Livedrive Backup review

Reliability issues claimed by some users

There is a blog at http://livedriveliedtous.com/blog/ where users have claimed serious loss of service from Livedrive. I took the claims seriously and decided to stick with Carbonite which has been reliable over 2 years for me.

By robeco on 16 Aug 2010

Livedrive is very reliable

Livedrive is a very reliable service. We also offer a 2 week free trial and a 30 day money back guarantee so that you can try it risk free. We are confident however that you will enjoy using Livedrive and join our many thousands of satisfied customers.

Alex

Livedrive Team

By Live_drive on 24 Aug 2010

Livedrive: serious reliability issues

Being a Livedrive customer for more than a year, I feel urged to address some serious issues with this service. Although attractively priced and feature-rich, the reliability of this service is very poor. There is the problem that not all files are synchronized, meaning you will have an incomplete backup in case of a harddisk crash. Customer support is poor; they will use a standard answer every time a customer addresses this problem:

"At Livedrive we have two levels of data storage – a first level for data that is accessed regularly, and a second level for archived data that hasn’t been accessed for a while. When you request historical data our system brings your files out from the archive automatically. For some reason this doesn’t appear to be happening with the files you’ve requested – I’ve asked our tech team to investigate and resolve the problem as soon as they can. I’m very sorry for the inconvenience, but please be assured that your data is safe and secure.

In the immediate term if you do want the data on your Livedrive immediately, feel free to reupload it – it won’t cause any problems.

Apologies again for the inconvenience – we’ll get back to you as soon as possible."

I still haven't got an answer and I am still lacking several files. Be aware!

By boismaison on 4 Nov 2010

Yes ReliabilityIssues

For perspective, I see these 1% of the time, the Briefcase, though not perfect is brilliant on multiple PC's. It rare I try to access a file on one PC that I edidted on another and had not yet been uploaded to the server.

Problems
I have seen serious issues, one avoidable, one ... almost makes backup worthless.

Avoidable issue, Don't install Briefcase on multiple PC's at once, enable LAN transfers then start uploading files to live drive on mor ethan one PC, it will loop, take for ever and you will end up in a mess. Or at least this was the case last year. Install on one PC, configure itmes to go into breifcase, wait until upload finished, configure 2nd PC and so on. Finally enable LAN transfers (beta). Works fine and will save you hours.

Backups
When restoring backups, if restoring whole folders there can be issues. I tried to download folders of photos and it repeatedly failed on a fast reliable internet connection.....

You can drill down to restore indivudual files, so I suspect nothing is ever lost. But ability to restore files in bulk I found unworkable.

I trust documents in my briefcase, but not in my backups.

By ivangill on 18 Nov 2010

Free trial needs credit card or get penalised

The sign-up process goes through 5 stages, collecting plenty of personal details and then on the final screen it asks to enter your card details now to avail of the annual upfront discount offer or skip this step to start your free trial and pay the monthly/annual subscription without discount.

After feeling disgusted with this move, I’m now trying Dropbox, which seems to have the main features I'm after in LiveDrive Briefcase. While the free option is restricted to 2GB and the pay versions are limited to 50GB/100GB, at least it doesn’t penalise you for not providing card details upfront, let alone request multiple screens of personal details!

By SSDFreak on 6 Jan 2011

Reliability Problems

My experience of the Livedrive service has been poor. The java software is a bit clunky and can be unreliable. Data speeds are variable to say the best. Their website control panel was difficult to access and regularly timed out. I have switched to Carbonite who offer a more solid service. I would rate this 2 stars and I think this expert review needs reviewing.

By ColinABC on 28 Jan 2011

Reliability Problems: Technical & Support

I am a currently using LD with 150GB and there are some main issues.

1)Alles files are correctly backed up to the LD cloud and visible correctly on their nice portal - But, many files of any type are visible on the local drive (with the option set, that all files are physically in the cloud and local), but they are not accessible from local applications (files has been moved or deleted). I re-synched everything 2 times and it still doesn't work correctly

2) The support took 14 days to answer on my first 3 requests ans only after contacting the press center and partner manager I got an answer within minutes! All support forum entries are filtered by LD and any critical, but objective comment has not been published so far

3) The product architecture is good, but if there is not a 100% relyability - why use it? I am currently testing Wuala to complete my intention to replace Dropbox and Moza with a single product

4) No native support for Linux/Ubuntu and Android

If they can not solve the issues in the next 3 days it's gone forever from my infrastructure - good luck!

By FreeStyle07 on 4 Jun 2011

My experience with Iozeta

I've been using Iozeta with the Livedrive and I never had any issues. I am using a Dell Latitude E series. I don't know why some people have issues with Iozeta but so far I haven't had any. With the previous online back up company that I subscribed to, I had tons of problems. I should say Iozeta is a very good online back up provider if not the best. For those who had issues. I suggest you buy a better computer.

By DarkMagic on 12 Aug 2011

Unreliable & Bad Support

Avoid Livedrive at all costs! I've had just about every problem that could have happened up to now. The software is unreliable and often things don't work properly. My portal has had about 15 different problems over the last few months & the support is possibly the worst I've ever experienced. I waited over 2 weeks before I received a response at one point (altough over 10 days is usual). They don't care about customers in the slightest so don't sign up!

By dave2011 on 3 Sep 2011

Mis-leading review re NAS & Network Drives

I took out the annual advance subscription on basis of this review (in particular "unlimited storage for a single PC plus any external or network drives."

Lo & behold no NAS drive support unless you pay another £60 on top of the £4.95 quoted in the review. Not on Computer Shopper poor review.

As for Livedrive will be claiming back within 1 hour of using it the full annual fee.

Disappointed.

By CTozer on 11 Sep 2011

Great on paper but not practical at all

I have been using LiveDrive since 2009. Before I signed up, I specifically asked them if after I delete the files from my local PC do they remain backed up on their server and I received a very strong “your files will always remain on our servers unless you log in and delete them”. Recently I went to retrieve some files from their server and come to find out they are not there. Some time between 2009 and 2011 they changed their method of backing up, and my files were permanently lost. They told me that in a newsletter at some point they alerted all the subscribers to the change. I decided to cancel my service and go with a Drobo system. With weekly hard copy backups, it is a very fast and efficient service.
If you are in the market for an online storage system and considering LiveDrive, please PLEASE please read the fine print and ask tons of questions before you subscribe.

By vtfirefighter19 on 21 Sep 2011

Big probs at Livedrive

Dozens of Livedrive clients have currently lost their Document files from their pcs. I am one of them. We were told there was a problem last week which was solved on Monday, but it wasn't. Livedrive told me this morning they were working on the problem, it had top priority etc etc but I still cannot access my Briefcase. I have been assured that the files are safe whatever cloud they are on but this is still immensely inconvient and troubling.

By peterg on 5 Oct 2011

Use of Upload Bandwidth

There is something no-one is mentioning here. I wonder how many Skype users have been getting poor operation and wondering why? I didn't twig until after several ruined conversations, I checked the upload bandwidth use on my router - and sure enough, those machines with LIVEDRIVE attached were hogging all of my 700k bandwidth. I contacted LIVEDRIVE who came back to say I needed to change a setting in Livedrive - I did - and it did not make two-pence worth of difference - on Windows 7 64 and 32 machines, LIVEDRIVE when backing up simply tries to use all of your upload bandwidth and it seems that the controls have little if any effect. I've now had to turn the service off even though I'm paying for it - I've now sent several emails to them and no responses. Seriously - check your router if you can to see what percentage of your upload bandwidth it is using - if like mine it is uncontrolled then it is virtually useless for anyone who needs real-time communications like Skype on their PC.

By Scargill on 14 Oct 2011

Can't recommend this product

It's buggy. Good idea in principle, but lack of featuers or features that don't work make it hard going. Also there is next to zero support. Can't be difficult to find a better service out there.

By SmartyPants on 29 Nov 2011

Slow, Unreliable, Inconvenient

I've used Livedrive for about a year - but I've finally given up on it. I had to download an album 4 times via the website before I managed to get a file that wasn't corrupted (even then, I found out sometime later, that one of the MP3s was corrupted). Bear in mind I have hundreds of albums...if my hard drive got damaged it'd take forever to retrieve my files.

Secondly - uploading has been a painfully slow experience...I've left my PC on for weeks and it still hasn't finished. It appears to upload one file at a time - no batch processing. So even small files take a while to upload.

Thirdly - I keep all my files on an external harddrive...I want to be able to install Livedrive on multiple computer and plug my USB harddrive into which ever computer I'm using and have the files backed up to Livedrive. However, I have to register a different PC name with livedrive everytime...and it starts the backup from scratch. I've been assured that the "file-duplication" technology means that it'll quickly work out which files need uploading...but it simply doesn't work. I've watched it reupload files I know are already backed up.

All these niggles have added up to a frustrating experience. Perhaps it's less troublesome for people with very fast connections?...but according to the comments above, probably not.

Now...where is the "cancel account" button...?!?

By GH05TED on 30 Nov 2011

Don't touch Livedrive!

Don\'t touch Livedrive

Although most of Livedrive is good there is NO SUPPORT. I have been writing to them for over a month begging for help and have been totally ignored. I once got through on the phone, had no useful help and that service has now been discontinued. Folders are partially uploaded with no warning and for a month over 4,000 files have been trying to upload and just abort. NO WORD OF HELP FROM LIVEDRIVE. Look elsewhere from here and you will only see bad reviews of Livedrive
If Livedrive is the best buy then there is no cloud storage worth having:(

By rosalindWenlock on 26 Dec 2011

livedrive

Hi all my daughter and her partner bought me knowhow livedrive for christmas this year, and OMG, its the worst present iv'e ever had, i hate it,
I am a digital scrapbooker, and i CT for designers, I put loads n loads of my didgital kits onto livedrive then deleted them from my P.C which was the whole idea,of getting livedrive to give my P.C lots of space, well the thing is i have messaged on livedrive forum now, well i have forgotten how many times, but i never get an answer from them, i cant open lots n lots of my images, and i really really need them, the kits i put on livedrive cost me lots of money, I would warn people not to buy this and try something else instead, i dont know much about this kind of thing, all i really know is to use the P,C for my digital kits and for making layouts with them, but i KNOW this, livedrive is pure rubbish !!!!!!

By amelia on 18 Feb 2012

livedrive

Livedrive is great! It seems to work really well, very easy to use. Support even got back to me within a day when I emailed them.

I tried ZipCloud and felt misled. Only when you sign up are you then offered extras like a supercharge to back up quicker so you don't realise that the base price is a substandard service. The Zipcloud software didn't seem work very well either whereas I had live drive up and running smoothly.

By Stewza on 7 Mar 2012

LiveDrive LOST ALMOST ALL MY HOME MOVIES!!!!

I read a couple of good reviews of LiveDrive and decided to pay for the Pro Suite version that included both the Backup and Briefcase solution. within 24 hours my files were completely missing. I made the HUGE MISTAKE of selecting "Do not keep these files on this Mac", assuming that it meant the service would upload the files I placed into the Briefcase folder to the online storage and then delete the files on the local machine. Instead, it started uploading the files and even created a record of them on the online folder. However, before actually uploading them all the way it deleted every singe file on my computer. I am super upset because I lost all the home movies I recorded of my baby since she was born 5 months ago. The support team over there sent me one short email saying that "I deleted the files" and that LiveDrive would have only deleted the files AFTER uploading them fully. THIS IS SIMPLY NOT TRUE. They have refused to reply to any of my tickets or requests after sending me that one email. I highly recommend never using their service. There are too many other good options. They are quite possibly the worst software company I've ever dealt with.

By MarketingGuy on 29 Mar 2012

Horrible Company

After the initial review in PCPRO magazine, I signed up for a year.

Less than a month in, the system collapsed - for four days I couldn't access my data. Server issues at their end.

Eventually it starts working again, but do you think I wish to have my data with a company which had me without my data for 4 days!

Not only was sync not working, I couldn't access the data that was on my drive, as the service wouldn't start up.

So I tried to cancel and get a refund. Frankly, they are just a bullying company. A response takes about 3 days from them. I now wish to make a chargeback, but they are now waiving t's and c's that state that if I make the chargeback they will recover it, and charge me the recovery fee.

Basically, their service failed me terribly, and their attitude is 'talk to the hand, cause the heads not listening'.

It might be a good system most of the time, but the customer support/attitude is just madness.

My advice - STAY AWAY.

Graham

By mylotus on 3 Apr 2012