Microsoft Windows Skydrive: Review

It has been very less time since Google started their online document collaboration services- Google Drive and soon after that Microsoft has updated Skydrive. As news suggest, Microsoft has made some updates in Windows phone app, for Skydrive in anticipation of Google’s much rumored Drive service.  It is Microsoft’s attempt to gain a bigger share in the cloud-storage technology after the recent release of desktop Skydr

Skydrive Features

Since Microsoft Skydrive has been here for some time, you can expect some great features from the app. Integration is good, something at which Windows based platforms are undoubtedly the best.

On sign up, you are given 7 GB of free storage, which is actually more than what Google Drive, Dropbox and Apple are offering for new accounts. Microsoft has the option of upgradation for those who want more share of the cloud. If we compare these prices with what Apple and Google are charging for extra space, we can see that Google charges three times as much and Apple charges four times as much as Microsoft is charging for extra 20 GB space. So, Microsoft has an edge over here. It’s definitely cheaper and you can store anything under the sun. You can attach any kind, any size of files and store in your Skydrive just like you do in your email account.  You can also create a document within the browser and work on MS Word, Power point, Excel etc.

Skydrive Browser interference

The browser interface looks pretty much similar to how it looks in Hotmail or MSN Live. An email address and inbox would be provided to you when you sign up to the service. You’ll see the main menu on the left hand side, consisting of the options of Recent Docs, Files, Shared documents and Computers. The computers option shows the windows systems on which you have installed the Skydrive client application. The list of your stored files occupy most of the screen space, with some advanced options like (copy, rename etc). On the top, you’ll be able to see the options of creating MS word, excel or Powerpoint file within the browser. You click on any of those, and here you are with an online document which you can share with anybody over the net. You also have quick access to social networking sites with tabs provided for Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, while you can add the others according to your wish.

Skydrive Desktop apps

Apart from the browser, Skydrive offers some desktop apps also. You can use the “fetch” feature to upload a file present in your windows PC that you forgot to attach and upload, given that you have installed the desktop client for PC. You can drag and drop files to the virtual folder, which would automatically get uploaded on the remote server. This way, you can always have an updated version online of a document that you are working upon and have it saved on SkyDrive. A client for OS X is also available, but you should have Lion running on your system to make it work.

Windows phone

Like we said, Skydrive has been integrated to the Windows mobile phone, making it an amazing windows phone app upgrade. As expected, the interface looks pretty much like the one for PCs, the Files, shared and recent options continue to hold their places while the computers option has been eliminated. The interface is cool, with less junk and more functions being displayed on the screen.  You can view your stored files under the “files” option on the screen. You can directly play audio files from the app, but you can’t save them. You can click a picture and share from the app directly, but video sharing option is absent. However, you can go to the camera, record a video and then share.

Other platforms

iOS and Android users can also have their share of cloud via Skydrive. The features are quite restricted, though. iOS users have access to file sharing, audio playback and others(file management is quite rough, though), but it’s not pretty much the same for android users. You will have to manage with substitutes of the original Skydrive app, such as the Microsoft’s Onenote app, which has some of the features of Skydrive app.

Summing up, we would say that the Microsoft Windows Skydrive impressions is innovative and cool in terms of storage, utility, interface and obviously, integration. We can definitely see a bright future for this amazing app. If you have any query related to Skydrive, feel free to share with us.

Download Skydrive (Official )