We’re getting ready for another scorcher of a summer here in Texas. And, we just put in a new AC, but when the power came back on, my desktop computer did not. Turns out the MBR (Master Boot Record) had become corrupted, and I had to reformat it– lost EVERYTHING.
But, actually, I wasn’t too worried. Just last week I had moved off Foldershare (now Windows Live Sync) and put all my current valuable files in DropBox. Super move. Not to mention, about a year ago I signed up for Carbonite. Not so super.
After reinstalling a fresh copy of Windows 7, I downloaded the 12 GBs from DropBox in a few hours. No muss, no fuss.
I also *started* the Carbonite restore process, and that’s where more of my hair started to turn gray. Carbonite represents itself as a “completely automatic” online backup service and says “within minutes you’ll be able to begin restoring all your files.” Well, there were over 90GB’s of files stored, so I figured it would take some time– so I tried restoring just the files I knew weren’t in DropBox. Stuff I didn’t have to have, but would like to have. No go. Carbonite kept stalling on downloads. There is very little information in the Carbonite InfoCenter about what is going on. The interface is incredibly confusing: there’s this button which says “Cancel Restore in Progress” and when you press it, it doesn’t highlight or change and there is ZERO notification you have cancelled. In fact, I can’t figure out HOW to cancel a Restore in Progress. After the button is pressed and you look at it later, you wonder is it saying THE Cancel Restore IS in Progress or is it the same button you pressed which should have said Cancel THE Restore in Progress? It doesn’t help that it has an icon which looks like you shouldn’t press it. This is just one of the MANY confusing interface issues in Carbonite’s Restore process.
And later when you try and view the restored files from InfoCenter, it takes forever and you never know exactly what you are looking at, because it only shows the first 1000 items. Furthermore, it doesn’t backup .exe files, so all the installers for programs were NOT backed up. Not to mention if you restart your machine, it may or may not resume restoring files. I suppose it depends on which way the Internet wind is blowing at that exact moment. Anyway, because of the intermittent stalling I started a FULL RESTORE, which I knew would take some time, but I didn’t expect it to be this DAMN SLOW. It’s been on 58-59% for 36 hours now, and the support folks say it is working (don’t get me started about support– took them 3 days to return an email!). Oh, and if you’re wondering, I do have a fast cable modem connection here, it’s Carbonite’s servers which are slow.
So, it’s clear I need to rethink my backup strategy. It doesn’t appear Carbonite will download all files for another week or so, and that’s just not acceptable.I guess things could be worse. I could have had to actually DEPEND on Carbonite to backup my most valuable files, but DropBox handled those perfectly. Can’t say I’d ever recommend Carbonite to anyone– and in fact I will discontinue service and uninstall it week(s) from now when I finally get all the files back. And, I’ll be sure and remove it from my Dad’s computer and “un-recommend” it to all others. Next up– a NEW backup strategy!
OMG. What a frigging nightmare!
I should probably worry more than I do, because I, too, have a lot of stuff in thek Cloud, in the custody of companies who may or may not care what happens to my data.
Best of luck finally finishing this horrendous problem fix.
Yup. We recommend Carbonite, but it’s a disaster recovery product, not something for casual backup/restore. It COULD be, but their restore process is terrible. It’s confusing, there’s no notification what’s going on – etc. Pretty much just like you pegged it here .
Doing a selective restore is worse. You pretty much have to select one folder at a time – let it do it s hing, then select the next one. Why? because it can’t parse nested folders. It’ll restore the folders but no files in them. You have to go back and open-restore one-by-one.
Here’s a few tips to make it better
- Make sure you’ve turned off any kind of “sleep” or “hibernation”. Ditto screen savers, power managers, anything that might disturb the running state of the computer. If it gets interrupted, you get to start your restore over from scratch.
- Unless you’re talking one or two files – don’t even think about a selective restore. Carbonite works best when you let it run a total restore. Everything else is a kludge.
- Use the “Carbonite Backup Drive” in “Computer” – NOT the mess in the restore center or the online file access.
- Check and double-check you got what you want back… you only have 30 days. 30 days after the file is removed from your host computer, it also disappears from your backup set. Don’t assume you got everything back.. go into the folders one by one and double-check.
Here’s the best tip – always restore to a DIFFERENT computer. What I do is restore to a spare computer with an external HDD. That way I’m not tying up my “main” computer for days during a file restore process. Then you can just drag/drop your files over to the computer you backed up originally. I realize not everyone has a spare computer kicking around, but if you do… it’s the way to go. Just do a total restore on the spare – let it run for 4-5 days undisturbed, and you’re done.
Of course, be sure to back up your other working computer while you’re restoring your backup on a different one, because Carbonite will not be backing up any new work while it’s restoring .
I’m trying out Mozy home right now …. I switched off of it years ago because its restore procedure was even worse, but that was years ago. I’m betting they have improved it. It’s worth a month at $4.95 to find out if it’s the better of the two solutions at the moment.
I endorse these comments too. Carbonite backs up OK (seemingly), but recovery is completely impractical and inadequate for consumer needs. Dropbox hasn’t let me down yet.
Carbonite doesn’t work. It fails to backup normal Office files downloaded from Outlook 2007 claiming they are “temporary files”. They are not. They refuse to respond to my many requests for resolution to this issue. “Never Worry About Your Backup Again” is an outright lie. You will lose files. It’s too bad about their attitude, too. If they were willing to own it, I’d let them work it out, but they just don’t seem to care.