Marc Hamilton's Weblog: Marc Hamilton's Weblog

Since yesterday I blogged on SSDs and ZFS (my favorite storage app), I thought I would followup today on DropBox, my second favorite storage app. I signed up for the DropBox beta some time ago, apparently after they already had too many beta users, as I was never invited to join. However, last week sitting in SFO airport, in pops an email saying they have made their public launch and everyone is now invited to try it out. I'm tempted with a launch code offering me 50 GB for free versus the standard 2 GB free account if I'm one of the first 100 users and quickly download DropBox and install it on my Mac laptop. I guess a lot of other people must have received the same email, as I wasn't one of the first 100 and received only a 2 GB DropBox. Still, that is a lot of files I can now have synchronized.

DropBox works exactly as advertised. It creates a special DropBox folder, and any files moved to that folder are automatically uploaded to and synchronized on DropBox's servers. You can then access the files from any web browser. While there are many other file sharing/remote backup programs out there, DropBox has hit a home run in the ease of use category. Performance is also impressive, both over WiFi as well as my AT&T 3G wireless card (which actually outperformed WiFi from many locations on upload speeds).

Disclaimer. I have no idea if DropBox uses Sun servers or storage. I hope they do, and passed on their name to our Boston area sales team. Hey, I'd even be willing to arrange for a special discount on Sun storage in exchange for that 50 GB DropBox :). Maybe they even will want to take advantage of our Startup Essentials program.