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.Mac Storage Now 250MB

Posted by pudge on from the mmmmmmemory dept.

Lycestra writes "Apple today announced .Mac users now have 'More room for everything you do online' with an increase from 100MB iDisk and 15MB Mail to 250MB total. The space is shared between iDisk and Mail, but users of .Mac have control over how it is shared. A long overdue change, in my opinion. It's still not 1GB, and Apple openly states that for those who want it, 1GB would cost another $50 a year. I guess the Apple cup-of-tea just got a little bigger, but it still feels like it's at room temperature."

7 of 77 comments (clear)

  1. Bandwith or storage? by zygote · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I wonder if their hesitation to go to a gig is less due to storage space available and more the traffic that would be generated? Bandwith consumption is likely of little concern to Google, shoot they probably get worried when it drops.

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    the future is here, it is just not evenly distributed - w. gibson
    1. Re:Bandwith or storage? by dhovis · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Apple operates the biggest movie trailer website on the internet and the most popular legal music download service. I don't think that Apple is hurting for bandwidth.

      The issue here is that the .Mac email is different from GMail. For one, it is IMAP based (Webmail is available too). Plus, mac.com emails are completely ad free, even the webmail site. At 15MB, it was a questionable value, but 250MB is a nice bump.

      .Mac also goes beyond just email too. iSync will use the .Mac service to sync your address book and calendar data between multiple Macs. It also syncs Safari's bookmarks. Really, how many times have you said: "Oh damn, I bookmarked that website on my Laptop". You can also access your address book from the .Mac webmail, so you don't have to keep multiple address books in sync.

      Finally, the iDisk feature is pretty nice too, especially after the upgrade to Panther. In Panther, your iDisk is cached on all of your local computers and synchronized automatically with Apple's servers. So if you create a file on your laptop that you will need to look at later on your home desktop, just save it to your iDisk and it will automagically be synced to .Mac and then to your desktop. Plus, there is a "Sites" folder in the iDisk that also serves as webserver space. Just save foo.html to iDisk/sites and it will sync to Apple's server and then be available at http://homepage.mac.com/yourusername/foo.html

      .Mac and GMail are not directly comparable services, and you get more utility out of Apple's 250MB than Googles 1GB. (GMail hacks notwithstanding).

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      The internet is the greatest source of biased information in the history of mankind.

  2. The Gmail comparison is unfair... by hai.uchida · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think the strength of having .Mac isn't the e-mail address... It's the iDisk, which is an extremely useful tool for exchanging large files and projects with other Mac owners (I use it quite often to exchange 30mb+ Photoshop files with companies I work for.) Gmail of course has a cap on attachment sizes, and anyway it's never a good idea to send files that size via e-mail even when it works (or attachments in general at this point.)

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    my password is private, but unchanged.
    1. Re:The Gmail comparison is unfair... by nine-times · · Score: 5, Interesting
      True... Also, Gmail doesn't include pop3/imap access, free software, a homepage, a backup program, etc. The most comparable service is Spymac, which (even if you don't like the community,) is a pretty impressive service.

      I'm not sure why other companies, especially google, haven't gotten into this sort of package deal. Something that lets you work online a little better- some sort of portal/hosting service aimed at individuals rather than businesses.

      It'd be nice if they offered some basic PHP/MySQL functionality. I mean, if you're just hosting a blog or something, a full domain hosting might be overkill, and how much does it cost, really, to make this functionality available?

      Another feature that might be nice is if you Apple provided the option to have your e-mail attachments automatically stripped off and sent to your iDisk. Then you leave a link to the e-mail to the attachment. Specifics would need to be worked out, but it should work.

  3. Comparisions to Gmail by CrackedButter · · Score: 5, Insightful


    Which I am sure will be made, but one has to stop and think for a moment before thinking without the geek cap on and saying "you can get a gig from google or pay for a solution at a lower price". That line reminds me of the comparisions between desktop processor speeds and the megapixels in cameras, just its now storage space numbers people are pissing further and faster with.
    Gmail for example, is a GB for email only while .mac isn't, its for mail, website creation, backup space and so forth wrapped into a half decent web gui and a slick interface when working offline with the various programs such as iDisk or iPhoto. I'd say it was worth it simply for the iPhoto integration, 3 clicks and your pictures are online.
    I paid for .mac again last year knowing there were alternatives out there that offered a cheaper price, again my point is that with everything Apple, quality is involved. Its all the integration that makes me cough up the dough.
    But I will admit, i'm being a bit ignorant towards myself, I know about hosting and such and such but I don't have the time to chase every offer on offer. I'm happy to give Apple my money knowing what they offer.
    Still screaming about the 1 GB space you get from google? I got that gmail account as well so don't fret, but that 1 GB email account from what i have heard is compressed anyway. Assuming this is true, its works because you are dealing with text and the odd jpeg, its easier to compress as opposed to Apple going down that route and compressing all of your work and so forth just for the sake of a shitload of megabytes which not everybody would use.
    To make matters even better, Apple lets you select how you would use the space, i have it set up for 235MB's for storage and 15mb for email.

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    Jonathanjk.com
  4. Re:spymac by gdbjr · · Score: 5, Informative

    Too bad spymac has a slow interface and last time I used it, it was down more them it was up. I paid the extra $$$ to get the 3GB version which includes IMAP. When I tried to use IMAP the amateurs at Spymac create a Inbox with the Sent, Drafts and Spam folder in the Inbox. How stupid is that?

  5. Re:Enough with storage, we need security features by biftek · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Everything is SSL, including WebDAV (for your iDisk & iSync).
    As far as I can tell, the actual WebDAV isn't SSL. The authentication seems to be, but not the actual remove webdav mount (the webdavfs package at http://opensource.apple.com/ seems to confirm this). Could be wrong, but I couldn't see any evidence of it.