We have all been waiting for GDrive to launch for years now. But it looks like GDrive is all set to become vaporware with the launch of the public beta of Dropbox today. Luckily I managed to get an invite and I’ve been playing around with Dropbox for the past hour and I am completely bowled over by its simplicity and functionality.

Only yesterday I wrote about Foldershare, but Dropbox beats Foldershare in all aspects. Every other online storage solution has had its own limitations. Dropbox gives them a hard punch and comes out on top.

Here are a few things that made me impressed :

• Dropbox is super fast. Uploads and Sync are done in a snap.
• The Interface is simple and easy to use and it is tightly integrated into your Operating System. I’m currently running Dropbox on my Hackintosh and Windows Vista PC and it works like a charm.
• Sync is the main feature. You can sync files between multiple computers and share stuff between different users.
• Everything you store in Dropbox is stored in an online account and the storage limit is capped to a maximum of 5GB.
• In case you accidentally edit a file you can always revert back to previous version. Think SVN for home users!

I plan to buy a premium account whenever that is available because I’m just in love with Dropbox at the moment. I suggest you watch the screencast to see how powerful Dropbox really is.

I have invites available, so if you want to try out Dropbox leave a comment in this post and spread the word.

I’m so sorry I forgot to Link up to Tony. Kudos to him for finding this back door to get Dropbox invites..

Update : Sorry guys the invites are now over. I just received this email from Drew Houston the CEO of Dropbox :

hey guys,

first, thanks for the enthusiasm and inviting people we really
appreciate it.

we will be tightening the reins though in an hour or two and putting a 5
person limit on invites — just wanted to let you know so that we didn’t
pull the rug out from under you and so that you can update blog posts,
etc. the invites you’ve already given out won’t be affected.

we will be letting in more people as soon as we can

cheers,

drew

Isn’t that sad, this was fun while it lasted. I’ve sent out more than 400 invites and I’m happy that I have been able to get invites for so many people. Well its just that dailyApps gave out just as many invites as Techcrunch and GigaOm put together gave. So dailyApps trumps the big guys right? I’ve closed the comments on this post, which means no more invites. Please subscribe to the RSS Feed to receive a lot more in the future.

If you are planning to purchase yourself a Flickr Pro Account, then this is the right time to do so. Well if you are wondering how, Flickr has a deal running for the month of January wherein if you purchase a Gift Account, 3 Extra free months are credited to your Flickr Account. Which means you get 15months of Flickr Pro Account for just 24.95$, not a bad deal isn’t it?

Well here is how it works..

• Go to the Flickr gift site.
• Purchase a 12 month gift subscription which will cost your $24.95 ( but this gift is for you, my friend)
• Once you are done with that, you’ll get a gift code, redeem it here. 
• After the purchase has been made, three free months will be added to your account.

Well, guys you better hurry up, because this super deal closes on the 31st of this month. The benefits of a Pro include, Ad Free browsing, Unlimited Storage, and Unlimited Photo sets. Well on a personal note, I’m planning to buy myself a Smugmug account rather than a Flickr Pro account.

So I suggest you have a look at Smugmug too. Its a lot better than Flickr in my opinion.

Via Tech-Buzz

I believe that GDrive is already existing in the form of the storage that we have in numerous Google services like GMail, Picasa, Blogger, Docs etc. I believe that GDrive will allow us to organize stuff that we have on various Google Services. Maybe we will see a unified interface that will allow us to organize the vast amount of data, and some software that will allow us to manage the data offline.

Pricing on the tool is not yet announced, but WSJ indicates that there will be likely free and paid versions available.

GDrive has been one of the longest rumored products from the Google Stable, if you would leave aside the gPhone that finally ended up being Android. The rumors of the arrival of GDrive has lead to the development of many hacks to GMail to make it behave something like GSpace.

Google alone knows when will we see GDrive but until then ReadWriteWeb has some amazing tips for Google Developers working on the GDrive project. Here are those tips :

• Your files will become computable on a massive scale (Think of a Supermassive Super Computer)
• Mobile access
• Gears + GDrive

Come on Google, go for it. I can’t wait for the release of GDrive. I got Gigs of stuff to store on it.

Google

Well here are the rough estimates of how much storage you will have :

Well that roughly translates into :

• 2912MB by October 11, 2007 midnight Google time
• 4.2GB by the 23rd this month

• 6GB by January 4th next year
• 42GB by the year of 2038
• and 2.70266701 × 10⁷² TB* by 1/2/3456 7:00

Well the additional storage is really appreciated, but GMail’s chief competitor Yahoo Mail already offers unlimited storage so it would be nice if Google did the same with GMail too. Well the last two estimates remain a little bit too exaggerated. Also 42GB by 2038, Google are you kidding me?? 42GB after 30years, wouldn’t it be too less ?

Google has also updated storage for Google Apps users giving them that extra bit of storage. Google Apps who are on the standard plan will now get inbox’s that would match GMail’s growth rate. If the free storage is not enough for you, then you should check out the paid storage option :

• 10GB for $20 per year
• 40GB for $75 per year
• 150GB for $250 per year
• 400GB for $500 per year

I really like, when Google does things in its own style. While the announcement from Yahoo about unlimited storage drew a lot of criticism for Gmail for being stuck in the past, but I strongly belive that Google does continue to innovate with Gmail.

Drop in your comments as to what you think about the storage bump in GMail? 

Gspace turns the 2.8GB+ of your Gmail account into free online storage. With Gspace you can manage unlimited Gmail accounts to store all type of files within its simple, user friendly interface.

Listen your favourite stored music directly from your Gspace, view your collections of pictures and manage your Gdrive files as well.

Using GSpace is as simple as saying 1-2-3..

• Once you have installed Gspace, open your Firefox browser. To access Gspace go to: Tools > Gspace. The Gspace console will appear on screen.
• Manage your Gmail accounts. You can set up as many as you want. Remember that each one provides 2.8Gb of storage.
• Login to any of your Gmail accounts.
• Gspace console is divided in 4 key areas for you to manage your files: My Computer / My Gspace / Transfers / Status.
• Enjoy Gspace features:
• File Transfer: to manage files
• Player Mode: to listen your stored music files directly from Gspace
• Photo Mode: to view your collection of pictures
• Gmail Drive: to manage your Gdrive files as well

On a small note of Warning Do not upload/download many files in a single day. You may get your account blocked for 24 houres. It seems that, this happens if more than 1GB of data is transferred in a single day.

So go ahead and install the GSpace addon and bask in its glory.

Yep Google is finally giving a paid upgrade to extra storage on Picasa Web Albums and Gmail. With a Google shared storage plan, you won’t have to worry about deleting files, pictures, or emails. After purchasing a storage plan, some of your individual Google services (e.g. email and photos) will share a single new storage space. This is a good news for all those people who have almost filled up their inbox. If you are one of those go ahead and buy yourself extra storage.. here are the plans

Here is the official googleannouncement. Considering that there are other services that gives you unlimited storage, i would have expected the plans to be a little cheaper. Also the option to buy a Picasa Premium account is being removed and it will be clubbed with the Shared Storage Plan. So if you read less email and have more photos or even the other way round, Shared Storage is a must for you..

To Buy yourself some extra space to breathe easy visit this page .