Apple iCloud vs. Carbonite by OpenText

Our growing organization uses about 95% Apple hardware. The Apple iCloud functionality across our organization ensures interfaces and synchronization that makes information workflow seamless. The cost structure and limited AI functionality keeps us dependent on products like Microsoft and Google and unable to put all of our cloud "eggs" into the Apple basket.

Incentivized

More than enough for small companies with several on-prem servers. In 2021, it wouldn't be wise to pit all important data to a single backup service. Carbonite Server is solid, but it's not 100% reliable so I'd definitely recommend having multiple backup services either on the cloud in conjunction with other backup services so the user has multiple safety nets in case of disaster and failed granular restorations.

Incentivized

• Syncing files, appointments, Notes and contacts. If I'm away from home, and set an appointment using my phone, that appointment automatically updates real time to my home laptop and vice-versa.
• It stores files (e.g photos) nicely
• Once it's set up, it's fairly easy to use.

Incentivized

• Simple administrative web interface - It's easy to provision users, look at data usage stats, disable users, and update policies to control what folders users are allowed to backup, and what options they can access
• Easy client installation - Installing and updating clients was very simple. The client would notify the user when a new update was approved by the site admins, and they typically went very smoothly.
• Good performance - Backups went fairly fast, and were generally invisible to the user, other than the icon updating on files to indicate whether the current version of a file was backed up or not.

Incentivized

• Customization - iCloud is great at the stuff it does well. But it lacks features that some competitors (in Google Drive or Dropbox) do really well. API support for third-party apps is really great for some other people.
• Remote use - Managing or accessing information from iCloud while not on one of your logged-in apple devices can sometimes be an issue. From a work computer for example. It doable, but the experience is much less user-friendly.
• Ability to edit documents on the cloud similar to google docs or some other competitors

Incentivized

• While overall file restoration is easy to do, obtaining earlier versions is not as user friendly as it could be. You need to enter a date and click search to bring up the latest versions as of the date entered. That’s fine, but what is missing is the ability to see all versions of an individual file. If I am looking for a past file version I want to be able to view the file history as a subset of that file (in other words I should be able to click a + sign and expand to see past versions of the file). Otherwise I am just guessing which dates the file was changed in the past. Sometimes that’s OK, but Mozy needs to build in this enhanced, but necessary feature.
• A couple of years ago, for non enterprise users, Mozy made radical storage and pricing changes forcing myself and many users off their system, as the price for the same storage was going up significantly. So be careful when using Mozy as past experience has shown they are willing to make major changes regardless of the negative impact on their users.

Incentivized

It's so seamless that I can't imagine another product doing a better job synchronizing all of my devices. I simply do not think about it at all. Everything happens behind the scenes and I'm confident that Apple keeps my data safe and secure. I'm a happy customer as far as this is concerned. I have not had a bad experience with this service.

Incentivized

Carbonite Server Backup does not integrate or support any reporting; it is not good at it. We required monthly and quarterly reports for audit. If we fail in that we get fined or we have to pay a certain amount of money to customer. It does not support cloud instances and we are using N2WS for the cloud instances. This is an additional burden for customers.

Incentivized

While it may be great to use with other Apple products, I find it's an absolutist-style workflow to be debilitating and to lead to many problems. When you sign into the cloud, it completely takes over your device in many ways that you don't notice at first until there is a problem.

Incentivized

Out of all the vendor we deal with they are one of the best when it comes to customers service. Reliable,you can reach them by telephone easily, Great overall can not say anything to the contrary. Usibility is excellent. I recommend them highly whether you need a simple backup ofr more complex for servers etc.

Incentivized

Occasionally, large files that haven't yet been synced require a few minutes to pull down but I've rarely noticed delays. It does a good job of keeping data cached on my local machines while updating them with changes from other machines transparently.

Incentivized

Apple customer service is fantastic. iCloud is built with Apple in mind and its design is extremely intuitive and user-friendly. Additionally, whenever our team has encountered issues, the speed of Apple support has been more than timely in addressing our issues and solving our request. We have encountered relatively few issues in my time with the platform and this only improves our overall score for those who keep the platform stable.

Incentivized

I usually find what I need to know by looking in the Carbonite knowledge base online. We haven't had any major problems, usually we just need clarification on a point or more details about a feature so we look it up. We haven't had to call in for help in quite awhile.

Incentivized

We had appliance and we just needed to setup the Director Console which was straight forward and easy.

Incentivized

Google Drive is similar to Apple iCloud, but since I prefer Apple products and have operated within the Apple ecosystem for many years, I use iCloud. Some clients who don't use Apple share documents with me in Google Drive so I have experience with the product, but I prefer iCloud. I do think photos syncing is superior in iCloud.

Incentivized

Netbak is a great product but we also had a secondary issue of having to backup several PC's on site and at remote locations. Carbonite helped with both and gave us one central admin console to be able to check the progress of all our backups, where netbak would have required us to setup a tunnel or use the internet to move data back to our main office.

Incentivized

• Apple's iCloud service can run very slow in countries where they aren't very focussed, like India.
• Apple did not back up videos over the cloud for a long time and needed manual sync. You will see similar issues like not allowing mobile data for some tasks.

Incentivized

• We have a safety net that we didn't have before.
• Key players are now backed up through an automated system that was easy to silently install.
• The resources used impacted our exchange server negatively and slowed email until it was disabled.

Incentivized