SkyDrive Increases Online Storage Limit to 25GB - Microsoft Windows Live Upgrade

SkyDrive – The Sky Is The Limit

Microsoft was not the first to arrive at the online storage party, in fact, many would say that they were even past fashionably late. So, in the world of online services, Microsoft’s SkyDrive offering was greeted largely with a shrug and the comment, “Another online storage service?”

Seeking to smash that conception, Microsoft rolled out an update to SkyDrive (along with many of its other Live Service offerings). The main feature of this update is an increase in storage from the former 5GB limit. Make that a really big increase in storage. Users with a Windows Live ID can now use SkyDrive to store up to 25GB of data online!

There is some other good news as well. SkyDrive continues to be a free service and it now offers a few usability improvements. You can now move files from one folder to another, and download all the files within a folder as a single zip file which is a huge improvement for users who store tons of small files like photos or MP3s on their SkyDrive.

By default, SkyDrive comes with a handful of folders defined including, Documents, and Photos which indicate Microsoft’s desire for people to use the service for those types of files.

Folders can be set as private or as shared. When shared, folders can be set to allow only specific users. Another useful feature is that shared folders can be set so that no Windows Live ID is required to access them. Uploading can be done via a web interface, or via a download tool that is installed locally.

There is one catch. Each individual file can be no larger than 50MB in size, so SkyDrive is out for storing larger multimedia files like high-definition videos or any other files that take up a lot of space. But otherwise, Microsoft’s upgraded SkyDrive looks like a solid contender in the online storage space, and this time, people are talking.

Keep an eye out for our in-depth review…