Dropbox is a PC builder’s best friend
Dropbox is a PC builder’s best friend
Dropbox 是 PC 装机爱好者的最佳拍档
When catastrophe strikes, having your whole computer in the cloud makes recovery a breeze. 当灾难降临时，将整台电脑的数据备份在云端，能让恢复工作变得轻而易举。
In 2018 I bet my reputation and self-worth on a huge crowdfunded game design project. It could have been a failure for many reasons, but the one I became most worried about was losing all of the work that was stored locally on my home-built PC — a scenario that would have left a lot of people very upset and placed me in deep trouble. I wasn’t irresponsible, I had local backups, but at some point I found myself in custody of so many important files that it scared me. And no matter how many redundancies I could build at home, they’d all still be in the same place — a risky bet. So I bought a subscription to Dropbox. Years later, it’s still one of the best software subscriptions that I happily renew each year. 2018 年，我将自己的声誉和自我价值押注在一个大型众筹游戏设计项目上。这个项目可能会因为各种原因失败，但我最担心的是丢失存储在自组装 PC 本地硬盘里的所有工作成果——这种情况会让很多人感到沮丧，也会让我陷入巨大的麻烦。我并非不负责任，我确实有本地备份，但随着重要文件越来越多，我开始感到后怕。无论我在家里建立多少冗余备份，它们最终都存储在同一个物理位置——这本身就是一场高风险的赌博。于是，我订阅了 Dropbox。多年后的今天，它依然是我每年都乐于续费的最佳软件订阅服务之一。
It was great to have all that work backed up in the cloud — both for peace of mind and because it made working with collaborators breezier, letting them upload stuff directly to my drive, and letting me transfer files up to 50GB in size. In quick order I had built a trove of incredible artwork and complicated InDesign, Photoshop, and Illustrator files. The original goal for my Dropbox configuration was to make sure I wouldn’t lose any data in a worst-case scenario, so I set it up to mirror everything living on my work partition. Eventually, I ran smack into a worst-case scenario. Not once, but twice. 将所有工作成果备份到云端感觉棒极了——不仅让我心安，还让与合作者的协作变得更加顺畅。他们可以直接将文件上传到我的云盘，我也能传输高达 50GB 的大文件。很快，我就积累了海量的精美艺术作品以及复杂的 InDesign、Photoshop 和 Illustrator 文件。我配置 Dropbox 的初衷是为了确保在最坏的情况下不会丢失数据，所以我将其设置为镜像同步工作分区中的所有内容。最终，我真的遭遇了最坏的情况。不是一次，而是两次。
I’m still not sure why, but my latest home-built PC chewed through two separate 2TB Samsung 970 Evo SSDs. It’s difficult to tell what went wrong with them, but in each case I woke up one morning to find when I tried to boot up that no drive could be detected. I can still feel my stomach trying to sink into the floor when I press that power button these days, never knowing if my drive had died in its sleep. 我至今不确定原因，但我最近组装的这台 PC 竟然接连损坏了两块 2TB 的三星 970 Evo SSD。很难判断它们出了什么问题，但两次都是在某天早上醒来尝试开机时，发现系统检测不到硬盘。直到现在，每当我按下电源键时，心里依然会咯噔一下，生怕硬盘又在睡眠中“猝死”。
Fortunately, both times, after some process-of-elimination testing I learned that just the drive had gone bad and everything else in my system was A-OK. Maybe I should have ditched Samsung after the second disaster, but I’m now on an 2TB 990 Evo Plus. Knock on wood, this thing better not fail. That drive now costs almost twice what I originally paid for it thanks to our new outrageously priced world of parts. 幸运的是，经过排除法测试，两次我都确认只是硬盘坏了，系统其他部分一切正常。也许在第二次灾难后我就该放弃三星，但我现在换成了 2TB 的 990 Evo Plus。祈祷吧，希望这块硬盘别再出问题。由于如今硬件价格极其离谱，这块硬盘现在的价格几乎是我最初购买时的两倍。
My Dropbox bill is about $204 a year for a family plan ($17 a month), which includes up to six members. If you’re just in it for yourself you can get it for $9.99 a month billed yearly (about $120 a year), which comes with 2TB of storage. You can upgrade to 3TB for around $143 a year. That might be a tough sell for people who already have dozens of subscriptions, but I find it to be a decent price for excellent digital insurance. 我的 Dropbox 家庭版套餐每年费用约为 204 美元（每月 17 美元），最多可容纳 6 名成员。如果你只是个人使用，可以选择每月 9.99 美元的年度订阅（每年约 120 美元），包含 2TB 存储空间。你也可以花每年约 143 美元升级到 3TB。对于那些已经订阅了数十项服务的人来说，这可能有点难以接受，但我认为作为一份出色的数字保险，这个价格非常合理。
There are other powerful options out there, especially for professionals working with heavy files or complicated workflows. Backblaze, for example, has a personal backup plan with unlimited data for $99 a year and no restrictions on file size. And, of course, if you live on the Mac, Apple iCloud Plus isn’t a bad option — especially if you’re already paying for an Apple One subscription. Even Adobe offers file backups through Creative Cloud if that’s your jam, but I would not recommend using that clunky software suite for anything other than doing the work you need to do. 市面上还有其他强大的选择，特别是对于处理大型文件或复杂工作流的专业人士而言。例如，Backblaze 提供个人备份计划，每年 99 美元即可享受无限数据备份，且对文件大小没有限制。当然，如果你是 Mac 用户，Apple iCloud Plus 也是个不错的选择，尤其是如果你已经订阅了 Apple One。甚至 Adobe 也通过 Creative Cloud 提供文件备份，但除非你是重度用户，否则我不建议使用那套笨重的软件来做备份，它只适合完成你的本职工作。
I can’t recall a single time the service failed
我不记得该服务有任何一次故障
I prefer Dropbox because the software works consistently well across multiple operating systems and is usually neither seen nor heard. The Windows client is snappy and I’ve found with a fast internet connection that its real-time syncing is efficient and painless. Anytime a file is modified in the partition I have mirrored in the cloud, Dropbox quietly begins uploading it and making changes to my mirrored files in the cloud. After using it for about eight years now I can’t recall a single time the service failed or faltered. It’s so fast and reliable I often forget it’s even there. 我更喜欢 Dropbox，因为该软件在多个操作系统上都能稳定运行，而且通常“静默”工作，不会打扰用户。Windows 客户端响应迅速，在高速网络连接下，其实时同步功能高效且无感。每当我镜像到云端的分区中有文件被修改，Dropbox 就会悄悄开始上传并同步云端文件。使用大约八年后，我不记得该服务有任何一次故障或中断。它如此快速且可靠，以至于我经常忘了它的存在。
Now, for the important caveat: This might not work for you if you have poor internet speeds. It really depends on how much data you’re regularly moving around on your computer and how quickly you make changes to it. This could particularly be a problem for asymmetrical data plans that commonly boast lightning-fast download speeds while offering pathetic upload speeds. I’ve done fine averaging only about 20Mbps upload, but if you’re on something even lower you should try a free trial for a backup plan before committing. You can also find plenty of download time calculators online; at my gigabit download speed it usually takes around two hours to download the 1TB of files I have synced in the cloud. 现在，有一个重要的注意事项：如果你的网速较慢，这可能不适合你。这完全取决于你电脑上经常变动的数据量以及修改频率。对于那些通常标榜下载速度极快但上传速度极慢的非对称网络套餐来说，这可能是一个问题。我的平均上传速度约为 20Mbps，使用起来没问题，但如果你的速度更低，建议在正式订阅前先试用备份计划。你也可以在网上找到很多下载时间计算器；以我的千兆下载速度，下载云端同步的 1TB 文件通常需要大约两个小时。
And one more caveat: Putting everything (or even just many things) on your computer in the cloud isn’t for everyone, and I completely understand why many folks wouldn’t or shouldn’t do that for sensitive files. I once built local RAID drives and even airgapped storage systems to avoid having everything online. These things are still possible but getting more expensive by the day as storage prices spike. You’re the best judge of how and where your data should be protected. 还有一个注意事项：将电脑上的所有内容（甚至只是大部分内容）放入云端并不适合所有人，我完全理解为什么许多人不想或不应该将敏感文件上传到云端。我曾经组建过本地 RAID 阵列，甚至使用过物理隔离的存储系统来避免所有数据联网。这些方案依然可行，但随着存储价格飙升，成本也日益昂贵。如何保护数据以及将数据存放在哪里，你自己才是最好的判断者。
That sinking feeling of potentially losing my whole PC? It was immediately followed each time by the assurance that I’d only lost a computer’s body and not its soul. When I got my PC back up and running with new storage, it ended up taking less time to resync all my files than it did to troubleshoot and install new hardware. I can almost hear Billy Crudup doing a Mastercard commercial in my head: New solid state drive, three hundred eighty-nine dollars. Yearly Dropbox subscription, two hundred and three dollars. Never worrying about losing your data? Priceless. 那种可能失去整台电脑的沉重感？每次在灾难发生后，随之而来的都是一种确信：我失去的只是电脑的“躯壳”，而非它的“灵魂”。当我换上新硬盘让电脑重新运行后，重新同步所有文件所花的时间，比排查故障和安装新硬件的时间还要短。我的脑海里仿佛响起了比利·克鲁德普（Billy Crudup）配音的万事达卡广告词：新固态硬盘，389 美元。年度 Dropbox 订阅，203 美元。再也不用担心丢失数据？无价。