Cloud storage with ASUS WebStorage can leave you with headaches
So when I purchased my G75VX, I was turned on to ASUS WebStorage. This is a cloud-based storage service available to ASUS product owners. To top it off, they gave me 32.5GB of free cloud storage. Awesome right? Yeah, at least that’s what I thought.
So let’s go through over ASUS WebStorage. Just like DropBox or Box, they have a desktop app that you can download and sync your files to. You can also choose what you want to sync and if you want manual or automatic syncing done. These are some pretty handy features, well enough to entice me away from my using my Box account.
ASUS WebStorage
Now the following is from the ASUS WebStorage website listed as their features:
Connecting your digital life
Wherever there is internet connection, ASUS WebStorage can help you to retrieve your data to your notebooks, smartphones or tablets. Get FREE 5GB and experience your own cloud today!* If you sign up on ASUS preloaded devices, more free space will be provided to you. Please click here for the amount of free space provided to each preloaded device model.
- Keeping your file in the safest cloud space
- Everything is securely saved on ASUS WebStorage. With 5GB cloud space you can throw everything on, files, photos, music, videos and lots more.
- A copy in the cloud; access on any devices
- Leave the USB drives behind and let ASUS WebStorage sync your up-to-date files to all your devices so that you can enjoy the mobility without burden. Moreover, your files stay up to date no matter how many times you edit them.
- Convenient sharing is readily available anytime
- ASUS WebStorage provides many ways of easy sharing of photos, videos, and other file
Setup of ASUS WebStorage is fairly easy. You signup with your email, create a password, login and then you have a pretty simple interface. You can tag your data, share it or just use the pre-set folders.
Now the way that it works is you tell ASUS WebStorage where you want your sync folder to be. Once you do that, you can create multiple directories within your sync folder and ASUS WebStorage will take that same structure and sync it to your secure account. Essentially ASUS WebStorage is acting as a backup program.
For me, my shared folder is on my data drive on my computer. I have that drive synced with a Raid1 network storage device for backup. ASUS WebStorage is a secondary backup away from by DLink cloud storage device.
The Asus WebStorage Nightmare
To start off, at first, I was very impressed. ASUS WebStorage met up to my expectations and delivered stunning smart syncing capabilities. I was truly amazed. Then all of a sudden, I go to access my files on my local drive. My folder is empty. So then I log in to ASUS Webstorage where my folder there is also empty. Well, have no fear I will just access my NAS for my files. They are gone there too. Not to worry, I have them on my laptop with the ASUS WebStorage desktop app and same shared folder. There was nothing. Now, my final fail safe is my 32GB Flash Drive that also housed the ASUS WebStorage shared folder. I plugged it in and was safe. All my files were there. A sigh of relief overcame me. So, I re-synced my folders onto my NAS, and then the shared folders. Then I left it in to finish syncing online with ASUS WebStorage. When I came back, everything was gone. Even from my flash drive because it was connected to the ASUS WebStorage service. Apparently, any folder being accessed by the shared service or connected to the sync folder became a victim to ASUS WebStorage. Luckily for me, I have one more fail-safe. My Box folder. It wasn’t the most recent version of files, but still, I was relieved.
So, my take on ASUS WebStorage is going to be harsh. Stay away from it. There are plenty of other good cloud storages to choose from. I recommend using Box. You can check it out here.
I was also ‘turned on’ to the Asus WebStorage when I purchased a netbook about 4 years ago. The service was inexpensive, and I was grandfathered in with unlimited storage, so continued using it on one of the laptops we have at home. Now it is 2014, and finally I’m ready to use it to restore a backup onto a new laptop. I install the WebStorage client to the new laptop and find that the option for restoring files says “(beta)” next to the restore function link. The restore tool begins to run, but crashes every time. After a few hours of restoring files I receive an error about lost connection and the application tells me I need to start again. Tried this 5 or 6 times with the same result, with both wireless and wired connection to my network, restoring files onto a Windows 8.1 64-bit machine. If I go to the WebStorage website, I can restore small subsets of files from there, but if I choose a directory with a large number of files it tells me that the size of the restore is too large. Also note that the website packs selected files into a 7Zip archive. I’ve been successful in pulling smaller subsets of files from that site, but with 80 GB of data I’d be restoring files for years to come before I got them all off the site using that method. I STRONGLY recommend you stay away from this service. Their user community website is full of comments from others with the same experience. THANKFULLY the old laptop continued working long enough to get my files copied from old machine to new across our home network.
I used the free space that came with the computer and bought more on a one time special deal. It worked for awhile then failed to sync across all of my devices. Customer service sent a generic resolution that did not work. When I contacted them again I received notification that the ticket had been closed. Further attempts to contact customer service received no response.
As the previous commenter stated, this is something better stayed away from.
I’m interested in the experience that you have been having since you have been using ASUS WebStorage. Is it still working for you?