So are you willing to spend thousands a year for another company to hold onto your data just in case a disaster happens (which has a good chance at never happening in your life time)

PS for my home computer, I have a 1TB drive that I keep in a fireproof (most likely fire resistant) safe, once in a while, I take it out, update my backups, then put it back in. It is cheaper than having a cloud backup.

 

[thomaseron]

[citation][nom]damianrobertjones[/nom]ME was the only mistake. The Vista mistake arrived from oems sgipping machines with only 512mb memory and the complaints. Of course, MS got shot, hence, you'll be hard pressed to find many machines shipping with under 1Gb memory these days.P.s. Vista was far more secure than XP and had it's many strengths as well as faults.[/citation]

My laptop with 4GBs of RAM was shipped with windows vista, and it was STILL slow.

 

[agent_47]

Hmm.. Why do I see the full contents of the backups being analyzed and then used to feed custom adds & search results to Bing... And, I'm not really a MS fanboy, but Windows 8 better be pretty freakin' amazing to make me drop Windows 7!

 

[cocogorilla]

Actually, I regularly use Carbonite backup and aside from taking an entire week to do the initial backup, it is extremely transparent. It keeps track and backs up incrementally so the cost is minimal. I personally prefer this to local storage becase 1) its off site 2) I don't have to do anything 3) no extra hardware collecting dust. I think this option would be popular with customers if done right.