I think Smart Sync wasn’t described in full here. It actually allows you to see your whole file and folder structure on your desktop as if the files were locally synced. Clicking on a file instantly downloads and opens it. Otherwise the file is in the cloud. You can also override that by choosing common files and folders to always be synced locally so you can access them while offline.
I'm appreciative of how honest you were about the updates... I just wish DropBox hadn't changed. The former version sounded much more personalized and secure.
Not only is the “new” DropBox of no value to me, I’m now frightened that my private files are exposed there as compared to my Windows One & Apple iCloud drives based on your description of DropBox’s lack of search encryption. I’m deleting my existing files & leaving DropBox permanently. Thank you, Steve.
Nah, what's typically happening in these kinds of cases is that the file gets sent over an encrypted connection from you to the cloud provider, they decrypt it, scan it for eg. OCR and search indexing, and then encrypt it at rest. An attacker to the cloud provider can in theory compromise them, but he'd need more than read access to the disks, he'd need to get his hands on the decryption keys. You'll usually hear the words "in transit" and "at rest" in explanations of these kinds of encryption schemes from providers. (eg. OneDrive storage is encrypted at rest and in transit, but MS does decrypt it briefly when it lands or when you use it via an online service or the like). A contrasting model would be so-called end-to-end encryption, often shortened to E2E. That means that for eg. messaging apps, only you and the recipient have the keys to decrypt the messages. From the messaging service's perspective, it's random data in, random data out. They can at most see the flow (which is far more telling than many would imagine), not the contents. This means they can't provide many value-added services that require access to the file at some point in the process. With cloud storage providers, E2E encryption works the same: You encrypt the file on your end, but not with a key the provider knows. They receive a blob of data, at some point your computer asks for a blob of data and they send it back to you, at which point your computer decrypts it. Obviously, this limits the service provider's ability to provide extra services since all they get is a blob of random nonsense, but is more secure against the provider being compromised, individuals at the provider being unscrupulous or the provider organization itself being unscrupulous in the first place.
I was disappointed with the increase. However they do add the sync option which must be clarified here. It’s not the same as the previous sync. It allows you to save more space on your hard drive by only adding a pointer/metadata to the file rather than the entire file locally.
I totally agree, I think they have been running for a while. I switched to PCloud which gives me all that I need. You can use it for backup, sync all devices with sync and it’s all encrypted..
Thank you for the review. I agree with you that DropBox dropped the ball on this one. I don’t need extra space, and I don’t need yet another app. What I would like is easy encryption for select files and folders, to protect against security breaches. DropBox already had an advantage over the other cloud services (I tested them all before deciding on DropBox), but increasing the price was a mistake. It has made me rethink whether I really need it.
I am really surprised, Dropbox still has not zero knowledge option. Spider Oak cost a lot more but office security. There is not issues with privacy or data snooping with Spider Oak. I use DropBox and might still use them in the future. It is just disappointing. I remember when I brought the stock and it sunk like a damn rock.
Hi Steve - I believe the old sync requires you to have a copy of the document on a main computer and can selectively sync it to other computers. If you have 2TB of dropbox storage, you have to have 2TB of hard drive space. With the new approach you can choose to make the file only live in the cloud. I can have 1TB of hard drive space and take up 2TB of cloud space. This is catching up to what Apple does with iCloud Desktop and documents folders when you let it manage your storage. Apple will delete some of the files off of your hard drive based on usage and only keep it in the cloud. Both of these features address the issue that mass storage prices are not falling as rapidly now that we are switching over to SSD instead of hard drives. I can have a MacBook Pro with less storage and pay a monthly fee for the extra space I need in the cloud.
I’m a business user and we have had this stuff for awhile. If you are a Apple user and you like the “spacebar quick preview” ability native to Mac OS to look at files. DONT ENABLE SMART SYNC it doesn’t work. It will then make anything you preview local and not leave it in the cloud.. and worse it will crash your preview app every few times you do it. Huge problem and they haven’t fixed it in 2 years... meaning it will never be fixed... also even after Turing off smart sync after the fact I can no longer “unmount” external hardrives thst contain any Dropbox files on them.
Hi Steve I had used drop box back in the day I am still not shore if that is the way to go . I think drop box still has a long way to go . Great video .
The addition of smartsync and the ability to save HD space is a significant upgrade for me. And with the extra Tb of space it eliminates any concerns I currently have with disk space and cloud space. Far better than the old selective sync.
Dude, dude, speak for yourself. I need a lot more than that. 2 terabytes will last me another few years at most. I upgrade my external backup drives as needed. I.E. drive failure, exceeded capacity, lifecycle, etc. I already have a 1TB drive that is halfway full. Also, I have files going back a minute. Every so often I go through my backups and sort them. Duplicate files, expired data, etc. Purging what I do not need. On average I clean up about ten percent of the total amount of space. There are at least two cloud storage companies that I know of. That offer life plans. Where you pay a one time fee . Then you get a set amount of storage for 'life.' One of these companies ate up a lot of Dropboxs' market share. If dropbox offered say 10 TB, for fifty years for $200 to $300. With the opportunity to pay for an additional terabytes for a small fee; fees depending but keeping the 'life' offer intact. I think doing this would help Dropbox survive. Like aforementioned Dropbox.com is losing market share due to the number of competitors. Google Drive offers the best 'bang for your buck.' When you are talking about the over all needs of the average consumer. Focusing on solutions for corporations and being innovative with data plans is the best bet. The competition also include the dropping cost of hard drive storage. Physical media, particularly platter drives have gotten so damn cheap. It this stage of the game. I am going to buy an older but new SATA drive for an enclosure I have collecting dust. My experience tells me that the drive should last me at least seven years. Just something to dump data on. If my risks of data loss is minimal and my security needs minimal it is a viable options to put into my workflow. Which leads me to cost. When backing up data, we all know the 3 2 1 Rule: At least three copies of the data. Two different storage mediums. And at least one off site. Most drives I have use last about seven to ten years. For 'me' it is most efficient to have buy a bunch of portable drives and have one or two enclosures with four to six terabytes of storage each. I could scarcely afford $60 to $100 a year in online storage. Trust me if I could budget it properly I would do it. If I were homeless but had a decent income, cloud storage is a preferred option. SECURITY AND PRIVACY ISSUES. From what I have seen on TH-cam there are trust issues with Dropbox.com. Another marketing strategy that drop box is not utilizing is 'ZERO KNOWLEDGE ENCRYPTION. The most commonly spoken example in the appropriate cycles is 'Spider Oak.' Think about it, why is a company that charges more, making more money? The weakness in the company that is see is simple. Lack of marketability. Offering what your competitors are offering at or below their prices is basic marketing. Dropbox needs to do what Amazon.com does. Focus on volume procurement. Amazon does things that are long term and focus on human behavior. Making it inconvenient or not economically viable to go anywhere. For example, I could go to a local storage that is a ten minute drive, 25 minute bus ride, or a hour long walk. In order to buy printer ink. I rarely do this because unless there is urgency for my purchase. It is economically more viable to order it online and wait the five to eight days. Same thing for a mouse or a gaming headset. Yet despite of all of this. I 'might' use Dropbox.com if I had to pay for a plan. How about a loyalty price reduction. Subscribe for two years. If you stay for two years. We will reduce your subscription by ten percent? Sounds like a good idea.
@@jamesedwards3923 Im against fixed storage plans because storage providers increase drive space every year anyway. I think dropbox kept adding 1TB each year for the past 3 years. Im using 3TB on professional. And if you buy 10TB for 50 years as you say who's to say 10TB is going to be useful for all that time. 1080p videos are gonna be a thing of the past one day and we're not gonna be stuck on today's kind of content in the future.
I was able to keep my $9.99 a month cost by changing from a monthly to a yearly plan. It's a real bummer but I don't want to switch to another service right now,. but next year, I will probably be making some changes. thanks for the update. I think I just saved $23.88 ($1.99 x 12months).
I’m in search for a replacement for Dropbox. Too expensive and not working the way it once did. I’m sick and tired of my computer running out of room. Ugh. Checking out PCloud.
Good update and first time viewer! When dropbox got rid of carousel way back I looked for other phot type apps. Since I’m a photographer I needed a way better solution. I now use google photos and pay for the 2 TB. I guess it’s their loss.
I've had issues with Smart Sync. It was introduced about 6 weeks ago and it has been an adjustment. Before files would automatically sync to my Dropbox (it's my primary file storage) folders and be available. Now with Smart Sync, unless you designate "Online Only", all of your files are stored locally ONLY. That defeats the purpose of using Dropbox. I still subscribe because I haven't figured out how to solve the problem but it is a pain.
You're spot on, Steve! Dropbox is running scared. The new features are not a value-add for me. Their search improvements just underscore the privacy concerns. And my work won't be living in their app while I Zoom and Slack from there. You already pointed us to Sync.com, and I'm glad I jumped over there. Dropbox's "improvements" just confirmed the decision. Thanks, Steve!!
I loved Dropbox before these phenomena of added additional changes. I still want the old dropbox filing system and will drop it the new version if I cannot longer use it as before.
I'm dropping Dropbox. Switching to Sync.com: just want my data backed up, ability to share, and excellent privacy. (Found Sync.com because of you.) When things get too complex, there's more that can go wrong. Don't want that.
Same here, and the sole reason was privacy and security. I do find sync.com to perform a little slower than Dropbox does, but when you have files that contain customer data, that stuff needs to be secure. Dropbox certainly has the resources to implement encryption and zero-knowledge like sync.com does, but they seem resistant to that idea. That feature alone would change a lot of peoples' minds, I believe.
Collin Dalkeith I recommend you to Pythonj4CK via my iG, he is the best man for hacking job...he just reconver my Dropbox account that has been hacked for two now😊
There are a few cloud services that give live long contracts. If drop box did similar, I would probably buy into it. You can buy a 10TB drive for less than $300. Think about that. Most cloud storage services offer upward of 2TB of storage. Microsoft offers this for less than $100 a year. Depending on your technology, you can buy 2TB for under $200. Also consider the fact that storage is dropping in price; dramatically. Especially order but reliable platter drives. 2TB for less than $100. Way less. 2TB SSD drives can cost $150 to $250 depending what type of SSD. Some online cloud storage providers allow for unlimited storage. The most economic option is to buy a few hard drives. $70 to $200 a year is expensive. A decent all around desktop. Built from the ground up. All purpose can cost $1000. Decent for gaming, media editing, general use. Keep in mind there are very good builds that can be a bit cheaper than that. So I would say subscribe to a one time life long contract provider. Use the yearly providers only if you need it. Keep in mind you can buy clearance products and retrofit them for less than this. $70 for ten years is $700. The average person in overall good health. Can expect to live into their late seventies to early 80s. So lets say that you start paying for this stuff from age 20. So say for simplicity $4,000 over the course of your life? For cloud storage? Or four to five decent computing rigs over the course of your life? Keep in mind we are not including salvaged components. Or selling parts you do not use at say 40% of what you probably paid for them. Again, you can retrofit a lot of clearance items. I am still using hard drives that are pushing ten years old. I have drives fail after a few months use. I typically buy replacement drives every five years. So newest drive in use that is the largest. Which I have been using for at least a year is 4TB drive. Formatted it is 3.5TB. That cost me less than $100. I have something bigger for a new rig. So let us safely assume if I put all my mission critical files on it. I have not even used up 1TB yet. At least as of 2/2021. The economics of drives lasting me five years tears the economics of cloud storage apart. Unless I pay for a lifetime contract. For myself, cloud storage would be nice. I can technically afford it. However given my workflow. Desired, but not needed. Also consider these scenarios: 1) What if you become homeless. Do you know how often homeless people get robbed by other homeless? I would bet you wish you had a lifetime contract with cloud provider! 2) Natural disaster. Remember, Puerto Rico, all that telecommunication and infrastructure damage. The cloud is nice, but having a few off site backups would come in handy also. If you are going to use cloud storage. I say encrypt you data. Go with a cheaper options. Or subscribe to a lifetime contracted one. Remember the 3 2 1 Rule.
Thanks Steve, I've only got a free Dropbox account with 40GB storage, but they've recently reduced the number of linked devices to 3 for free users. I've currently got 5 devices linked which will become a problem when I upgrade my iPhone for example.
Dropbox is priceless for me. If they took more out of my account didn't notice. I save everything in Dropbox they have already saved me more than they could possibly charge
I also think they are potentially behind when the new iOS files app is released. You can point to Dropbox and probably have more functionality than their native app so just use them for the storage and not use the apps.
I love Dropbox for its simple visual layout. I tried many many times to switch to google drive but the way it is layout actually overwhelms me. I love smart sync coz indeed it frees up space and I do store video files there and all my files actually but I don’t know if I’m gonna remain with them..with all the competition offering similar services at competitive prices
Hey Steve. Nice overview; thanks for this. Personally, this update is not enough to entice me to move from OneDrive but the simplicity of DropBox is why I will keep using its Free version, especially for those members of my family who want to share photos and who are well into "the grey zone". For that purpose, Dropbox is great; anything else and I feel as you do - there are not enough new features to move from my current system to the revamped Dropbox.
Informative video. To be honest, most of this tech stuff goes over my head. I am a Microsoft 365 personal subscriber, and to be honest, it seems most of what you have explained is available from Microsoft. My files are saved in cloud, freeing up my hard drive, I can file share and have 1TB of storage. I rarely use Dropbox and haven’t for a long time. Slack and zoom I never use anyway
Steve, once again, you are saving us so much time by doing the dirty job for us! In your previous demo of Sync, you mentioned that Dropbox is asking via their user licence, to be able not only to scan the content of our documents but also to share it with third parties! For me, this was a "No Go" and I'm getting out of it asap. The primary function of all these systems is online storage, and two important factors are privacy and security. I followed your previous advice (and your affiliate link) on Sync.com and I'm happy to pay for 2 TB storage with my data being encrypted with a key I'm the only one to have and hosted by a country where protection for privacy means something. Dropbox can change their interface or try to mimic Slack or Google Drive, they are still infringing my privacy. So, it's a "No, Niet, Nada, Non, Nein". I'm using Google Drive with my business and Sync for the rest. If I want access to Slack, I'm using Slack. Dropbox is dying, another victim of the leadership illness (if people ask what it is, they can ask the former CEO of Blackberry RIP).
For a few months I have been going back and forth between Dropbox and the Google Drive storage I receive as part of my G Suite subscription. I had moved everything into Google Drive and was going to cancel Dropbox. However, I find that Dropbox has some real advantages from a business perspective. So I recently moved everything back over to Dropbox. Dropbox Advantages: most people I work with have a Dropbox account they use professionally, it is easier to share links quickly, I don't care for Google's File Stream implementation (deleted the app), I like Dropbox Paper vs using Google Docs to share notes or being a hub for project collaboration, and Google Drive vs Dropbox working with iOS's Files app. The biggest one for me is Google Drive not working well with Apple's iOS Files application. I occasionally use an iPad Pro and I constantly receive errors when using the Files App. This also happens on my iPhone using the Files app. I never receive this error with any other cloud storage service. I prefer using this app to work with documents and share actual attachments with customers using the iOS mail app. I contacted Google's technical help about the issue and they kept pointing the finger at Apple. However, Apple said it was Google's issue. I have to believe Apple here since Dropbox and even OneDrive work fine with the Files App. Google is the only one that has errors and at times you are unable to see your files. This was the final straw and I am now all in on Dropbox for work and I am using iCloud for mostly personal document storage.
After testing smart sync and selective sync , now I select everything in my selective sync nowadays and I right click on my main directories to make them as online version only. For my current pictures, everything is sorted years and dates , so it was easy for me to set all my past pictures directories as online version only. Right now I have only in local version my 2020 pictures. When we are in 2021, my 2020 directories will be set to online version to save some space. Finally , I must prefer to have all my stuff inside my hdd but (online version ) because it easier to keep everything organized. Maybe it’s my OCD side that is talking :) I have around 42000 pictures and it’s around 849 Gb of data. It took me 4 days to upload all my pictures to Dropbox :)
I dropped Dropbox (haha) after the 3 device money grab malarkey. Replaced with Nextcloud self hosted running out of Digital Ocean. $5 per month, no device limits, no creepy spying on data terms and better integration with 3rd party storage. Sweet.
Great video. My synology NAS does most of this for free. For the money I'll save this year, I can buy another 6-8TB hard drive worth of storage. I'm seriously considering canceling.
That's weird - they wrote to me: You’ve got more space and new premium features. Make life easier for you and your clients. Your plan is now packed with tools to streamline your workday. At no extra cost to you. "No extra cost".
@@dottotech Dropbox Professional. Just got a popup also in dropbox, starting "More storage. New premium features. No extra cost". Don't know if it's different here in Europe?
Great Job Steve. I like your communication style. Much like my own. Yes, it is causing me to rethink my Dropbox relationship. I will be looking into sync.com and I will be looking at the steps required for switching. Of course, the first thing I'll do is look in your video selection to see if you've done something on switching away from Dropbox safely and how not to lose files/folders in the process. AboutArchie.
I have used the paid version of Dropbox for years and have had a Macbook for about four years, but had no clue there was an app for Dropbox. I always use finder or the browser version if I need to find something that I’ve not synced to my computer. I guess I will go check it out, but based on this video and some of the comments I will also be checking out the sync.com site.
Dropbox keeps disappointing me. It use to be so simple to use via browser... now it’s just clunky. Hate that I can’t just drag and drop a folder into Dropbox. I gotta zip it first. Ridiculous. I only keep Dropbox because of clients. As for the recent pricing change... I like it. A $3 increase ($9.99 to $13.99) and automatic upgrading to 2TB of storage is nice. Most businesses would just increase the price and not increase anything else. I agree that Dropbox is scared. Seems like the majority of people that I know are using Google Drive more and more. Mainly because Dropbox not allowing drag and drop folders and it’s clunky web browser interface.
After Dropbox limited my number of devices to just 3 for the free account, I started looking elsewhere. After this "App" convolution it's the last straw.
While Apple chops its iTunes into bits and pieces, Dropbox seems to just have created a new monster. To me, it feels a bit like Office 365 without Office. I'm not sure wether or not I should like it. By the way: I can not only add G Suite documents to my Dropbox, but also Excel, Word and PowerPoint-files. Maybe because I do use the Professional Plan...
Great video. Thanks ! What is wrong with tech companies nowadays? It’s not just Dropbox. Why aren’t giving choices and a variety of plans? The upgrade is always welcome but you have to respect the customers offering choice. So no choice for me anymore. Bye 👋 bye 👋 Dropbox. There are other services which are offering for free what Dropbox want to charge and it’s frustrating.
I like that Dropbox is just another folder on my computer that I can work with and it automatically syncs to the cloud. I use it for unimportant files that I can open and work on using my tablet or another computer. I have used Drive and its handy but it appears to me to be different in that there is no desktop folder that works like Dropbox, plus some of these apps that the big companies have keep changing for example that brought out google+ and now its gone and Picasa is gone unless you have an old version, but so far Dropbox seems solid and to my liking. I don't pay for it as I don't store much on it.
Great stuff as always, Steve. As for the encrypting of Drobbox, I'll point out an option (perhaps you knew of it) called BoxCryptor., which does just that (offers encryption of dropbox files, before they are moved up to the cloud, and decryption on retrieval). It has free and commercial plans. I realize this is just one of many aspects of dropbox you mention. And FWIW, there is still a free plan for Dropbox itself, with 2G free. It's called "Basic", and while not offered from the pricing page, it is offered if one goes to dropbox.com while not logged in.
Hi, thanks for the nice and well explained video. Now I'm think going elsewhere as SmartSync feature derails by backup solution. Because it won't backup the whole file, but just it's metadata instead.
Steve, back when you first started talking about Dropbox, I got it. Recently was told it was full. Now trying to get wedding photos out and can’t take them out unless I share with another Dropbox. Is there a way to get them out of Dropbox?
Hey Steve, good review - my first reaction when I saw the message from Dropbox is... how presumptuous! It's almost like I wasn't given a chance to decide for myself let alone get a heads up that things were getting updated. Sure, they doubled my storage. But like you suggested, I'm not making full use of my existing storage plan... only because I manage my storage online pretty well, me thinks. That is mostly down to my fear of Dropbox getting hacked one day, so I only use files that are necessary for projects at the moment. I understand where Dropbox might be coming from in terms of wanting to keep existing customers by offering them "value"up front, but I still feel I got strong-armed here. And I also agree that the value of the other interfaces other than the added storage benefit is marginal given I spend most of my time using the other applications on the platforms themselves. I'm kinda on the fence about this one - I was actually pretty happy with how things were already. So the jury's still out on this one. Looking forward to your next Dropbox review.
Also just saw that sync.com offers 3TB at 10USD per month compared to 2TB at 9.99 EUR per month with Dropbox. Considering simplicity is what I like, I am inclined to say sync.com has a better incentive here (at least from pricing for storage) - what do you think? Am I missing something here?
I seldom use Google Drive and my primary use of Dropbox is the ability to access certain files on ALL my computers (windows OS) and my iPad and iPhone. I don't share with others, so why should I pay more? I need to look for other options or possible downgrade of my Dropbox account.
Steve. If I'm on your you tube channel Dottotech is there a way to search like if you did a RoboCopy documentation if you can remark here I'll look for it next week. By the way your explanation on your topics
It's a few features I didn't even ask for just so they could raise the price. I'll reward Dropbox by not referring my friends to them and considering moving off their platform.
I am thinking about changing Dropbox for a substitute. I do not think those new features worth extra price. Please help us choosing alternatives to Dropbox. Thanks.
I have a 8gb free account but when you said it has no encryption and Sync does, it changed my mind a bit. Already paying 1tb Adobe creative Cloud and 200gb icloud, why do i need dropbox??
Hy Steve, you have never talked about how in many cases it may be illegal under PIPEDA or PIPA (or the equivalent of PIPA in your province) to keep some of your files or any client files in Dropbox (or Onedrive). You are not permitted to store client sensitive or personal information on US servers or non-encrypted. That's why I keep all of my client data on Sync.
Have enjoyed your content for many years Steve. Thanks for all the good work you do! Dropbox was such a god-send when it first came on the market, but I have to say, I agree in large part with your assessment. I will keep DB, it's just too core to my work life, but I'm looking to downgrade. Most of these features are not of interest to me, and I actually do not want "Smart Sync" at all. My laptop got all manner of messed up when I 'tried' MS Office 365's version of that--yukko! I do not want all my local files in the cloud at all! (And yes I have a real backup solution for them.) Anyway, really helpful & timely video (as usual for you). Thanks!
Steve, I love your videos. The one you did a few weeks back about Sync.com and Dropbox's Terms of Service absolutely "caused me pause" as you say. So much so that I dropped Dropbox (pun intended) and went with Sync. I've had no issues what-so-ever with Sync. So now I'm seeing this video where it seems as though you are back on the Dropbox train. Can you please do a new video where you compare and contrast why one might go with one vs. the other. It seems you are using both. I'd be curious to know why both would be needed? Thanks in advance.
Hey Steve. I know you now have a Synology NAS. I also know from my conversation with their tech support, after I watched your video today, that you can set up you own "dropbox" type file sharing from a Synology NAS. When will we see your video on how to set up a NAS as a personal file storage/sharing system? (I have my IT person working on our system this evening. We have 2 Synology NAS systems.) NAS' are cheap compared to the cost of Dropbox for a small work group. I'm excited by the possibilities.
Hello. In a few days Dropbox will renew my yearly subscription but I think it's too expensive comparing to the $90 USD Google Drive service. Should I change to Google Drive instead of Dropbox? Thanks for the video.
Sounds nice but im in it for the storage and filing system. Idk what slack is...and i think they should have worked harder on the photos and video expiriance. I should be able to connect my dropbox to PayPal as a share option by now. They should have spent some time developing and allowing URLs for website connections and development for custom digital products. If that functionality already exist...then excuse this post. I may not have know about the product.
I wanted to move 8 gig directory to Dropbox to free space on my computer. I right clicked and moved to Dropbox option was available so I clicked on it. When it was all done moving I think the blue dot is an indicator I was hoping to see an additional 8 gigs on my hard drive. However it was the same as though it was never moved. How do I remove the 8 gigs from my hard drive now that the folder is on Dropbox?
What happens to Spotlight reults if I use Smartsync. Files are no longer localy stored but in the cloud (one of the options). Only an indicator is seen localy. If I do use Smartsync, will I still be able to find content in files that are under the "Smartsync-rule"?
i want dropbox to be a real suite with PM feature...im waiting to drop google...jumping to googledocs is meah. i pay icloud, google cloud, dropbox....i want one.
He Steve, Great demo and review again. I've 'dropped' dropbox months ago. I've been working with BOX.com and it seems that this new version of Dropbox is just adding some basic features that Box (and others) already got. I think you are spot on by stating they are 'running scared'. I would probably rephrase that a little bit. They are forgetting to focus on their actual purpose in the productivity sphere. You don't (unless you are a brought up Unix geek) start your online productivity journeys anymore in a filesystem. Why focus on an app, where all the world is moving to the cloud? You start your journey nowadays in the collaboration tools, such as Slack, Asana, Basecamp or Atlassian. Or even, in Evernote or some of the online platforms such as this one. Dropbox got it totally wrong, and they've been there for the last few years. Great tool when it came out, but they've been bellybutton gazing ever since. (does this Dutch pro-verb actually makes sense in English Canadian:-), I guess it must be since so many of us moved over there :-) ) Anyhow, love your channel. Keep up. Cheers for now from sunny Amsterdam, Jan-Willem
Are you still positive on sync.com? I saw your video a few months ago and was ready to make the switch once my Dropbox annual membership comes due. Thanks
My problem with sync is trying to get your folders back out of sync if you want to move to another platform. Not finding any instruction on how to do that .
You should also do OneDrive review sometimes, especially now that we're able to purchase additional 1TB. Anyway, I've been using Onedrive for some time but I recently purchased Dropbox Professional because of the additional storage needs. There are some nice tools like Transfer and File requests that make Dropbox appealing. On the other side Dropbox is a resource hog because of it's slow and intensive indexing process. My laptop with i7 and ssd is struggling when I start uploading larger amount of files. And the upload is generally slow - up to 8 MB/s. Also, video previews in Dropbox don't work when you try to jump to a certain time if the video is several hundreds MB. It just keeps loading forever. And Onedrive maxes out my upload speed and starts uploading immediately. Jumping in video previews is instant. In my testing, Onedrive upload is also faster than Google's File Stream and Backup and Sync. Anyone else having performance issues with Dropbox (upload and slow indexing)?
Its bit pricey in such a way to increase the amount yearly with not really good features. I use it but as I got it free service from Dell purchased product . but nice video thanks- subscribed
I recently had a Dropbox nightmare with a trial of their Dropbox for Business. The rollback killed shared folders I had created. Zero help from Dropbox support. I long for the days of simpler file sharing when I became a use 10 years ago. Be careful trying any new versions with them.
Totally agree. I already decided before this review because we also have Office 365, but the review cancels any remaining doubts. It's a pity, I'm a long time Dropbox user and I think it still is faster and more reliable than OneDrive.
What they don't tell you is you only have a 200gb download limit a month. First time you go over that they freeze your account for 24 hours for 'abusive behavior' and they will increase that for additional 'infringements' So you can store stuff there but just don't try and download it.
I'm wondering how to get my photos out of dropbox and put them somewhere else. I don't want to pay for the new version as all I really have is pictures - but I don't want to lose the pictures when I cancel?
Good video and analysis. Sounds like a lots of smoke and mirrors. I'm glad in not a real user. I only use them if someone shares a folder of file with me.
I'm trying to send videos to my son high quality big video files.... I want to keep the macro features to show details of the mushrooms and plants to put them on TH-cam... My son is going to edit and create movies from my clips I'm going to send him.... Email is a no go lol... He told me Dropbox free may not have enough storage for what I need.... He told me to pick either Dropbox or Google Drive I think.... I have no idea what I'm doing lol....
For security reasons I don’t like having all my information with one company. I like diversification. Just like investment, you should never have all retirement $ in one type of investment . You should have some in real estate as well as the stock market. The more diversification the better. This concept apply to backing up your data as well. Since I use Gmail as my email ... I don’t use google drive to back up all my personal information. Also I have an iPhone and Apple auto backup my phone to iCloud so I definitely don’t want to use iCloud to back up my files. My laptop uses Microsoft 360 and this too get auto back up. I feel more secure knowing Dropbox is an independent company not connect to any of my devices. I was spooked when I got an email from Google reminding me of my anniversary with my friends in Mexico a year ago. How they know this information is beyond me. I think it’s worth the $ to keep my data independent from my other devices. Also I love the Dropbox user friendly share feature.
Hey guys. My team uses team drive for Google and the problem is that we cannot share files outside of our organization on team drive. Is there a simple way to move all of our thousands of files over to dropbox in a very seamless integration way? Our team has been thinking about moving to dropbox, but is afraid that the work to transfer all the files will be astronomical. Thanks Derek
I think Smart Sync wasn’t described in full here. It actually allows you to see your whole file and folder structure on your desktop as if the files were locally synced. Clicking on a file instantly downloads and opens it. Otherwise the file is in the cloud. You can also override that by choosing common files and folders to always be synced locally so you can access them while offline.
Thanks for filling in the blanks!
I'm appreciative of how honest you were about the updates... I just wish DropBox hadn't changed. The former version sounded much more personalized and secure.
I don’t know what slack and zoom even is. I think they are focusing on group stuff and meetings and neglecting a single person user.
I don't have a link to the desktop app. The smart sync is really nice and long overdue, but not sure why I'm getting charged more.
Not only is the “new” DropBox of no value to me, I’m now frightened that my private files are exposed there as compared to my Windows One & Apple iCloud drives based on your description of DropBox’s lack of search encryption. I’m deleting my existing files & leaving DropBox permanently. Thank you, Steve.
Nah, what's typically happening in these kinds of cases is that the file gets sent over an encrypted connection from you to the cloud provider, they decrypt it, scan it for eg. OCR and search indexing, and then encrypt it at rest. An attacker to the cloud provider can in theory compromise them, but he'd need more than read access to the disks, he'd need to get his hands on the decryption keys. You'll usually hear the words "in transit" and "at rest" in explanations of these kinds of encryption schemes from providers. (eg. OneDrive storage is encrypted at rest and in transit, but MS does decrypt it briefly when it lands or when you use it via an online service or the like).
A contrasting model would be so-called end-to-end encryption, often shortened to E2E. That means that for eg. messaging apps, only you and the recipient have the keys to decrypt the messages. From the messaging service's perspective, it's random data in, random data out. They can at most see the flow (which is far more telling than many would imagine), not the contents. This means they can't provide many value-added services that require access to the file at some point in the process.
With cloud storage providers, E2E encryption works the same: You encrypt the file on your end, but not with a key the provider knows. They receive a blob of data, at some point your computer asks for a blob of data and they send it back to you, at which point your computer decrypts it. Obviously, this limits the service provider's ability to provide extra services since all they get is a blob of random nonsense, but is more secure against the provider being compromised, individuals at the provider being unscrupulous or the provider organization itself being unscrupulous in the first place.
I was disappointed with the increase. However they do add the sync option which must be clarified here. It’s not the same as the previous sync. It allows you to save more space on your hard drive by only adding a pointer/metadata to the file rather than the entire file locally.
I totally agree, I think they have been running for a while. I switched to PCloud which gives me all that I need. You can use it for backup, sync all devices with sync and it’s all encrypted..
HI @failsworthboy
- is it possible to use pCloud like DB with SmartSync? Considering buying lifetime 2TB, but have not found this info.
Thank you for the review. I agree with you that DropBox dropped the ball on this one. I don’t need extra space, and I don’t need yet another app. What I would like is easy encryption for select files and folders, to protect against security breaches. DropBox already had an advantage over the other cloud services (I tested them all before deciding on DropBox), but increasing the price was a mistake. It has made me rethink whether I really need it.
I am really surprised, Dropbox still has not zero knowledge option. Spider Oak cost a lot more but office security. There is not issues with privacy or data snooping with Spider Oak.
I use DropBox and might still use them in the future. It is just disappointing. I remember when I brought the stock and it sunk like a damn rock.
As always an Excellent video Steve. I agree re the lack of value and would love to see a your views comparing cloud storage and the value of these.
Hi Steve - I believe the old sync requires you to have a copy of the document on a main computer and can selectively sync it to other computers. If you have 2TB of dropbox storage, you have to have 2TB of hard drive space. With the new approach you can choose to make the file only live in the cloud. I can have 1TB of hard drive space and take up 2TB of cloud space. This is catching up to what Apple does with iCloud Desktop and documents folders when you let it manage your storage. Apple will delete some of the files off of your hard drive based on usage and only keep it in the cloud. Both of these features address the issue that mass storage prices are not falling as rapidly now that we are switching over to SSD instead of hard drives. I can have a MacBook Pro with less storage and pay a monthly fee for the extra space I need in the cloud.
Good explanation, thanks!
I’m a business user and we have had this stuff for awhile. If you are a Apple user and you like the “spacebar quick preview” ability native to Mac OS to look at files. DONT ENABLE SMART SYNC it doesn’t work. It will then make anything you preview local and not leave it in the cloud.. and worse it will crash your preview app every few times you do it. Huge problem and they haven’t fixed it in 2 years... meaning it will never be fixed... also even after Turing off smart sync after the fact I can no longer “unmount” external hardrives thst contain any Dropbox files on them.
Hi Steve
I had used drop box back in the day I am still not shore if that is the way to go .
I think drop box still has a long way to go .
Great video .
The addition of smartsync and the ability to save HD space is a significant upgrade for me. And with the extra Tb of space it eliminates any concerns I currently have with disk space and cloud space. Far better than the old selective sync.
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Dropbox should offer 100 GB plan for some reasonable price. Many people don't need 2 TB!
Dude, dude, speak for yourself. I need a lot more than that. 2 terabytes will last me another few years at most. I upgrade my external backup drives as needed. I.E. drive failure, exceeded capacity, lifecycle, etc. I already have a 1TB drive that is halfway full. Also, I have files going back a minute. Every so often I go through my backups and sort them. Duplicate files, expired data, etc. Purging what I do not need. On average I clean up about ten percent of the total amount of space.
There are at least two cloud storage companies that I know of. That offer life plans. Where you pay a one time fee . Then you get a set amount of storage for 'life.' One of these companies ate up a lot of Dropboxs' market share.
If dropbox offered say 10 TB, for fifty years for $200 to $300. With the opportunity to pay for an additional terabytes for a small fee; fees depending but keeping the 'life' offer intact. I think doing this would help Dropbox survive.
Like aforementioned Dropbox.com is losing market share due to the number of competitors. Google Drive offers the best 'bang for your buck.' When you are talking about the over all needs of the average consumer. Focusing on solutions for corporations and being innovative with data plans is the best bet. The competition also include the dropping cost of hard drive storage. Physical media, particularly platter drives have gotten so damn cheap.
It this stage of the game. I am going to buy an older but new SATA drive for an enclosure I have collecting dust. My experience tells me that the drive should last me at least seven years. Just something to dump data on. If my risks of data loss is minimal and my security needs minimal it is a viable options to put into my workflow.
Which leads me to cost. When backing up data, we all know the 3 2 1 Rule:
At least three copies of the data.
Two different storage mediums.
And at least one off site.
Most drives I have use last about seven to ten years. For 'me' it is most efficient to have buy a bunch of portable drives and have one or two enclosures with four to six terabytes of storage each. I could scarcely afford $60 to $100 a year in online storage. Trust me if I could budget it properly I would do it. If I were homeless but had a decent income, cloud storage is a preferred option.
SECURITY AND PRIVACY ISSUES. From what I have seen on TH-cam there are trust issues with Dropbox.com. Another marketing strategy that drop box is not utilizing is 'ZERO KNOWLEDGE ENCRYPTION. The most commonly spoken example in the appropriate cycles is 'Spider Oak.' Think about it, why is a company that charges more, making more money?
The weakness in the company that is see is simple. Lack of marketability. Offering what your competitors are offering at or below their prices is basic marketing. Dropbox needs to do what Amazon.com does. Focus on volume procurement. Amazon does things that are long term and focus on human behavior. Making it inconvenient or not economically viable to go anywhere.
For example, I could go to a local storage that is a ten minute drive, 25 minute bus ride, or a hour long walk. In order to buy printer ink. I rarely do this because unless there is urgency for my purchase. It is economically more viable to order it online and wait the five to eight days. Same thing for a mouse or a gaming headset.
Yet despite of all of this. I 'might' use Dropbox.com if I had to pay for a plan. How about a loyalty price reduction. Subscribe for two years. If you stay for two years. We will reduce your subscription by ten percent? Sounds like a good idea.
@@jamesedwards3923 Im against fixed storage plans because storage providers increase drive space every year anyway. I think dropbox kept adding 1TB each year for the past 3 years. Im using 3TB on professional.
And if you buy 10TB for 50 years as you say who's to say 10TB is going to be useful for all that time. 1080p videos are gonna be a thing of the past one day and we're not gonna be stuck on today's kind of content in the future.
@@espresso4eva Fare enought, but they should at leaset experiment with the ideas.
Dude I recent purchased a new drive. Needed the extra space. 3.7TB of storage.
100GB is for short term stuff.
I was able to keep my $9.99 a month cost by changing from a monthly to a yearly plan. It's a real bummer but I don't want to switch to another service right now,. but next year, I will probably be making some changes. thanks for the update. I think I just saved $23.88 ($1.99 x 12months).
I’m in search for a replacement for Dropbox. Too expensive and not working the way it once did. I’m sick and tired of my computer running out of room. Ugh. Checking out PCloud.
I wish Dropbox had more plans, like one with 500 GB at half the price.
Lifetime Plan would be better. That is why a certain companies are eating up their market share.
Good update and first time viewer! When dropbox got rid of carousel way back I looked for other phot type apps. Since I’m a photographer I needed a way better solution. I now use google photos and pay for the 2 TB. I guess it’s their loss.
I've had issues with Smart Sync. It was introduced about 6 weeks ago and it has been an adjustment. Before files would automatically sync to my Dropbox (it's my primary file storage) folders and be available. Now with Smart Sync, unless you designate "Online Only", all of your files are stored locally ONLY. That defeats the purpose of using Dropbox. I still subscribe because I haven't figured out how to solve the problem but it is a pain.
You're spot on, Steve! Dropbox is running scared.
The new features are not a value-add for me. Their search improvements just underscore the privacy concerns. And my work won't be living in their app while I Zoom and Slack from there.
You already pointed us to Sync.com, and I'm glad I jumped over there. Dropbox's "improvements" just confirmed the decision. Thanks, Steve!!
I loved Dropbox before these phenomena of added additional changes. I still want the old dropbox filing system and will drop it the new version if I cannot longer use it as before.
I'm dropping Dropbox. Switching to Sync.com: just want my data backed up, ability to share, and excellent privacy. (Found Sync.com because of you.) When things get too complex, there's more that can go wrong. Don't want that.
Same here
That's how I feel. Totally agree - too much complexity added to the mix.
Thanks for the update, Steve .. All this makes me feel even better about moving to Sync.com ..
Me too!
Totally Agree, I moved to Sync.com also
Same here, and the sole reason was privacy and security. I do find sync.com to perform a little slower than Dropbox does, but when you have files that contain customer data, that stuff needs to be secure. Dropbox certainly has the resources to implement encryption and zero-knowledge like sync.com does, but they seem resistant to that idea. That feature alone would change a lot of peoples' minds, I believe.
I don't see a good reason to leave google drive and pay for dropbox. I still have a free dropbox account.
I cancelled my Dropbox account when the price increase was announced. A step too far for me. There are better alternatives.
Collin Dalkeith I recommend you to Pythonj4CK via my iG, he is the best man for hacking job...he just reconver my Dropbox account that has been hacked for two now😊
I switched to MS Office 365 Home. My family members get a 1Tb each on Onedrive.
There are a few cloud services that give live long contracts. If drop box did similar, I would probably buy into it.
You can buy a 10TB drive for less than $300.
Think about that.
Most cloud storage services offer upward of 2TB of storage. Microsoft offers this for less than $100 a year. Depending on your technology, you can buy 2TB for under $200. Also consider the fact that storage is dropping in price; dramatically. Especially order but reliable platter drives. 2TB for less than $100. Way less. 2TB SSD drives can cost $150 to $250 depending what type of SSD.
Some online cloud storage providers allow for unlimited storage.
The most economic option is to buy a few hard drives.
$70 to $200 a year is expensive. A decent all around desktop. Built from the ground up. All purpose can cost $1000. Decent for gaming, media editing, general use. Keep in mind there are very good builds that can be a bit cheaper than that. So I would say subscribe to a one time life long contract provider. Use the yearly providers only if you need it. Keep in mind you can buy clearance products and retrofit them for less than this. $70 for ten years is $700.
The average person in overall good health. Can expect to live into their late seventies to early 80s. So lets say that you start paying for this stuff from age 20. So say for simplicity $4,000 over the course of your life? For cloud storage? Or four to five decent computing rigs over the course of your life? Keep in mind we are not including salvaged components. Or selling parts you do not use at say 40% of what you probably paid for them. Again, you can retrofit a lot of clearance items.
I am still using hard drives that are pushing ten years old. I have drives fail after a few months use. I typically buy replacement drives every five years. So newest drive in use that is the largest. Which I have been using for at least a year is 4TB drive. Formatted it is 3.5TB. That cost me less than $100. I have something bigger for a new rig. So let us safely assume if I put all my mission critical files on it. I have not even used up 1TB yet. At least as of 2/2021. The economics of drives lasting me five years tears the economics of cloud storage apart. Unless I pay for a lifetime contract.
For myself, cloud storage would be nice. I can technically afford it. However given my workflow. Desired, but not needed.
Also consider these scenarios:
1) What if you become homeless. Do you know how often homeless people get robbed by other homeless? I would bet you wish you had a lifetime contract with cloud provider!
2) Natural disaster. Remember, Puerto Rico, all that telecommunication and infrastructure damage. The cloud is nice, but having a few off site backups would come in handy also.
If you are going to use cloud storage. I say encrypt you data. Go with a cheaper options. Or subscribe to a lifetime contracted one.
Remember the 3 2 1 Rule.
Thanks Steve, I've only got a free Dropbox account with 40GB storage, but they've recently reduced the number of linked devices to 3 for free users. I've currently got 5 devices linked which will become a problem when I upgrade my iPhone for example.
Nice explanation. I like google sheet, but not google drive. I much apreciate dropbox. It’s a vert good product.
Dropbox is priceless for me. If they took more out of my account didn't notice. I save everything in Dropbox they have already saved me more than they could possibly charge
I also think they are potentially behind when the new iOS files app is released. You can point to Dropbox and probably have more functionality than their native app so just use them for the storage and not use the apps.
I love Dropbox for its simple visual layout. I tried many many times to switch to google drive but the way it is layout actually overwhelms me.
I love smart sync coz indeed it frees up space and I do store video files there and all my files actually but I don’t know if I’m gonna remain with them..with all the competition offering similar services at competitive prices
Smart sync and the File Request Folder make this a step above what I get from Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive. I think it is worth it.
Hey Steve. Nice overview; thanks for this.
Personally, this update is not enough to entice me to move from OneDrive but the simplicity of DropBox is why I will keep using its Free version, especially for those members of my family who want to share photos and who are well into "the grey zone". For that purpose, Dropbox is great; anything else and I feel as you do - there are not enough new features to move from my current system to the revamped Dropbox.
I have always appreciated their simplicity and agree with you I think it is the easiest online storage solution
@@dottotech I was horrified when I saw the new App. They took away what I love most about Dropbox, it's simplicity.
Informative video. To be honest, most of this tech stuff goes over my head. I am a Microsoft 365 personal subscriber, and to be honest, it seems most of what you have explained is available from Microsoft. My files are saved in cloud, freeing up my hard drive, I can file share and have 1TB of storage. I rarely use Dropbox and haven’t for a long time. Slack and zoom I never use anyway
Steve, once again, you are saving us so much time by doing the dirty job for us! In your previous demo of Sync, you mentioned that Dropbox is asking via their user licence, to be able not only to scan the content of our documents but also to share it with third parties! For me, this was a "No Go" and I'm getting out of it asap. The primary function of all these systems is online storage, and two important factors are privacy and security. I followed your previous advice (and your affiliate link) on Sync.com and I'm happy to pay for 2 TB storage with my data being encrypted with a key I'm the only one to have and hosted by a country where protection for privacy means something. Dropbox can change their interface or try to mimic Slack or Google Drive, they are still infringing my privacy. So, it's a "No, Niet, Nada, Non, Nein". I'm using Google Drive with my business and Sync for the rest. If I want access to Slack, I'm using Slack. Dropbox is dying, another victim of the leadership illness (if people ask what it is, they can ask the former CEO of Blackberry RIP).
From my research Google Drive's privacy is worse than Dropbox
@@therealbrandonwood I wouldn't disagree. Therefore, I'm umoving to Sinc....😉
For a few months I have been going back and forth between Dropbox and the Google Drive storage I receive as part of my G Suite subscription. I had moved everything into Google Drive and was going to cancel Dropbox. However, I find that Dropbox has some real advantages from a business perspective. So I recently moved everything back over to Dropbox.
Dropbox Advantages: most people I work with have a Dropbox account they use professionally, it is easier to share links quickly, I don't care for Google's File Stream implementation (deleted the app), I like Dropbox Paper vs using Google Docs to share notes or being a hub for project collaboration, and Google Drive vs Dropbox working with iOS's Files app.
The biggest one for me is Google Drive not working well with Apple's iOS Files application. I occasionally use an iPad Pro and I constantly receive errors when using the Files App. This also happens on my iPhone using the Files app. I never receive this error with any other cloud storage service. I prefer using this app to work with documents and share actual attachments with customers using the iOS mail app. I contacted Google's technical help about the issue and they kept pointing the finger at Apple. However, Apple said it was Google's issue. I have to believe Apple here since Dropbox and even OneDrive work fine with the Files App. Google is the only one that has errors and at times you are unable to see your files.
This was the final straw and I am now all in on Dropbox for work and I am using iCloud for mostly personal document storage.
After testing smart sync and selective sync , now I select everything in my selective sync nowadays and I right click on my main directories to make them as online version only. For my current pictures, everything is sorted years and dates , so it was easy for me to set all my past pictures directories as online version only. Right now I have only in local version my 2020 pictures. When we are in 2021, my 2020 directories will be set to online version to save some space. Finally , I must prefer to have all my stuff inside my hdd but (online version ) because it easier to keep everything organized. Maybe it’s my OCD side that is talking :) I have around 42000 pictures and it’s around 849 Gb of data. It took me 4 days to upload all my pictures to Dropbox :)
How do you manage your Dropbox directory on your PC these days ?
I dropped Dropbox (haha) after the 3 device money grab malarkey.
Replaced with Nextcloud self hosted running out of Digital Ocean.
$5 per month, no device limits, no creepy spying on data terms and better integration with 3rd party storage.
Sweet.
Great video. My synology NAS does most of this for free. For the money I'll save this year, I can buy another 6-8TB hard drive worth of storage. I'm seriously considering canceling.
To be fair, that doesn't provide geographical redundancy. Without a cloud service, if you lose your home you lose all your data.
I only have a free dropbox account. I intend to keep it that way unless they say I have to pay, then I will not use dropbox at all. I prefer google!
i want to move away from google drive..not that great at synching.
That's weird - they wrote to me:
You’ve got more space and new premium features.
Make life easier for you and your clients. Your plan is now packed with tools to streamline your workday. At no extra cost to you.
"No extra cost".
I wonder what plan you were on?
@@dottotech Dropbox Professional. Just got a popup also in dropbox, starting "More storage. New premium features. No extra cost". Don't know if it's different here in Europe?
Great Job Steve. I like your communication style. Much like my own. Yes, it is causing me to rethink my Dropbox relationship. I will be looking into sync.com and I will be looking at the steps required for switching. Of course, the first thing I'll do is look in your video selection to see if you've done something on switching away from Dropbox safely and how not to lose files/folders in the process. AboutArchie.
I haven't done a video specifically on migrating from dropbox to sync but it might be worth a thought
I have used the paid version of Dropbox for years and have had a Macbook for about four years, but had no clue there was an app for Dropbox. I always use finder or the browser version if I need to find something that I’ve not synced to my computer. I guess I will go check it out, but based on this video and some of the comments I will also be checking out the sync.com site.
I didn't know about this app either. Smart Sync works in the Mac Finder which is nice
Dropbox keeps disappointing me. It use to be so simple to use via browser... now it’s just clunky. Hate that I can’t just drag and drop a folder into Dropbox. I gotta zip it first. Ridiculous.
I only keep Dropbox because of clients.
As for the recent pricing change... I like it. A $3 increase ($9.99 to $13.99) and automatic upgrading to 2TB of storage is nice. Most businesses would just increase the price and not increase anything else.
I agree that Dropbox is scared. Seems like the majority of people that I know are using Google Drive more and more. Mainly because Dropbox not allowing drag and drop folders and it’s clunky web browser interface.
After Dropbox limited my number of devices to just 3 for the free account, I started looking elsewhere. After this "App" convolution it's the last straw.
Note that part of the upgrade is reducing the number of devices accessing free accounts to 3️⃣
While Apple chops its iTunes into bits and pieces, Dropbox seems to just have created a new monster. To me, it feels a bit like Office 365 without Office. I'm not sure wether or not I should like it.
By the way: I can not only add G Suite documents to my Dropbox, but also Excel, Word and PowerPoint-files. Maybe because I do use the Professional Plan...
Way to GO Stefan...........
It appears that Dropbox is like the guy that is running to catch the bus that left the stop a few minutes earlier.
Great video. Thanks ! What is wrong with tech companies nowadays? It’s not just Dropbox. Why aren’t giving choices and a variety of plans? The upgrade is always welcome but you have to respect the customers offering choice. So no choice for me anymore. Bye 👋 bye 👋 Dropbox. There are other services which are offering for free what Dropbox want to charge and it’s frustrating.
Thanks for your honest review. Cheers
Everytime I hear that theme I go back to being a kid watching Knowledge Network... Smiles everytime 😁
You made me smile
I like that Dropbox is just another folder on my computer that I can work with and it automatically syncs to the cloud. I use it for unimportant files that I can open and work on using my tablet or another computer. I have used Drive and its handy but it appears to me to be different in that there is no desktop folder that works like Dropbox, plus some of these apps that the big companies have keep changing for example that brought out google+ and now its gone and Picasa is gone unless you have an old version, but so far Dropbox seems solid and to my liking. I don't pay for it as I don't store much on it.
Great stuff as always, Steve. As for the encrypting of Drobbox, I'll point out an option (perhaps you knew of it) called BoxCryptor., which does just that (offers encryption of dropbox files, before they are moved up to the cloud, and decryption on retrieval). It has free and commercial plans. I realize this is just one of many aspects of dropbox you mention.
And FWIW, there is still a free plan for Dropbox itself, with 2G free. It's called "Basic", and while not offered from the pricing page, it is offered if one goes to dropbox.com while not logged in.
Good solution thanks for sharing!
I just use mine for storage. Lack of simple drag and drop and price increase is a deal breaker for me.
They should do simple things like change thumbnails, change colours and search exif and keywords etc.
Love the honesty here. Good video.
Always!
Hi, thanks for the nice and well explained video. Now I'm think going elsewhere as SmartSync feature derails by backup solution. Because it won't backup the whole file, but just it's metadata instead.
Steve, back when you first started talking about Dropbox, I got it. Recently was told it was full. Now trying to get wedding photos out and can’t take them out unless I share with another Dropbox. Is there a way to get them out of Dropbox?
You can always download them to your computer store them on a local hard drive
Hey Steve, good review - my first reaction when I saw the message from Dropbox is... how presumptuous! It's almost like I wasn't given a chance to decide for myself let alone get a heads up that things were getting updated. Sure, they doubled my storage. But like you suggested, I'm not making full use of my existing storage plan... only because I manage my storage online pretty well, me thinks. That is mostly down to my fear of Dropbox getting hacked one day, so I only use files that are necessary for projects at the moment. I understand where Dropbox might be coming from in terms of wanting to keep existing customers by offering them "value"up front, but I still feel I got strong-armed here. And I also agree that the value of the other interfaces other than the added storage benefit is marginal given I spend most of my time using the other applications on the platforms themselves. I'm kinda on the fence about this one - I was actually pretty happy with how things were already. So the jury's still out on this one. Looking forward to your next Dropbox review.
Also just saw that sync.com offers 3TB at 10USD per month compared to 2TB at 9.99 EUR per month with Dropbox. Considering simplicity is what I like, I am inclined to say sync.com has a better incentive here (at least from pricing for storage) - what do you think? Am I missing something here?
Thanks for sharing, I think we are all in the same boat, and Dropbox is skating on thin ice with us.
I seldom use Google Drive and my primary use of Dropbox is the ability to access certain files on ALL my computers (windows OS) and my iPad and iPhone. I don't share with others, so why should I pay more? I need to look for other options or possible downgrade of my Dropbox account.
Steve. If I'm on your you tube channel Dottotech is there a way to search like if you did a RoboCopy documentation if you can remark here I'll look for it next week. By the way your explanation on your topics
hi, steve have you heard of dokkio and PBworks I like dokkio great stuff
People probably just want the power of windows explorer in the app. I mean what more would you want from an online file explorer?
I am rethinking my Drop Box... I use G-Drive, Box, and Drop Box but looking to consolidate ... What do you recommend?
You might consolidate to a home NAS and copy sync to bavkblaze for nackup
It's a few features I didn't even ask for just so they could raise the price. I'll reward Dropbox by not referring my friends to them and considering moving off their platform.
I have Dropbox hopefully I can keep the free version I've only 2GB.
I am thinking about changing Dropbox for a substitute. I do not think those new features worth extra price. Please help us choosing alternatives to Dropbox. Thanks.
I have a 8gb free account but when you said it has no encryption and Sync does, it changed my mind a bit. Already paying 1tb Adobe creative Cloud and 200gb icloud, why do i need dropbox??
You know how hard it is to get people to subscribe to a 'free' service so you can get more free space?
Hy Steve, you have never talked about how in many cases it may be illegal under PIPEDA or PIPA (or the equivalent of PIPA in your province) to keep some of your files or any client files in Dropbox (or Onedrive). You are not permitted to store client sensitive or personal information on US servers or non-encrypted.
That's why I keep all of my client data on Sync.
Great points, I am not sure I am qualified to talk about those laws.
Have enjoyed your content for many years Steve. Thanks for all the good work you do! Dropbox was such a god-send when it first came on the market, but I have to say, I agree in large part with your assessment. I will keep DB, it's just too core to my work life, but I'm looking to downgrade. Most of these features are not of interest to me, and I actually do not want "Smart Sync" at all. My laptop got all manner of messed up when I 'tried' MS Office 365's version of that--yukko! I do not want all my local files in the cloud at all! (And yes I have a real backup solution for them.)
Anyway, really helpful & timely video (as usual for you). Thanks!
Dropbox is not worth it at all, especially when you consider that 200GB of Google Drive space costs only $30.00 per year.
Steve, I love your videos. The one you did a few weeks back about Sync.com and Dropbox's Terms of Service absolutely "caused me pause" as you say. So much so that I dropped Dropbox (pun intended) and went with Sync. I've had no issues what-so-ever with Sync. So now I'm seeing this video where it seems as though you are back on the Dropbox train. Can you please do a new video where you compare and contrast why one might go with one vs. the other. It seems you are using both. I'd be curious to know why both would be needed? Thanks in advance.
Hey Steve. I know you now have a Synology NAS. I also know from my conversation with their tech support, after I watched your video today, that you can set up you own "dropbox" type file sharing from a Synology NAS. When will we see your video on how to set up a NAS as a personal file storage/sharing system? (I have my IT person working on our system this evening. We have 2 Synology NAS systems.) NAS' are cheap compared to the cost of Dropbox for a small work group. I'm excited by the possibilities.
Hello. In a few days Dropbox will renew my yearly subscription but I think it's too expensive comparing to the $90 USD Google Drive service. Should I change to Google Drive instead of Dropbox? Thanks for the video.
Sounds nice but im in it for the storage and filing system. Idk what slack is...and i think they should have worked harder on the photos and video expiriance. I should be able to connect my dropbox to PayPal as a share option by now. They should have spent some time developing and allowing URLs for website connections and development for custom digital products. If that functionality already exist...then excuse this post. I may not have know about the product.
I wanted to move 8 gig directory to Dropbox to free space on my computer. I right clicked and moved to Dropbox option was available so I clicked on it. When it was all done moving I think the blue dot is an indicator I was hoping to see an additional 8 gigs on my hard drive. However it was the same as though it was never moved. How do I remove the 8 gigs from my hard drive now that the folder is on Dropbox?
What happens to Spotlight reults if I use Smartsync. Files are no longer localy stored but in the cloud (one of the options). Only an indicator is seen localy. If I do use Smartsync, will I still be able to find content in files that are under the "Smartsync-rule"?
i want dropbox to be a real suite with PM feature...im waiting to drop google...jumping to googledocs is meah.
i pay icloud, google cloud, dropbox....i want one.
He Steve, Great demo and review again. I've 'dropped' dropbox months ago. I've been working with BOX.com and it seems that this new version of Dropbox is just adding some basic features that Box (and others) already got. I think you are spot on by stating they are 'running scared'. I would probably rephrase that a little bit. They are forgetting to focus on their actual purpose in the productivity sphere. You don't (unless you are a brought up Unix geek) start your online productivity journeys anymore in a filesystem. Why focus on an app, where all the world is moving to the cloud? You start your journey nowadays in the collaboration tools, such as Slack, Asana, Basecamp or Atlassian. Or even, in Evernote or some of the online platforms such as this one.
Dropbox got it totally wrong, and they've been there for the last few years. Great tool when it came out, but they've been bellybutton gazing ever since. (does this Dutch pro-verb actually makes sense in English Canadian:-), I guess it must be since so many of us moved over there :-) )
Anyhow, love your channel. Keep up. Cheers for now from sunny Amsterdam, Jan-Willem
Are you still positive on sync.com? I saw your video a few months ago and was ready to make the switch once my Dropbox annual membership comes due. Thanks
I am indeed!
My problem with sync is trying to get your folders back out of sync if you want to move to another platform. Not finding any instruction on how to do that .
Nice presentation. If I use Dropbox now, do I have to upgrade? If so I’ll switch to OneDrive.
I didn't see any option to stay with the same plan
You should also do OneDrive review sometimes, especially now that we're able to purchase additional 1TB. Anyway, I've been using Onedrive for some time but I recently purchased Dropbox Professional because of the additional storage needs.
There are some nice tools like Transfer and File requests that make Dropbox appealing.
On the other side Dropbox is a resource hog because of it's slow and intensive indexing process. My laptop with i7 and ssd is struggling when I start uploading larger amount of files. And the upload is generally slow - up to 8 MB/s. Also, video previews in Dropbox don't work when you try to jump to a certain time if the video is several hundreds MB. It just keeps loading forever.
And Onedrive maxes out my upload speed and starts uploading immediately. Jumping in video previews is instant. In my testing, Onedrive upload is also faster than Google's File Stream and Backup and Sync.
Anyone else having performance issues with Dropbox (upload and slow indexing)?
You have nailed it
$155 + tax for only 2T sounds ridiculous.
another reason I am considering Sync
I have not been excited about DropBox since Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive arrived.
Thank you very much, that’s very helpful explanation.
Your dog 😻💛
Its bit pricey in such a way to increase the amount yearly with not really good features. I use it but as I got it free service from Dell purchased product . but nice video thanks- subscribed
I recently had a Dropbox nightmare with a trial of their Dropbox for Business. The rollback killed shared folders I had created. Zero help from Dropbox support. I long for the days of simpler file sharing when I became a use 10 years ago. Be careful trying any new versions with them.
Definitely canceling my account. Not worth the price increase. Thank you for your great review, Steve.
Totally agree. I already decided before this review because we also have Office 365, but the review cancels any remaining doubts. It's a pity, I'm a long time Dropbox user and I think it still is faster and more reliable than OneDrive.
What they don't tell you is you only have a 200gb download limit a month. First time you go over that they freeze your account for 24 hours for 'abusive behavior' and they will increase that for additional 'infringements' So you can store stuff there but just don't try and download it.
I'm wondering how to get my photos out of dropbox and put them somewhere else. I don't want to pay for the new version as all I really have is pictures - but I don't want to lose the pictures when I cancel?
You can download them and then upload them to Google Photos and Amazon Photos or any other service
Good video and analysis. Sounds like a lots of smoke and mirrors. I'm glad in not a real user. I only use them if someone shares a folder of file with me.
I'm trying to send videos to my son high quality big video files.... I want to keep the macro features to show details of the mushrooms and plants to put them on TH-cam... My son is going to edit and create movies from my clips I'm going to send him.... Email is a no go lol... He told me Dropbox free may not have enough storage for what I need.... He told me to pick either Dropbox or Google Drive I think.... I have no idea what I'm doing lol....
So what if selective sync is all setup like you want. Will it continue to work as it did?
I suppose so but I would certainly go through and check all of my settings
Jon Bushell yes you have it enable smart sync. I wouldn’t on Mac OS. Is is very buggy and has been for the past 2 years
I guess Steve Jobs was right about Dropbox
I use box which gives me 50 GB of storage and it's free
For security reasons I don’t like having all
my information with one company. I like diversification. Just like investment, you should never have all retirement $ in one type of investment . You should have some in real estate as well as the stock market. The more diversification the better. This concept apply to backing up your data as well. Since I use Gmail as my email ... I don’t use google drive to back up all my personal information. Also I have an iPhone and Apple auto backup my phone to iCloud so I definitely don’t want to use iCloud to back up my files. My laptop uses Microsoft 360 and this too get auto back up. I feel more secure knowing Dropbox is an independent company not connect to any of my devices. I was spooked when I got an email from Google reminding me of my anniversary with my friends in Mexico a year ago. How they know this information is beyond me. I think it’s worth the $ to keep my data independent from my other devices. Also I love the Dropbox user friendly share feature.
Is it possible to add TH-cam videos to Dropbox? If so, how?
Hey guys. My team uses team drive for Google and the problem is that we cannot share files outside of our organization on team drive. Is there a simple way to move all of our thousands of files over to dropbox in a very seamless integration way? Our team has been thinking about moving to dropbox, but is afraid that the work to transfer all the files will be astronomical.
Thanks
Derek
You could install the Google Drive application on a PC and download the files and folders. Then use the DropBox application to upload them.