Cloud Storage Makes Cents, But No Sense

Grazed from EETimes.  Author: Brian Bailey.

Whether we like it or not, changes in the way we perform computing, and where our data gets stored, seem inevitable given everything we read these days about cloud computing.  Perhaps I am an old fuddy-duddy, but I have been resisting the calls to put my data online. It just does not make sense to me due to convenience and cost issues. I can buy a 1-terabyte disk for quite a bit under $100 these days, and I can make it accessible to all of my devices while at home and through a web interface when I want to access my data from anywhere else. For another $100, I can secure that data by putting it in a RAID array.

Admittedly, if I have a fire in my house, I could lose the data, and I would love to have an offsite disk at a friend’s house to give me that extra layer of protection. Unfortunately, the software is not in place to enable that to be done easily. So, for about $400 total, I can have one terabyte of reasonably secure storage, and assuming a disk life of five years, that equates to under $100 per year plus a little bit for electricity to run them…

To compare, I looked at cloud storage solutions. I am using Rackspace as an example because they have clear pricing. I have no idea if they are the cheapest or best solution out there — they are just an example. They charge 10c per Gigabyte per month. So, for one terabyte, it’s $100 per month — over 10 times the cost. In the place I use it the most — home — it’s going to be more than 10 times slower…

Read more from the source @ http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1319243