Carbonite Review

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These are the latest posts about Carbonite here on Cloud Storage Buzz.
  • New Research from Carbonite Shows More than Two Out of Five SMBs Have Lost Data, and One Third of SMBs Never Get Their Lost Data Back
    A news release from Carbonite today talks about how small and medium businesses have lost data. This does not really surprise me, since so many small and medium businesses do not have dedicated IT staff and the job of managing the computers often falls to the person that knows the most about them. Then they …
  • Carbonite Releases Version 4.0 with Upgraded Backup and Restore Features
    Was looking through some tweets and noticed that Carbonite had announced their latest version of their backup software. It sounds like they have made several improvements in this version that will make using it even easier to backup. If you are already a Carbonite user what do you think of the new version? The complete news …
  • Carbonite Named Tech Awards Circle Winner
    Came across this Carbonite press release announcing that they are the Tech Awards Circle Gold winner in the Consumer/Small Office, Home Office (SOHO) service category. The complete news release is included below. Want to know more about Carbonite online backup? Read our complete Carbonite Review for more information. Start Backing up with CarboniteClick here to sign up!Latest …

Carbonite at a Glance

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Our Rating

3.75 / 5 stars
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Pros:

  • Support for Windows and Mac
  • Easy sign-up
  • Easy download and set up
  • Unlimited backup storage space
  • Free trial with unlimited space
  • Backs up locked and open files
  • Fast
  • Will recover old versions of files
  • Data encryption
  • Private encryption key
  • Continuous backups
  • HomePlus and HomePremier plans support external hard drives
  • Available in eight languages
  • iPhone application now available
  • Offers web access to files
  • External hard drive backup
  • Backup photos automatically

Cons:

  • Must purchase by the year, no month to month is available.
  • Does not distinguish between certain files such as gif, jpg, etc. Does not understand all are picture files.
  • Does not backup video files by default.
  • Throttles data. 35GB ‚Äì 200GB at 512 kbps. 200GB+ at 100 kbps Bandwidth Throttle removed Nov 2013.

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Latest Posts / Deals about Carbonite

Full Carbonite Review

Carbonite Home Page

Carbonite was founded in 2005 and began as a photo backup utility in 2006 at Staples, since then they have evolved to be one of the top online backup services available. With so many changes with the Carbonite service over the past year or it was time for OnlineBackupDeals.com to take a new look at this well established backup service.

Carbonite has a large customer base, making this company one of the more established among cloud backup providers. One of the world’s top-favorite cloud backup services, and for good reason.

All of its backup plans are unlimited and come with a lot of features, putting Carbonite online backup near the top of my list of unlimited cloud backup plans.

After saving any changes, you are encouraged to begin the initial backup. Many customers may opt to schedule this for a period of low activity but, for a company with no prior solution in place, it would make sense to begin this as soon as possible. Assuming the default option is chosen, the user is immediately taken to the Monitor tab, which is efficient and clean.

Backups are organized from newest to oldest, with status information located to the right of each entry. More detail is available in the adjacent Report tab, which would appeal to those wishing to audit their backups for legal reasons or quality control.

The Carbonite app lets you do the same for iOS and Android mobile apps. Accessing stored files and automatic backup for all photos stored on your phone.

How Long Does Carbonite Keep Deleted Files?

Carbonite regularly keeps at least three versions of files regardless of time. Beyond that, versions are kept for up to three months. That includes one version for each of the previous seven days, one version for each of the previous three weeks and one version for each of the previous two months.

Using file versioning, you can recover past versions of files from before changes were made. This protects you from unwanted or accidental changes. Versioning is also very useful against ransomware, which works by corrupting files.

How Do I Restore My Files from Carbonite?

Restore options are also direct. Two levels of granularity are available to the user: Bare Metal and Files/Folders. For application-specific backups, individual options are provided. Bare Metal restore requires the creation of a Windows PE bootable image that can be installed on a CD, DVD, or flash drive. Files and folders information can be scanned across your backups, which will make the retrieval of deleted files much easier. For desktops, the new feature called Restore Flow makes recovering very easy. It acts like a switch that will put your system in restore or backup mode. In the backup process, your system remains in a continuous backup state. By switching to restore mode, you can get all of your files back the way they were since the last backup. It doesn’t get much simpler for users.

Installation

After visiting the Carbonite website and creating an account you can download the Carbonite installed for your computer system. Once downloaded simply opening the setup file Carbonite will begin the client installation. For my trial installation, I moved the setup to the Windows 8 desktop and started the installation from there. Once the setup starts you will need to give the setup permission to continue and then follow the installation wizard.

The first step is the acceptance of the terms of service. You will want to take some time to read the terms but for my simple testing, I sped through it. Once the terms of service are accepted the client will continue installation and the next option you will need to do is give your computer a nickname so you can easily identify it.

The next step is to choose your backup settings. You can select automatic settings or advanced settings. For most people, the automatic settings are probably satisfactory, but if you want more control over your backup or if you are on Windows and want to set a private encryption key, you will want to select the advanced backup settings. Setting up Carbonite is essentially complete at this point with a walkthrough of what files will and will not be backed up initially.

Installation is simple and straightforward for the majority of computer users and should pose no issues for most people. I did a short screencast of my Carbonite installation on Windows 8. It took roughly 2 minutes.

Backing Up

Your initial backup starts as soon as your installation is complete. You can open the Carbonite InfoCenter and check what files are pending for backup. The automatic settings make it easy to start backing up your files quickly and easily. There are some important points to know about what files Carbonite backs up. This was mentioned in the installation tour but needs to be highlighted. Certain file types are not automatically included in the backup including video files, executable files, files larger than 4GB and files that are located on external hard drives. There are three versions of Carbonite Home backup, Home, HomePlus, and HomePremier. Each plan comes with more features. HomePlus automatically backs up music files and files on an external hard drive. HomePremier adds automatic backup of video files to the list of additional features from HomePlus.

carbonitehomewin8-08
Carbonite offers unlimited storage but after you backup 200GB your upload speed is throttled to 100 kbps. If you have a large backup it can take a significantly longer time to complete your initial upload and to complete subsequent uploads.

Carbonite also restricts the automatic file size to 4GB. Files larger than 4GB can be included in a backup but need to be selected manually. It is important to know about these limits to select the appropriate Carbonite subscription.

Carbonite has a feature called status dots that allow you to see the status of your folder and file backup on Windows as little dots in your file explorer. This is a handy feature but if you prefer you can also turn the dots off in settings.

Restoring

You have several options to restore your data from Carbonite. You can use the Carbonite Backup virtual drive to browse your backed up files and restore directly from there. You can also select the restore tab in the Carbonite InfoCenter to search for files to restore, select certain folders or do a complete restore. You can also do a restore via the Carbonite web portal.

You can also restore previous versions of files. Carbonite keeps up to 12 previous versions of files up to two months old. If you delete a file Carbonite keeps files in your backup for 30 days. Your restore speed will partially depend on your download speed. Carbonite can restore data at 10 Mbps or roughly as much as 100GB per day. Depending on your Internet service provider you may or may not be able to download that amount per day.

carbonitehomewin8-17

Other Features

Web Portal – Carbonite allows you to access your files by any web browser once you login. You can browse you backup, restore files and share files to your Facebook account if you like. The web portal is a very convenient way to access your files if you are not at your computer.

Mirror Image – Carbonite offers a local backup option with Mirror Image. It is only available for HomePlus and HomePremier subscribers and allows you to make a local backup of your computer. This feature alone could make HomePlus and HomePremier worth the extra money to purchase.

Mobile Access – The newest version of the Carbonite mobile app has improved from just merely offering access to your file to allowing you to backup your photos and video from your mobile device. There is a more complete review of the Android app available here if you would like more information.

Currents File Sync – Carbonite Labs has released Currents a file synchronization application that syncs files between your computers and mobile devices automatically. This feature is still in beta but does show promise.

Support – Carbonite offers support through live chat, remote assistance, phone and email support. It is important to note that Carbonite phone support us based in the United States and open 7 days a week, 8:30am – 9pm Eastern time. The Carbonite website also has a large knowledge base and video tutorials.

Overall

Carbonite has continued to improve its online backup offering over the last few years to include local backup, mobile backup and lately file synchronization. While limits in file selection and bandwidth do limit Carbonite somewhat they are still an excellent choice for backing up your computer files.

Carbonite Offer Code

To take advantage of our special Carbonite offer code simply click the link below. The special subscription price will be automatically applied.

Carbonite Screenshots

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More Carbonite Reviews

PC Mag [xrr rating=3/5]

Unlimited online storage and a simple setup are feathers in Carbonite’s cap, but I still ran into difficulty when it came to restoring files.
PC Mag

Expert Reviews [xrr rating=4/5]

Carbonite’s great if you need a simple online backup service for one PC, but it doesn’t provide many extra features beyond mobile access.
Expert Reviews

Laptop Mag [xrr rating=3.5/5]

This online backup service makes it easy to send all of your crucial files to the cloud with a single click.
Laptop Mag

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Comments

25 responses to “Carbonite Review”

  1. Tom Avatar
    Tom

    I think some errors are in this review. They do not throttle after uploading 200GB. I am at over 500GB and the backup maxes out my upload speed at 3MBps.

    1. Cloud Storage Buzz Team Avatar

      That is not an error it comes right from the Carbonite help pages.

      This bandwidth policy allows you to back up larger amounts of data at a faster speed. After you reach 200GB in your backup, your upload speed will be reduced. The current maximum speeds are as follows:

      • The first 200GB of data can achieve upload speeds of up to 2 mbps (megabits per second).
      • At 200GB or more of data, upload speeds are limited to around 100 kbps (kilobits per second).

      See this page in the Carbonite help pages. http://bit.ly/103PKKf

      Carbonite for Business does not have a bandwidth limit like this I believe but then the business plan is not unlimited. If you are not being throttled then they have either changed the policy but not updated their support pages or perhaps there is something wrong with your account.

  2. David Rice Avatar
    David Rice

    I am very disappointed in the upload speed for the initial backup. 3-4 Gb’s per day mean that it will take a month to get my system backed up. I saw nothing in their advertising. My bandwidth is not the issue.

    So far the help I have received recommended turning off my power saving settings, which I had already done 2 days ago..so after 5 days I am up to 13GB backed up..only 137GB more to go to get the minimal backup done….

    If you want to purchase this service you need to know this. You pay for your first month, but are not protected.

    1. Cloud Storage Buzz Team Avatar

      It takes time to transfer 150GB over the Internet this would probably be true no matter what service you are with.

      If you want to estimate how long it will take to transfer your data I found this great file transfer time estimation tool.

      http://techinternets.com/copy_calc

      and enter the size of data and your upload speed and it will give you an idea of how long it will take. If you don’t know your upload speed run the test at http://speedtest.net/ and it will give you a good estimate of your upload speed.

      This is a good reminder though, you should always have a local backup copy as well and not just one in the cloud.

  3. AB Avatar
    AB

    Pros:
    – Easy to see file status (backed up, pending for backup, is not scheduled for backup) in Windows Explorer.
    – Ability to force backup of a specific file (not for a folder).

    More Cons:
    – Carbonite could open and lock some files for backup what prevent applications, requiring the corresponding file to start. This was observer with Outlook and Skype. Unfortunately the same is true for most of the competing offerings.
    РManually assign several folders for backup is tedious – each folder require manual confirmation, selecting several folders still require separate confirmation for each folder.
    – Hidden/system folders cannot be assigned for backup until hidden/system attribute is cleared.
    РSlow backup of the updated files (maybe except photo/images) – some txt/doc versions could be missed. Competing solutions backup changes reasonably often (2-3 changes per day were saved as separate versions, Carbonite “missed” several versions).

    Corrections:
    – > Versioning restore supported only on the file level, folders are always restored with latest version.
    For folders in real location (not Carbonite Backup Drive), which contains files with several versions already backed up, Restore previous version option is available on folder level.
    – > Restore (after confirmation) always override local files. There is no option to select destination drive, rename original or restored file or other options.
    There are Restore to, and Restore previous versions options, that allow you to select destination. When restore using contest menu in real location (not Carbonite Backup Drive) which option is available only of several versions already backed up, Carbonite restore selected version under different name, original file is preserved.

  4. AB Avatar
    AB

    More Cons:
    – If during initial installation option was selected, that allow Carbonite to manage encryption key, the selection could not be changed later if user want to use personal key data protection. It is required to uninstall, then install Carbonite to change encryption scheme. All already backed up data should be re-uploaded again. The same behavior could be seen with other providers. Other competitors do not require re-installation or data re-upload after key management scheme changes.
    – If private encryption key was used to protect backup, web interface is not available to browse/restore the backed up files. This behavior hard to justify from technical point of view (provided that user supply private protection password/key). Offering from competitors do not have such limitation.

  5. AB Avatar
    AB

    Carbonite
    ————
    Cons:
    РDoes not backup files larger than 4 MB by default (exception – Outlook .pst files, which are backed disregarding size).
    – *Does not* backup locked files. At least .docx files opened by MS Word 2007, and .pst files used by Outlook 2007 were not backed up so far.
    – Too heavy integration with Windows Explorer (Carbonite Shell Extension/Explorer plug-in). Noticeable delays and instability (explorer terminated and restarted by Windows to prevent memory access violations) when working with Explorer or merely opening Start/Context menus. The delays and issues most prominent when working in explorer with Carbonite Backup Drive (Carbonite namespace)
    – Overall computer performance noticeable degradation. CarboniteService.exe consumes significantly more total CPU time than any other process.
    – Versioning restore supported only on the file level, folders are always restored with latest version.
    – Restore (after confirmation) always override local files. There is no option to select destination drive, rename original or restored file or other options.
    – Files deleted from local hard drive kept by Carbonite for limited amount of time (30 days currently). Some competitors offer unlimited deleted files storage.

  6. Ed Avatar
    Ed

    I just quit Carbonite. Reason is simple. I have a lot of digital photos and Carbonite is simply not the right service for anyone that has already accumulated a couple hundred gigabytes of such files in addition to regular stuff. My backup was calculated by Carbonite to be about 300gb. Two months after starting the service and intiating the upload to Carbonite only 56% of my files were protected and throttling was so severe that it was now accepting only 250 files per day or about half a gigabyte tops. At the current upload rate it would take over a YEAR to complete the initial upload. Preposterous. They should instead simply state that their policy is to accept initial downloads of only 200gb or less as it was a colossal waste of time to attempt a larger initial upload which leaves me unprotected still. I’ve switched to Backblaze which does not throttle and in the first 48hours have been able to upload 50gb. I’ll finally be protected within two more weeks with Blazeback versus sometime in June of 2013 had I stayed with Carbonite.

    Carbonite was easy to use but their “unlimited” marketing is a bold faced lie. They had the gaul to initially refuse a refund based on being past the 15 day grace period. That is simply stupid if you don’t find out until later that you will not be able to complete a backup for over a year because of their throttling policies. I’d recommend Carbonite as reasonable for someone without a lot of data but caveat emptor for those who do.

  7. Edward Coffey Avatar
    Edward Coffey

    I have Carbonite. How do I extend my subscription to get three year discount?

    Thanks.

    Eddie

    1. John Tucker Avatar

      If you can do it, it might be in your account after you login on the Carbonite website.

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