Dropbox and Google Drive

Tuesday, after much speculation and a few hints from Google themselves, Google finally released their new product: Google Drive. As a Google fanboy I am ecstatic but I am, for the most part, sticking with Dropbox. 

Google Docs used to both be the place you created and edited files (such as documents, spreadsheets, etc.) and where those files were saved. Now the page where you access your files is known as Google Drive and you can now sync those files with your Mac or Windows computer with a small application as well as upload file types that Google Docs can’t read.

Like Dropbox, Google Docs allows you to download a small application that will sync files on your computer with their servers. Both services also allow you to share your documents with others (via different methods).

They are both essentially the same service but Dropbox has been at it for 4 years already so in comparison Google Drive seems rough around the edges. Google Drive just doesn’t have the clean look and feel that Dropbox does but Google has a history of releasing quickly and updating the service later. I do find it weird that Google Drive doesn’t incorporate Google Music, you still need a separate app to keep that synced. Also Google Drive only lets you add files to the Google Drive folders, Dropbox allows you to tell it which folders you already have on your system you want to sync without moving them.

For the time being I am keeping my non-Google Docs files in Dropbox. I pay for 50GB (on a yearly basis) and with all the opportunities to get free space I up to 88GB. If Google updates Google Drive to be a little more polished when my annual subscription is up for Dropbox I will have to look at it again.