Review Of Mover Cloud File Migration And Backup Service
In a recent story we reported the announcement that cloud based backup and sharing service Copy was about to close. Many have come to depend on Copy for it's file sharing service and some have gigabytes of data stored on their cloud based servers, which means that a new service will need to be found... more on that later.
However another question is what is the best way to migrate or backup the data stored on a cloud service? For some it will simply be a case of downloading any data sitting just in the cloud and then choosing a new service and uploading to it.
If like me you have a mix of your own files and files shared with you by others sitting on a cloud, and you use selective sync so all files may not be on your physical drive, then you need to find a simple way to do this. The time to complete this task can differ depending on the quality of your download and upload service. I live in the middle of nowhere so my download and upload speed is pretty poor so moving gigabytes of data could take days... really. Enter Mover, the cloud file migration and backup service.
Mover couldn't be simpler, you create an account, choose a source Cloud service and a destination service and then choose to migrate or backup. Rather then any download and upload happening via your computer they magically happen in the background.
To use Mover with many of the popular Cloud services is free, these include;
- Box
- Copy
- Dropbox
- Google Drive
- OneDrive
- Yandex.Disk
Mover also offers paid for migration and backup options for most of the most used Cloud based storage and sharing services including Amazon S3 and other enterprise services.
I tested Mover's migration option with 4.7gb of data sitting on a free Box account by setting up a migration to a Dropbox account. The whole process is a simple step-by-step operation. You authorise access to your source and destination cloud services and then choose either your whole drive or folders and then hit start. The whole transfer of 4.7gb of data took about 15 minutes, in fact it was quite magical sitting with my Dropbox open and watching the entire contents of my Box drive appear.
Mover also creates a log of the entire process that you can download as a CSV file to check that all what files have been moved.
Summary
Mover seems to do what it claims, offering a simple and pain-free process for moving and backing up large amounts of data between cloud services. I'm becoming less convinced by free-only services as long term workflows, I've been burnt twice by them and so I am less likely to recommend anything that does not have a source of revenue to support the service. Thankfully Mover does have paid for services, which whilst not being a guarantee of their service being here forever it does make me think they have a better chance of continued lifespan.
With all that said, if you need to move or backup data between cloud services then check out Mover, it works and for many of us it's free.