The feature that has impressed me the most so far is the new local backup option. I have always maintained a local backup of my data but now with the new Windows client it is possible to maintain both a local backup and an online backup using just the Mozy client. I no longer have to schedule my local backup using the Windows Scheduler using either xcopy batch files or Microsoft’s Sync Toy. You will need an extra hard drive that is assigned a drive letter in Windows, this does mean that most external USB and Firewire drives will work and extra internal hard drives. Network storage drives will still be an issue however.

The new user interface is an improvement on the previous version as well. It gives you more information on what the client is currently doing. For those that do not want all the information it is turned off by default in the options, so you will not be overwhelmed. I turned it on so I could see what the client is up too.

The client is also considerably faster to upload data. While I have not sat and timed the upload speed I recently added 4gb of new photos and home videos to the computer and they were backed up easily over night. This often took over a day on my DSL connection. The Mozy blog claims it is 25% faster at uploading, I can believe it.

Overall the new Mozy for Windows version is an improvement on the previous version and I highly recommend you sign up for Mozy. It makes maintaining an online and local backup a breeze.

While it has been awhile since I signed up with MozyHome I thought it would be fun to create a search story using the Google Search Story creator. Of course I added one extra step for Mozy Promotional Code so you can save some money on your MozyHome subscription and keep your photos and home movies safe.

Here is a quick video showing you how to test if the promotional code is valid.

From Friday February 12, through Sunday February 14, 2010, subscribers who that use the promotional code below will receive $10 off of a 1 year MozyHome subscription or $20 off of 2 year MozyHome subscription. Plus, business customers will receive a nice 15% off their initial MozyPro purchase with the same promo code.

Click Here to Use the Mozy Sweetheart Promotional Code!

Here are a couple photos of the posted in my office.

Thanks a ton for the poster Mozy!

This special Mozy promotional code ends on Monday November 30, 2009 so you do not have very long to take advantage of this great deal. This promotional code will take $15.00 off a one year MozyHome subscription and $30.00 on a two year MozyHome subscription.

That works out to a monthly cost of $3.29/month for a one year MozyHome subscription and $3.09/month for a two year MozyHome subscription. Excellent savings from Mozy this Thanksgiving, Black Friday and Cyber Monday!

Click Here to Use the Mozy Cyber Monday Promotional Code!

There are several good things about Carbonite that are similar to Mozy. They offer unlimited backup, use 448-bit Blowfish encryption on all data that is transferred and they are reasonably priced. Unfortunately Carbonite fell short on a few other details that I thought were important.

First there are several file types that Carbonite does not automatically backup. Primarily video files. This was important to me. I have several GB of home movies that I want to make sure are safe and Carbonite did not want to back them up. I also have several personal projects that are executable files that I wanted to backup. Carbonite refused to select them by default, even though I had selected the folders they were in. This type of file exclusion was not acceptable. Using Mozy I was able to select the folder to backup and all the files in the folder were selected regardless of the file type.

Backing up your files is one thing, but when disaster strikes you need to restore those files. The restoration process for Carbonite is the major reason I decided to go with Mozy. Carbonite only offers restores through their desktop client. What happens if I can’t install the client on my new computer, for example when a new version of Windows is released and Carbonite does not support it yet? The amount of data I was expecting to initially backup was already over 100gb. Downloading that amount of data can take an extremely long time. Mozy won simply because they offered more ways for me to get my data back. With Mozy you have choices to do a Web restore, a client restore or order a restore on DVD. Unofficially I have also seen tweets that Mozy will send you an external hard drive restore in place of DVD’s. These restore options pushed Mozy ahead of Carbonite when I was deciding what online backup service to go with.

I think Mozy is the best online backup service, but whether you choose Carbonite or Mozy the most important thing is you need to backup your files. Do not leave it to chance. Subscribe and start backing up today.

Instead of selecting all of the folders and files you want to backup at once when you configure your backup. Prioritize the order of your backup. For example, select your My Documents folder but leave out your My Pictures, My Music and other large folders. By prioritizing your initial backup you can make sure your most important files are backed up first.

The order you choose to backup your files is up to you but the order I often use for new Mozy installs is: office documents, photos, music then videos. By doing the initial upload in this order the office documents that people rely on are uploaded first. I can then check and make sure the files are uploaded correctly and try a test restore on important databases and financial documents. If you have a large amount of photos, music and videos you might want to break those uploads up in smaller parts as well. If you are a photographer you might choose a different order, but this works well for many home backup situations.

While this process might seem tedious to some, it will help you to learn the Mozy configuration interface. It will also allow you to double check to make sure that all of the file syou want backed up are actually included in the backup. There is nothing worse than having a hard drive fail and then discovering that your selection of office documents did not include open office documents that you routinely use. Once you have all of the folders and files that you want backed up your backups will not take very long, since Mozy only backs up changed and new files after that point.

Currently I use Dropbox on my main desktop and my laptop. It works great. When I need files available on my laptop when I am going to be working out of my office I just copy them to my Dropbox and they are automatically synced with my laptop. If I create new documents and want to make sure I have them on my desktop, I just copy them to my Dropbox and they show up on my desktop ready to be edited.

Dropbox is great, and while I only use some of the basic features of Dropbox, I no longer have to worry about carrying a USB flash drive. The files are just there for me to use. The beautiful thing about using Dropbox and Mozy on the same computer is that I can automatically include the Dropbox folder in my MozyHome unlimited or MozyPro backup and have all the files that I copy and create in my Dropbox on my laptop automatically backed up to my Mozy account. This gives me multiple copies of the files between Dropbox and Mozy. In the event that a hard drive dies or my computers are stolen I should be able to restore the files between those two sources.

Dropbox and Mozy have made a great combination for me. Mozy because it is just there backing up my files, Dropbox for making it easy to sync the files I need between my desktop and my laptop. If I could just take the photos I have on either service and share them on Facebook, Flickr etc then I could be in social media heaven, until then I will enjoy the excellent combination of Mozy and Dropbox.