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• The Good: For the price, cheap mass storage and media server
• The Bad: A little awkward to set up
• The Verdict: Over the long haul, the cheaper way to store and back up data
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When it comes to giving gifts to geeks, there's nothing less sexy than storage. And nothing more appreciated.

Computing, after all, is an invitation to hoarding: Before you know it, you'll need lots of space to store all 117 episodes of The Brady Bunch. Or if you have experienced a serious hard-disk failure, you'll wish you had invested in a proper backup system.

Manufacturers, however, have seen the rise in personal file sharing (think YouTube) and can't see why you wouldn't want storage of your own. So they've been trying to put sexiness — well, let's call it simplicity — into storage.

The sexiest is Hewlett Packard's new HP Media Vault, which is basically a small computer-like box that contains one big hard drive and installs on the home network via Ethernet. Two models are available: the MV 2010 ($439.99 Cdn.), with 300 gigabytes of space, and the MV2020 ($629), with 500 GB. Included software helps manage its contents from any other computer on the network.

The Media Vault has an extra drive bay for an optional second drive (top capacity of 1.2 terabytes), and includes the ability to stream audio and video to other universal plug-and-play computers on the net. And it's a fast operator: The box is set up for fast serial ATA drives (older, slower IDE drives won't work), three USB 2.0 ports (you can daisy-chain more external hard drives from those ports) and a super-fast gigabit Ethernet port. You can even attach up to three printers to its USB-based print server.

Although HP has tried to give the box a friendly look, there is still a little geekery required to install it. You must make sure your DHCP server on your router is running, and you should also turn off any software firewalls this side of the router to assure a proper installation. A couple of firewalls — Trend Micro's PC-cillin and Norton's firewall — can put up a real fuss if you don't.

The Media Vault appears as another box on your network, and you can map a connection to it as a network drive, or you can map each of its four pre-configured folders (Backup FileShare, MediaShare and CinemaNow) as separate drives. Or you can browse its contents using the included software, which allows for flexibility to determine which folders are to be shared, and which folders you want backed up. There are two software utilities included — NTI DriveBackup to back up entire disks, and NTI Shadow, for selected files and folders.

HP fell back on its old corporate jargon when it called the Media Vault a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device, which is like calling a car a road-based home and work transportation device. Suffice it to say that with a full 1.2-terabyte capacity, it can offer sufficient space for most home and small-office needs.

Whatever you call it, the Media Vault is a sweet product.

• The Good: A great improvement over a great product, Ghost, for drive-imaging and backing up data
• The Bad: No drawbacks
• The Verdict: a superb way of protecting your data and operating system
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Of the four other products I want to discuss, all are either software or on-line services, and so are hard to wrap in festive paper with a big red bow on it — with the exception of Norton Save & Restore, which is a boxed product ($69.99 Cdn.).

Symantec, maker of the Norton line of utilities, has put its old Ghost to rest; this it did by degeekifying that popular disk-imaging and backup utility (Ghost, at version 10, will still be supported as a corporate program). Symantec has also made it friendlier and given it the upbeat Save & Restore name — I would have called it Casper.

S&R was released in March accompanied by a puzzling lack of publicity, considering it is such a complete consumer product.

S&R is actually a successor to Ghost; the only thing Ghost did was to back up entire drives. With S&R, Symantec has added a utility to back up folders and files selectively, and it can do both. It is also more tightly integrated with Norton Protection Centre, and it shields the S&R backup files if Norton Antivirus detects catastrophic viral activity.

Symantec has also revamped S&R's interface with wizards and guides. The CD on which S&R comes can also be used as an emergency boot disk.

And, of course, S&R can back up data to the HP Media Vault or similar networked storage device, or it can be directed to put the drive image on one storage system and the selective file backup on another.

With these features, S&R has jumped way ahead of the competition. And I can't say enough good things about it.

• The Good: An astonishingly easy way to synchronize and back up files
• The Bad: no data compression, and requires more space
• The Verdict: The cheapest backup system on the market
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A similar product is GoodSync Pro, from Siber Systems ($19.95 U.S.), which is a file-synchronization utility for Windows 98, ME, 2000, XP and 2003. It might seem out of place in a review of backup and storage systems, but essentially it does what backup systems do: create and update duplicate files on two different devices.

It doesn't lack many of the bells and whistles that embellish many backup programs; remember, this software goes for $20, and you can't do any better for that kind of price.

GoodSync does two-way file and folder synchronization, tracking all file modifications in a database to prevent data loss, and creates different groups of synchronizations to run under differing circumstances In a one-way mode, it will act as a backup utility, and run automatically run a synchronization when file changes are detected, a removable device is connected, a time period has elapsed, when a user might log in, or on a set time schedule.

GoodSync will work directly, over a home or workplace network, or via the Internet; it will synchronize files on a variety of networked computers. It works between a desktop PC and laptop, home and office computers, computer and removable devices (USB Key, Flash Drive, CDRW disc), over a local network or the Internet, and it comes with 20 languages installed.

As far as automatic operation in concerned, the software will do it when a removable device is connected (a USB device, digital camera, MP3 player, flash card reader, but not networked drives); after a time period has elapsed (from one minute to one month); when files have changed (it can check from once every minute to once an hour), and it will respond to Windows' Task Scheduler applet.

When you come down to it, this is much the same as what backup software does. It also adds another feature: Click a button labeled "Analyze" and GoodSync will enumerate all the files it will sync and their sizes. Tell GoodSync the source drive is C:, and it will back up every file on that disk. Not only that, it will do this with blazing speed: The GoodSybc creators have come back from the drawing board with a new synchronization algorithm that really clips along.

The only drawback is that the backup files are not condensed, which can quickly chew up space. That's because the program is intended to synchronize things such as laptops and desktops, or cameras and storage systems. And because it's bi-directional, it will ensure that both copies of your files are identical; most backup programs merely copy files holus-bolus, whether they're damaged or not.

This can be especially useful if you want to put files on a USB Flash Drive and dangle them from a keychain.

GoodSync is the closest you can get to a five-star restaurant meal when all you have is lunch money.

• The Good: A good system for online storage and display of multimedia
• The Bad: Limited to one computer; it can get expensive if you don't pay strict attention
• The Verdict: A good way to share multimedia files as long as you're not trying to compete with YouTube
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Bell Canada has just started offering an online backup service, called the Bell Sympatico Personal Vault (http://www.bell.ca/personalvault), which is based on the same premise used by people who must decide whether to rent or buy their homes.

Bell has actually imagined this vault to be a little like HP's Media Vault, in that it's designed less to hold backup files (which it can do), than to act as a server for multimedia files (photos, music, video) to be shared with family and friends. The idea is that ultimately, Bell sees it as a great way to integrate with cellphone-created videos, photos and sound recordings.

The vault is reachable by anyone with a connection to the Internet and the right password, of course. It can be told which files to share and which to keep hidden, and it can be configured to update its content automatically. Subscribers download the vault's Backup Manager, and check off the various folders or files intended for online storage.

I have two issues with this system. First, Backup Manager will not look for stuff to upload from across a network, which is a startling omission for Sympatico, which has been enthusiastically promoting its home networking products. Another perplexing feature is that although the Personal Vault will back up your Microsoft Outlook contacts list (and only Outlook), you have to export the list from Outlook, save it as a CSV (comma-separated values) file that can be read by a spreadsheet program, and then send it on.

That's far too annoying. Better to stick with a backup program.

The cost? Sympatico subscribers will pay $6 a month for 3 GB of storage, and $4 for each additional 3 GB of storage (non-subscribers pay $7 a month for the first 3 GB and $5 a month for every 3 GB after). Payment is based on the size of the service purchased, not on the volume of files you put in.

• The Good: Easy online backup of data
• The Bad: It can get expensive if you don't pay strict attention
• The Verdict: A good way to store data on-line as long as you're not trying to compete with Google
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The price structure is in marked contrast to that asked by Data Deposit Box, from Acpana Business Systems Inc., which I reviewed here in 2005. Like Sympatico's Personal Vault, DDB requires you to download a small application, select which folders you want to back up and then upload them.

Like Sympatico's service, DDB has a bias, not toward sharing media (although it can do that), but data, and as such it's designed more for small businesses or individual users who just don't trust their own machines.

Also, DDB software can be installed on as many computers as you need. You pay for storage, not by the machine. By default, Backup runs under the authority of the current user; if you want to back up a server, you have to run it as a Windows Service (available for Windows NT, 2000, XP, and 2003 Server).

But that requires some savvy tinkering with the system.

When I tried the system in 2005, I had set it to back up all the files in My Documents, but I had forgotten that Microsoft and VMware like to put their virtual machines there, and where I had put a backup of my Outlook data file.

The horror, the horror.

Pricing in those days was a penny per megabyte per month, which sounded dirt cheap. But by the time DDB had calculated the cost of my backup, I was storing 56 GB of data, DDB began to charge a flat $225 per month.

Well, those days are gone, and DDB has revised its fee schedule.

DDB now charges $2 per month per gigabyte, and averages out usage over each month. You can do this from as many PCs as you want.

So my disastrous experience of 2005 would today have resulted in a monthly fee of $112, or more than $1,300 a year.

The bottom line: If you buy something like the HP Media Vault with one 500-GB disk inside, you can store that 56 GB of data and still have room for more than 400 GB worth of other files for $629. In contrast, for 56 GB of backup, Sympatico would charge me more than $76 a month, or $848 a year. And Data Deposit Box would charge me $1,300 per year.

This is not an entirely fair comparison; each service has been configured for different purposes. Want to share files with far-flung people? Go for online storage; that way, I calculate Sympatico's service is still cheaper. If you simply want backup and need the drive space, stick with the HP Media Vault. You get a terabyte of storage for about $1,000.

Or, if your files are of a more modest size, buy Norton Save & Restore for $69.95 and, if you need the space, pop in a second hard drive into your computer (you can get a 500 GB hard drive in Canada for about $250, and a 100 GB outboard drive for $130).

Well, I wasn't entirely right about backup systems not being sexy. Their prices are certainly getting to be pretty hot.