IT Tips & Tricks
The Benefits of Migrating to Dropbox
Updated 16 January 2024
If you’re shopping around for a Cloud storage solution, the sheer number of options out there can confound even the shrewdest shopper. Since you’re reading this, we’re going to assume that you’re researching Dropbox, and you’ve got questions. What are the benefits of Dropbox? What does Dropbox cost? How well will it work for your situation? What are the Dropbox pros and cons?
Drew Houston, founder and CEO of Dropbox.
Having some kind of standard against which you can measure contenders can be helpful. How about taking a look at what some big companies have chosen to use? How about looking at some successful companies to see what they’re using? Or how about we save you a ton of time and tell you what more than half of Fortune 500 companies are using?
Dropbox has a solid reputation for offering impressive performance throughout its features and has some exceptionally fine tools. And, frankly, if Dropbox is good enough for 56% of Fortune 500 companies, they’ve got to be doing something right, right?
How about we save you a ton of time and tell you what more than half of Fortune 500 companies are using?
Since its inception in 2007, Dropbox has maintained a competitive edge, adding new features, staying abreast of market trends, and always aiming to outdo its competition.
It’s a strategy that has worked for them. The proof is a network of more than 700 million registered users in over 180 countries, making Dropbox a global platform with excellent collaboration features. Let’s do a quick Dropbox review.
Dropbox Uses: Is It Right for Me?
What is Dropbox? Well, if you’re looking for a cloud storage service that allows users to save files online and sync them across multiple devices, Dropbox may be the one for you. Photo storage? Video storage? Document storage? No problem. It’s like having your own personal storage studio in the Cloud. Here are some Dropbox basics:
- File Storage: With Dropbox, you get the convenience of storing all your files in one safe place and having them accessible from anywhere.
- File Sharing: Dropbox links can be used to share files and folders with others, without sending large attachments.
- File Hosting: Dropbox is a file hosting service, which means it uploads and maintains your files for you.
- Collaboration: Dropbox has excellent collaboration features that allow you to easily collect, respond to, and manage feedback.
- Automatic Syncing: You can backup important folders such as your “Desktop”, which automatically syncs any changes across your account.
- All-in-One: Forget about having to switch between apps or wasting time searching for files. All your work can be created and edited — including Cloud-content and Microsoft Office files — directly in Dropbox.
The net result is a platform that allows you to securely collaborate with your team and work with all your tools and content from the convenience of one centralized, organized place.
Dropbox for Business Meetings
Do you need the ability to host or participate in online meetings? Get the whole team together on a Zoom call and then use Dropbox to seamlessly share feedback and collaborate on content in real-time. Add, join, and instantly start a Zoom meeting from Dropbox content. Plus, you can automatically save recorded Zoom meetings and transcripts to Dropbox so that you can refer back to them. Online meetings with Dropbox? Done.
Dropbox vs. Google Drive
According to Gartner, Google Drive may well be Dropbox’s closest competitor, but in a head-to-head matchup, Dropbox wins. Here’s how they stack up against each other.
- In terms of security, both offer two-factor authentication and encrypt data in transit. However, Dropbox uses a stronger version of encryption to keep your data safe when it’s being stored — AES 256-bit encryption, approved by the US National Security Agency. For data at rest, Google Drive uses 128-bit encryption. Additionally, in Dropbox, you can set passwords on shared files so that only people with the password can access them. You can also set an expiration date for sharing, after which the file-sharing link won’t work.
- Not only does Dropbox win in the security and file-sharing arenas, but it also comes out on top in terms of syncing. Google downloads and uploads an entire
document to sync it, often resulting in delays. If you also happen to lose your internet connection while Google is syncing, you could lose the work you’ve done. Dropbox, on the other hand, syncs the changes to a file in blocks, making it much faster, with changes appearing more quickly for everyone, meaning you can access the latest version of your file — on any device — and do it faster. - Dropbox also has a unique advantage with LAN sync. If you have multiple computers connected to a single network, Dropbox will sync files directly between them. It will still back up files to the Cloud but transferring large files to computers on the same network will happen a lot faster. With Google Drive, a file on Computer A will have to upload to the web, then download to Computer B, which can take longer for larger files.
Referring to Dropbox, Chris Burgess, Vice President of IT at Expedia says, “We invest in technology products that simplify our employees’ work and don’t get in the way of their productivity, while also offering best-in-class security.”
In addition to Expedia, Dropbox has many other well-known customers, such as News Corp, Yahoo!, National Geographic, Hyatt, Intuit, Hard Rock, and Lonely Planet, amongst others. That’s a pretty decent list by anyone’s standards.
While Dropbox is well-known for its online storage capabilities and file-sharing features, one thing missing from its toolbox is a way to prevent the lost data that occurs when you move or rename files and folders that contain links.
Dropbox Costs
The Dropbox Basic plan is a free Dropbox account that makes it easy to access your files from multiple devices — computers, phones and tablets — on both Windows and Mac. It is probably best for home use by an individual with simple requirements. Beyond the Basic account, Dropbox offers four different plans. Pricing for the annual billing option is accurate at the time of publication.
- The Plus plan is for personal use and offers 2TB of storage for $9.99/month. (The free Basic plan offers 2GB of storage.)
- The Essentials plan is recommended for professionals and offers 3TB of storage, plus several additional perks, for $18/month.
- The Business plan for teams starts at 9TB of storage for the team, plus extra perks beyond the Essentials account, for $20/month.
- The Business Plus plan starts at 15TB of storage for the team and offers the most benefits and features, for $26/month.
What Do I Need To Know About Migrating to Dropbox?
While the Dropbox perks include online storage capabilities and file-sharing features, one thing missing from its toolbox is a way to prevent the lost data that occurs when you move or rename files and folders that contain links.
Do you want your lost data restored instantly?
This, however, is easily solved with a powerhouse like LinkFixer Advanced™, which can either prevent those links from breaking in the first place or repair existing broken links and automatically restore your lost data instantly. This naturally makes for a smoother migration to (or from) Dropbox.
If you want to protect your linked data, visit LinkTek.com for more information or to request a free no-credit-card-required trial. Alternatively, talk to a friendly Service Consultant at 727-442-1822 about your specific situation or to see a free demo. Don’t forget to ask about the third way that LinkFixer Advanced could help you!
With LinkFixer Advanced, you can forget about missing data, downtime, upset end-users and grumpy bosses and look forward to smooth sailing when it comes to data migration, whether to or from Dropbox — or elsewhere. You’re welcome.
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