Friday, December 31, 2010

Cloud Backup: Hitachi’s Life Studio Mobile Plus, Tested


What do you do if you need to back up your data, transport it, synchronize it between several locations, and access it online? Hitachi’s Life Studio Mobile Plus is a brave attempt at solving that dilemma, but it only really appeals to mainstream users.
A lot has been said and written about data protection, so we're happy every time a company tries to breathe new life into the market with some amount of real innovation. Obviously, backing up data to an external hard drive or network storage solution is nothing new. Virtually everyone has a USB thumb drive today, and even saving data onto your personal Web space is old hat. However, when someone promises all of this in a single, user-friendly, convenient, and affordable package, we gladly take a closer look.
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Hitachi promises that its new LifeStudio product makes organizing and finding files, music, and photos even easier. The software uses the same Cooliris 3D wall paradigm found in Android smartphones' Gallery app. All content is conveniently accessed, edited, and managed through a centralized piece of software with support for uploading photos to Facebook, Flickr, and Picasa. The integrated USB thumb drive provides an easy and flexible way to transport important data. Finally, apps for the iPhone let you can access the data online later. Unfortunately, these are not free of charge.
On the following pages, we'll take a closer look at the Hitachi LifeStudio Mobile Plus. We didn’t doubt that the concept would work, but the promised user friendliness and simplicity is something we had to see to believe. This includes benchmarking the individual components, as well as assessing everyday use. We also chose two unbiased test subjects who had never used a product like this before.

We already owned external hard drives, a collection of USB thumb drives in various capacities, and various Internet storage spaces. Could the Hitachi LifeStudio Mobile Plus render all of these disparate pieces obsolete? We had to know.


Packaging
We've been considering packaging in our reviews for a while given that, sometimes, you really can judge a book by its cover, especially when that cover is responsible for protecting the product throughout shipping and retail. Packaging also gives you clues about how eco-minded the manufacturer might be. From this perspective, Hitachi has created exemplary packaging by getting rid of unnecessary plastic and instead opting for form-shaped cardboard. Instead of including an installation CD, the hard drive is configured as a virtual CD drive that provides all required software.

Delivery
A short, printed manual is included, helping the user through the first few installation steps. The drive also comes with two USB cables in addition to the docking station and 4 GB USB stick. In this Mobile version of the product, power comes directly from USB ports. To help deal with any low-power ports, Hitachi includes a Y cable with two USB connections. We found the USB cable a bit short, and had to use an extension cable to connect the Life Studio Mobile Plus to the tower PC located below our desk.
Details:
• 2.5" external hard drive
• 4 GB USB stick
• USB docking station
• 2 USB cables
• LifeStudio software
• Hitachi backup software
Technical Data

• Available capacities: 250 GB, 320 GB, and 500 GB
• Available colors: graphite and platinum
• Dimensions (HxWxD): 13.6 cm x 8.5 cm x 8.05 cm
• Supported operating systems: Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 with USB 2.0 or 1.1 ports. Apple MacOS 10.5 or newer with USB 2.0 or 1.1 ports.
First Startup
Assembly is hassle-free. When unpacking, observe how parts are placed inside the box. Maybe even take a picture or two. Getting everything back into the box in case you want to return the product for whatever reason can be tricky.
Setting up the hard drive and docking station takes about one minute.



USB Connection
We mentioned the short USB cable; hopefully you won't need to buy a longer one. The drive is detected immediately after connecting, and both the hard drive and the USB stick show up as removable media. The next step is to install the software from the virtual CD drive.

Software Installation
Software installation is quick and trouble-free, as well. It's a bit strange, though, that just after the installation is complete the setup runs a mandatory update check, immediately installing a newer version. Why not run this before installing the first version?
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Maybe this sounds like nitpicking, but there's an annoying aspect to the update process, too. Despite having just installed the application, LifeStudio needs to be completely (automatically) uninstalled before the new version can be installed. This is time-consuming and should have been more efficiently implemented, especially since this is supposed to be a smart, nimble, and mobile solution. We would have gladly accepted an update patch, but now there's this lengthy procedure to endure on all computers that use the product.
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Preferences
There aren't many options to choose from.
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The simple nature of Hitachi's software results in some reductions in functionality. Just allowing the user to select which directories to back up would have made things easier. Without any kind of file filter, this superficial approach quickly leads to meaningless and wasteful data transfers. For example, the entire Windows user directory is selected for online backup by default, meaning that your browser cache and temporary data is backed up and synchronized. We'll discuss this in more detail later in the article.

Preferences
You use Cooliris to view data content. Whether or not this tool meets your personal taste is for you to decide. It's quite easy to view simple content structures, but checking out a large photo collection with the original camera file names quickly becomes challenging.
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The Second Account
The login button on the main screen has nothing to do with the cloud, but requires a separate Cooliris account.
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The registration process could be smoother. Despite the error messages, we did receive confirmation links when registering, but these emails all landed in our spam folder. It's not that hard to follow some basic rules in order to bypass spam detection, and less experienced users in particular may depend on properly delivered email.
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We would have preferred an alternative visualization method to the wall. Users archiving a few photos and music will get used to it pretty fast, but power users with a variety of file types that are not all multimedia files will be frustrated by the lack of an overview.

We observed the two following people as being representative of the experiences an average user would have. We followed them from opening the package through installation to actually using the product. We wanted to supplement our own conclusions with their observations and actions. The criticism and tips mentioned in this section are thus indirectly included in the final conclusion. We asked both users to evaluate the product in a few sentences.
Test Person 1: Student (16, male)
This is a summary of the first test person’s evaluation. In addition to some cell phone photos, the user mainly dealt with short movie clips, wallpapers, and MP3 files. After a short introduction on the advantages of online backup, the user enthusiastically dove into the product.
He had some criticisms regarding the boring Web interface and its usability. The search either found the wrong content or offered too many hits with little relevance. He mentioned the lack of a directory hierarchy as well as the absent EXIF data in photo files. The hard drive and USB thumb drive storage were praised, though the lack of file filtering was an issue. The 3D Wall was enjoyed and classified as stylish, balancing out the problems with file searching.
The included software proved no challenge for this user. The iPhone we supplied with the prepaid app installed was met with a "no, thank you." His grade for the entire product was a B.
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Test Person 2: Adult (29, female)
This is the assessment of a professional Web designer. She liked the idea of the adopting a USB thumb drive, and its operation went smoothly. The two required user accounts were taken negatively, as was the overly complicated registration process. She missed file filtering and described these as the only reason why she would never use this product on her own, in spite of a good concept.
This is the key question: why should users have to adapt when storing files on the computer instead of having the backup software adapt to them? She would have liked more options, as well. Overall rating: satisfactory.

Pros:

• good idea and interesting concept, especially the cloud connection and the USB thumb drive
• eco-friendly and efficient packaging
• premium materials and good construction quality
• good product design
• everything essential is included in the package
• easy software installation
• settings are easy to understand
• visually attractive management interface
• 3 GB free online storage space

Cons:

• short USB cables
• few configuration options
• no options for file filtering (more specifically, what to backup)
• not possible to hide sub-directories
• need to register two different online accounts
• minimalistic Web interface
• limited search functions or too many search results
• no user-defined hierarchical file organization
• Windows user directory backed up by default, including temp folder and browser cache
• the 3D wall is stylish but impractical
• form over function throughout
Final Evaluation
In order to properly evaluate the LifeStudio, we must draw a clear line between average home users and the power user with technical knowledge. This product is most likely best classified as a lifestyle product for casual, personal users. The absence of a number of file selection options makes it inappropriate for semi-professional or professional use.
While the backup result is rather good out of the box, the lack of data selection settings could be a deal breaker. The backup solution automatically includes the Windows Default User directory for backup. We spent over two hours uploading more than 5000 files to the cloud, and none of them contained important documents or media files! It was just the browser cache and temporary files.
The concept behind LifeStudio is great. So are many aspects of the product. But it is severely limited by the beautiful, yet inefficient, software interface and a poorly-implemented Web interface.
Recommendation
The Hitachi LifeStudio Mobile Plus is guaranteed to find its audience. People with modern lifestyles who want to handle a manageable number of images and secure their data from disasters are offered just the right product. The hardware is fast enough and convenient, and the software does its job well once set up.
The services are temptingly easy to work with because of their simplified features. However, anyone looking for an effective and more powerful backup solution for daily work needs to keep looking, because this product lacks a few important backup features and criteria.
We conclude this review with mixed feelings. We hope that this article provides a few useful suggestions to Hitachi. The hardware is perfectly fine. Only the software is holding it back for anyone who considers herself or himself more knowledgeable than a mainstream consumer.







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