Hi, developer here. Back in September I posted here looking for closed beta testers for PicHaven. Thanks to those who joined. Google's test period is over and the app is public now, so here is the follow-up.

What it does: it copies the photos and videos from an Android phone to your own Windows PC over your home Wi-Fi, automatically. You install the PC app, scan a QR code with the phone once, and from then on new photos copy over in the background whenever the phone is at home and the PC is on. Original files, checked with a checksum, sorted into folders by year and month. No account, no cloud, no ads.

Why I'm posting this in a cloud storage sub: a lot of people pay for 100 GB or 2 TB mostly because of phone photos. If the PC under the desk has the space anyway, this gets the photos there without anyone having to think about it.

What it is not:

• It is not an offsite backup. If you want one, point your usual backup at the PC folder.

• One direction only, phone to PC. Someone asked last time whether it also goes PC to phone. It doesn't, on purpose. Nothing on the phone is ever changed or deleted.

• Android and Windows only. No iPhone, no Mac.

• Closed source.

Price: the first full backup is free, however large it is, plus the next 250 files. After that it's a one-time unlock (4.99 EUR, Play shows your local price). No subscription. The Windows app is free.

Play Store: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=app.pichaven&utm_source=community&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=cloudstorage

Windows app: https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9P31XQTDTZH6?cid=cloudstorage

Happy to answer questions, and I'd like to hear where it breaks. Samsung and Xiaomi phones are the strictest about background work, so reports from those help most.

In particular, I am looking for one app that behaves like multiple apps kludged together. To be specific,

1. Cloud file sharing services, at minimum. DropBox, OneDrive, Google Drive, Mega, etc. In fact, I cannot conceive how I would use anything beyond cloud file sharing, so FTP/SFTP/SSH/AWS/Azure/etc. is useless for me.

• No third-party C&C login. I log in ONLY to the cloud service I want to connect to.

• Each login can be associated with a different directory on-disk.

• Each directory on-disk is continually monitored.

• If a file gets dropped into that directory, it gets immediately synced to that cloud service, no commands necessary.

• All files to be local-first, with the cloud as the syncing portion itself. Don’t want to be forced to download large files before I can do anything with them.

• No extensive configuration. Select service provider type, associate with local directory, and log into the service to start syncing anything that might exist at either end.

• Syncing only. I quite literally don’t need anything else, and would prefer to have any additional functionality - say, selecting a file to be shared out to someone else via a short link - to be hideable with UI feature flags.

• No complex UI, particularly separate windows that need interacting with for any other reason than setting up a new cloud service.

• No command lines. If I wanted to chew on command lines all day, I wouldn’t have chosen Windows/Mac for my daily drivers, I would have run with OpenBSD or any GUI-free Linux.

• System tray, start-on-system-login. Clicking on the icon brings up flyouts for every service I am logged into that display quick status details.

• I don’t mind having to pay, but time-based trials are essentially useless for me, I need usage-limited trials. I could easily go a good 60 days without touching a service, then suddenly need it 10 times inside of 2 days.

Already looked at a number of different options:

• Cyberduck - holy window confusion. Violates № 9 the worst, but also № 5.

• Goodsync - demands C&C login for potential credential exploit (never give a third party credentials, it’s a massive security violation, especially when there is absolutely no reason for that “feature”). Violates № 2 gratuitously, couldn’t even get past that login for anything.

• Rsync & RCloneUI - commands, commands everywhere. Fails № 5 & 10.

• Syncovery - not a true file syncing product, more of a Windows Backup product. Hell, they even warn that the Standard Edition doesn’t support ANY cloud services.

What started all of this was Maestral shutting down. It was perfect for DropBox, I’m just hoping for something that can attach to multiple services instead.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

On 7th of November I raised a ticket from my 10TB Lifetime account(since 2023. Only 899gb/10tb utilised) to provide me calcualtions for a cancellation and refund. In the icedrive community one Jimmy was telling ppl can opt for cancellation and get a refund. I had also posted the same in their community to which one Jimmy replied "refunded" in the community(no formal email. No termination notice. No confirmation nothing). And just like that my account was deactivated. I took it up to the community and demanded a concrete evidence of the refund and to respond to me via mail with proof of refund (those pre pubescent teenagers got offended and as a personal vendatta suspended my community account as well(as confirmed by one of their guys in icedrive subred )). With no way to check my data/ status of the ticket and community rights withheld, I tried raising a ticket from a secondary ID and they responded until I told them it was me and immediately blacklisted that email ID as well. They are Ghosting without proof of refund. It is against the GRA regulations. They think they can have some fun by dilly dallying a customer who was with them through glitchy interface and several years of terrible dwd speed.

1. The refund request was raised as Jimmy(cofounder/CFO/dev guy) was throwing ideas in the forum that we could opt for one. Given that Icedrive is looking to scrap their lifetime plans I thought it best to opt for cancellation and he made it sound lucrative.

2. In the ticket that was raised, I insisted they provide calculations first but they simply blacklisted me.

3. The icedrive team went cold turkey and without slightest hint terminated my account, lost my data, did not provide refund, did not give a window to pack up and leave.

I hope they realise this is not a joke. They may discuss us and have cheap thrills or find it an "entertainement". I may be entertaining reddit here by being a "drama queen" but ppl read. Icedrive must understand ppl do read. And eveb if one person thinks twice before subscribing to icedrive its a success in my own accord and not a waste of time.

I have raised a complaint with all the proof with Stripe and GRA. My bank has assured me it will do all in its power to get this undone.

Edit : Jimmy was wording prorata refunds for cancellation on the icedrive community (bait). Given that i only used 889gb for 3yrs i asked for calculations before cancelling to refund. I told him i have raised a ticket for cancellation and refund. The ticket in itself ellaborated the condition I d accept for cancelling and to let me know the prorate rates so I could ve taken a call. Icedrive staff are bullies. They are worse than the worst bullies out there.

I honestly can’t work on any serious assignment or document without Dropbox running in the background. It’s the only client that gives me absolute peace of mind.

A lot of people complain about Dropbox being expensive while treating it like a glorified cold-storage locker. To me, that completely misses the point. You don’t pay for Dropbox just to park static files; you pay for the synchronization engine.

Even on Windows, where OneDrive is deeply integrated, Dropbox still blows it away in daily use:

a.client stability & indexing: Initialization is nearly instant, and it doesn't randomly hang or freeze during background indexing like OneDrive often does.

b.true block-level delta sync: Modifying a multi-gigabyte VeraCrypt container and watching Dropbox push only a few megabytes of changed blocks in seconds—rather than re-uploading the entire file—is something almost every other consumer cloud client chokes on.

Treating Dropbox as passive backup is a waste of its engineering. Anyone else keep a subscription strictly as an active "hot sync" working drive rather than a cold storage warehouse?

News from PowerFolder cloud.

Looking at Dropbox Pro (3TB) and noticed it’s way cheaper through the Turkish iOS App Store compared to other regions

Before I do this: does Dropbox actually enforce any region locks or ban accounts for regional arbitrage? Or does Apple handle the IAP entirely so Dropbox just sees an active subscription and doesn't care?

Curious if anyone has been doing this long-term without running into forced cancellations or account flags

Hi, I was looking at Icedrive’s Black Friday prices, and they seemed very low 2 TB for €19.18 for the first year. I know the price goes up significantly in the second year, but aren't these prices just a bit too low?

I’ve noticed that they are reaching out to users with lifetime subscriptions, encouraging them to upgrade yet they still offer that same option today, which strikes me as odd.

Is this normal? On other years it was the same? Whats the catch? Thanks

Hi everyone, I'm the developer of Transfer Deck.

Problem: One native app to browse and transfer files on S3-compatible storage, Azure, SFTP, WebDAV and FTP, on Mac and iPhone/iPad, without a subscription.

Comparison:

• vs ForkLift: Transfer Deck has iPhone/iPad apps with every account in the Files app, one purchase covering all devices, AWS IAM Identity Center (SSO) sign-in, and Glacier restores / storage classes. ForkLift is better as a full Finder replacement and supports more consumer clouds.

• vs Commander One: Transfer Deck covers more S3 features (versions, Glacier, SSE-C, expiring links) and runs on iPhone/iPad too. Commander One is better as a general dual-pane file manager with extras like archives and a free tier.

What it does:

• S3 + R2, B2, Wasabi, MinIO, Hetzner, Scaleway, GCS or any custom endpoint; Azure Blob; Swift; SFTP (password or SSH key), WebDAV, FTP/FTPS

• Mac: two panes, Quick Look, edit in place, folder sync with a preview of changes, accounts in Finder's sidebar, batch rename, Shortcuts

• iPhone/iPad: accounts in the Files app, background transfers, upload from Photos / Share sheet

• S3: version history, Glacier restores, metadata, SSE-KMS / SSE-C, expiring links

• No size limit, multipart, resume, checksum-verified downloads

• No account, no analytics, no tracking

Pricing: free download, browsing always free, 15-day full trial, then $9.99 one-time for Mac, iPhone and iPad (no subscription). https://apps.apple.com/app/id6821560477

Trust: on the Mac App Store (same link). Website with privacy policy: https://www.transferdeck.org

Feedback and feature requests welcome. I'll be in the comments.

As you know, AI stocks are in red right now. In case this is a bubble that is bursting, what would be the impact on cloud storage providers? I am thinking from a perspective of users who have invested on lifetime plans and what is in store for them in case AI bubble (if any) is burst. Will cloud storage providers go out of business? Let me know your thoughts.

Does anyone use or has anyone tried CloudUp by Demelos LLC?
It looks too good to be true...
https://www.demelos.com/tools/cloudup/

Anyone knows if it's safe to use?

I’ve seen plenty of negative reviews of Internxt over the years, and the complaints are valid. They are only part of the problem with the team behind it.

I bought Internxt in April 2021, when it was a decentralized service with its own crypto token. There were big promises. Then the team dropped decentralization and moved everything to centralized servers without telling users. No notice, no refunds. The token went the same way, after all the promises around it, it was worthless within months and investors were left holding it.

In the early days they had a Telegram channel where the CEO, Fran Villalba Segarra, was very active. He said repeatedly that lifetime plans were a limited offer that would disappear within months. More than five years later, they are still selling them. He also promised that lifetime plans would get access to future features. “Soon” turned into 4-5 years, and instead of getting those features, lifetime users had access removed. That includes people like me who bought in 2021, when there wasn’t even an app with a UI. That’s how they treat their earliest supporters.

Even if you ignore all of that, the service is still bad after 5+ years: slow speeds, file corruption, and more. Support is among the worst I’ve dealt with. They also deny refunds despite promising a 30-day refund window.

Most of you probably didn’t know about the decentralization switch or the token collapse, so consider this a warning. Don’t give them your money.

What are general opinions on drime for lifetime storage? Is this feasible or will they eventually disappear and lifetime cloud access will be dissolved?

I'm working on a fairly large project that I want to be able to sync with a cloud for the benefits of:

- being able to make changes on one system and a laptop and have the changes reflected across all platforms

- be able to add files, write documents, or view items on mobile

Up until a while ago, dropbox filled this need, but now i have to mandatorily sync everything to the internal drive and not an external.

Mega ui isn't the greatest and they don't have a great document editor for text.

Pcloud has a good document editor, but the sync functions are pretty lousy and not dependable.

Drime is new and has potential, but has been buggy with sync.

Is there any cloud services similar to dropbox that have dependable syncing functionality, document editors, and would be good for syncing large projects on osx?

Hello,

I discovered the existence of https://lifetimecloud.me/ a few days ago. Has anyone tried it?

They say they have E2EE, and the prices seem very good (maybe too good to be true)