2011. június 26., vasárnap
AVG Technologies LiveKive review
Verdict:
LiveKive is good value and there are some useful options, but the idiosyncratic interface makes it a frustrating service to use.
AVG is best known for its antivirus software, but the company has now launched its own online storage service called LiveKive. It looks eerily familiar since it's actually a rebranded version of SpiderOak with better value pricing.
The more you pay, the more storage you get. 2GB is available for free, while 25GB costs £35 a year and unlimited storage (subject to a publicly viewable fair usage policy) is available for £55 a year. You'll need a fast broadband upload speed to make the most of the unlimited plan, though.
Once you've installed the program on your PC or Mac, you can pick and choose which files you'd like to back up. The Basic mode allows you to back up all of your Documents, Music and/or Photos, including any files on your desktop. The Advanced mode is more sensible since it lets you pick specific files to back up, although the interface for doing so is tedious to use. You can only view your hard disk in a tree view and the accuracy of finding files by keyword search is hit-and-miss. Unfortunately, you can't simply drag and drop files from Windows Explorer into the LiveKive app to back them up.
The backup process itself works smoothly. Files can be backed up automatically or at set intervals. You can exclude files larger than a certain size, of a certain age or certain file types from being backed up to make the most of your online storage. You can also choose to keep a local copy of your backup on an external hard disk or NAS. There's no way of manually throttling the amount of bandwidth used if you need your internet connection for other tasks, other than simply pausing all uploads. We didn't have any trouble restoring our files though.
Files can also be synchronised between two different computers across the internet so you always have the most up-to-date versions of files that you're currently working on without having to carry around a USB disk. You can only synchronise files which you've chosen to back up, but you'll most likely have added these to your plan anyway. Versioning is supported so if you make an alteration you later regret you can revert to an older version of a file.
Backed up files can also be shared with others, even if they don't have LiveKive accounts. Again, setup is a little fussy since you can't simply right click on a file to share it; you have to go through a wizard in the AVG program first. Once that's done, anyone with a web browser and your chosen password can download your shared files, either individual files or all at once with a single click.
Sadly there's no web interface for viewing and restoring your backed-up files, since the LiveKive program encrypts and decrypts everything as it's uploaded and downloaded. There are iOS and Android smartphone apps (left) for viewing your backed up files and files shared by other LiveKive users, but files stored on smartphones can't be uploaded to your online storage.
Although LiveKive is aggressively priced, the fussy interface and numerous odd design choices mean we can't recommend it wholeheartedly. We'd rather use Dropbox for general online storage and Livedrive for online backups.
LiveKive is good value and there are some useful options, but the idiosyncratic interface makes it a frustrating service to use.
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| AVG Technologies LiveKive review |
AVG is best known for its antivirus software, but the company has now launched its own online storage service called LiveKive. It looks eerily familiar since it's actually a rebranded version of SpiderOak with better value pricing.
The more you pay, the more storage you get. 2GB is available for free, while 25GB costs £35 a year and unlimited storage (subject to a publicly viewable fair usage policy) is available for £55 a year. You'll need a fast broadband upload speed to make the most of the unlimited plan, though.
Once you've installed the program on your PC or Mac, you can pick and choose which files you'd like to back up. The Basic mode allows you to back up all of your Documents, Music and/or Photos, including any files on your desktop. The Advanced mode is more sensible since it lets you pick specific files to back up, although the interface for doing so is tedious to use. You can only view your hard disk in a tree view and the accuracy of finding files by keyword search is hit-and-miss. Unfortunately, you can't simply drag and drop files from Windows Explorer into the LiveKive app to back them up.
The backup process itself works smoothly. Files can be backed up automatically or at set intervals. You can exclude files larger than a certain size, of a certain age or certain file types from being backed up to make the most of your online storage. You can also choose to keep a local copy of your backup on an external hard disk or NAS. There's no way of manually throttling the amount of bandwidth used if you need your internet connection for other tasks, other than simply pausing all uploads. We didn't have any trouble restoring our files though.
Files can also be synchronised between two different computers across the internet so you always have the most up-to-date versions of files that you're currently working on without having to carry around a USB disk. You can only synchronise files which you've chosen to back up, but you'll most likely have added these to your plan anyway. Versioning is supported so if you make an alteration you later regret you can revert to an older version of a file.
Backed up files can also be shared with others, even if they don't have LiveKive accounts. Again, setup is a little fussy since you can't simply right click on a file to share it; you have to go through a wizard in the AVG program first. Once that's done, anyone with a web browser and your chosen password can download your shared files, either individual files or all at once with a single click.
Sadly there's no web interface for viewing and restoring your backed-up files, since the LiveKive program encrypts and decrypts everything as it's uploaded and downloaded. There are iOS and Android smartphone apps (left) for viewing your backed up files and files shared by other LiveKive users, but files stored on smartphones can't be uploaded to your online storage.
Although LiveKive is aggressively priced, the fussy interface and numerous odd design choices mean we can't recommend it wholeheartedly. We'd rather use Dropbox for general online storage and Livedrive for online backups.
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