Every online storage company seems to jump onto file sync lately. And frankly, that makes sense. People are being more and more mobile, they have several devices and create constantly new data that they need to access from everywhere. Mozy is one of the major online backup services out there (which by the way I can highly recommend if you don’t have huge backup needs) and a few days ago they released a new feature of their offsite backup solution called Mozy Stash.
To be honest they’re damn late. I would say too late. Are they really going to compete against services like Dropbox, or are they just trying to avoid losing customers that way? The latter seems more likely to me. In terms of sync, Dropbox is huge and even more powerful services like Bitcasa are ramping up with unlimited syncing space. But this shall not be a rant about Mozy’s shortcomings in terms of sync. I’d like to give Stash a legit try and see how it works.
Also, Stash is still in beta. That’s why I wouldn’t recommend using Stash right now as your primary syncing provider. In my testing everything worked well, but this shall not give you a false sense of security. That being said, let’s head over to some features:
Syncing
Obviously, this is the main feature. You can now sync your files among a variety of devices, provided they are either a Mac or Windows PCs, currently there is no version available for Linux. In this test I tried to sync a folder with some party pictures I shot last weekend. These were roughly 100MB of files, so nothing fancy on that side.
If you are a Mozy customer you can download and install Stash by loggin into your account. On the right hand side you find the option to download the Stash beta version for you machine. After installing Stash adds a folder to your file system called “Stash” but you can change that as you wish.
As a paying customer you either have a 50GB account or a 125GB account. The space you have available depends on how much data you have backed up with Mozy. So if you have 25GB of files and have to 50GB version you are left with a nice 25GB of syncing space.
Syncing quite slow
In my testing syncing was still quite slow. It took 13 minutes to sync all the selected pictures. I will cross test the speed with Dropbox in this week, so stay tuned for that test. Although I expect dropbox to be a lot faster as it also support LAN sync.
Price
For 50GB you pay only $5.99 per month other syncing providers charge double. So this is a very good price point. However, if you use your current Mozy account also for backup purposes the 50GB are getting full pretty fast. Also, I believe that this is not going to stay that way if you their FAQ:
MozyHome paid subscribers who sign up during the beta can count on having Stash as part of their ongoing subscription at no extra cost.Mozy will announce new MozyPro and MozyHome subscription plans which include Stash in the near future.
Mozy gives you a 2GB account for free, so this is the same size you get with Dropbox. However, you can’t increase your syncing space with Invites.
No file sharing?
As of today Mozy Stash does not offer file sharing which is a shame. I hope they’ll add that quickly as this is crucial to me. Of course I want to share the best moments of the party with my friends showing them how wasted they were 
“Naah I didn’t drink that much”, that’s what they always say…
Security
I personally love Mozy’s security. It encrypts your files with a 448bit blowfish encryption so that your backup but also your syncs are safe. The only provider I feel even more comfortable with in terms of security is probably SpiderOak or JustCloud.
Final verdict
Yes, this is an unusual short review to the ones you normally find here. But it is just a beta and I’ll have to include Stash in the main Mozy review anyway. So it is a little early for a final verdict. What bugged me a little was the speed. I hope they’ll improve that a lot for the final release. Also, I do think Mozy has do revamp their whole plans structure to be on top of the competition. Limited plans are just not up-to-date anymore. They were once heading into the right direction as they startet out with an unlimited plan but then they canceled it, unfortunately. Anyway, I hope I could show you what is possible today with the new Mozy Stash in this little review.
Have you tested Mozy Stash, then please share your thoughts. Do you have any question, I love to help, just leave a comment!
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Hey, Mauricio:
Thanks for taking the time to try out Stash. Nice work on the video, as usual for Cloudbackuping.com.
I have a couple notes that may be of interest to you and your audience. First, Mozy *does* have a referral program, so you can tell a friend and get bonuses of 250MB. Second, it looks like your Mozy account is based in the US, so your data is probably making the transatlantic hop…twice, with Stash. You might find Stash performs much more swiftly with an account based in Europe (maybe run a test with a 2 GB Free account). And, last, we plan to pursue sharing options, but only after we have made sure that Stash is highly performant and rock solid.
Cheers,
Ted from Mozy Product Management
Hi Ted,
Thanks for your comment! Good info on the referrel program didn’t know that – sorry for the mistake. I’ll have to try Mozy Stash with a European account then as I am based in Berlin, Germany. Can you switch my account or do I have create a new one?
Great news that you want to implement sharing options as well. I guess this is crucial for a lot of people.
Regards,
Mauricio
Good review. I have been using Mozy for many years, and I have found Mozy to be a superior choice for online backup–and now online sync. First, Mozy has been around a lot longer than a lot of the competition, and I am more comfortable trusting that the company has a reliable business model and is not a flash in the pan. Second, Mozy is fast and reliable–Mozy has saved me many times when I accidentally deleted a file or had a hard drive failure.
Another great feature of Mozy is its Mozy 2xProtect feature. That feature allows users to create a second encrypted copy of all data backed up to a local hard drive. That second copy could simply be stored locally for faster restores, and/or synced to another backup service (such as Dropbox). Because it is encrypted, it would be safe to store on any cloud storage service.
Perhaps one of the best features Mozy offers is local encryption with a private encryption key (meaning the company cannot decrypt your files), and Mozy provides a decryption utility that you can use apart from their service. (Other companies, such as SpiderOak, also offer local encryption with a private key, they do not provide a utility to decrypt the data apart from downloading it from their servers.) That means that even if Mozy shuts down, you could use their decryption utility to decrypt your data that you backed up locally or synced to Dropbox using the Mozy 2xProtect feature. This provides me a LOT of peace of mind!
Danny