As soon as the upcoming Dropbox API is released and gains footing among developers, I am out of MobileMe.
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Have You Cancelled your MobileMe, and Why?
- Thread starter Wicked1
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As a freelancer the greatest value to me is the syncing of calendars. Now I know if I have another job on the day someone calls me up while I'm on location. No risk of double booking or sayin no because you thought you were working that day.
iDisk is great for sending big files that are password protected. I could probably do all these things for free, but now it's just to convenient and easy for the relatively small cost.
I do think it can be improved a lot though
iDisk is great for sending big files that are password protected. I could probably do all these things for free, but now it's just to convenient and easy for the relatively small cost.
I do think it can be improved a lot though
I use it to host my web pages as well, so it's not really a bad value. I track two iPhones with Find My Phone, and the push email is an added bonus.
I cancelled it because there is a free alternative to everything MobileMe offers. You can sync Google calendars to your iPhone, use Dropbox to sync files on different computers, a simple iTunes sync keeps my contacts synced up. And honestly I don't really care too much for push mail. I'm ok with waiting 15-30 minutes to find out I have a new email.
I haven't. I just don't have the time nor inclination to try to throw together the free stuff and get it to "sort of" work together. To me it's worth the $.21/day (if you get your renewal through eBay/Amazon) to just have everything work...
To give it a fair shot, I checked out drop box and set up the GMail push services. For me, the set up doesn't work well. To use GMail push for calendar, contacts & mail, I need to use Exchange and had to delete the email for one of the companies I freelance for. I don't always keep it there but when I'm working on a job for them, it's handy. But as far as the GMail/ActiveSync service itself, yes, it works just like MobileMe it seems.
But I also don't use push for email unless absolutely necessary (when I'm working on a job and I'm on location, etc) so it's not worth it for me to loose the exchange setup just for GMail.
As for DropBox, I've been hearing so many good things I decided to check that out as well. Very nice service. Syncs well & integrates well. It does a good job of replicating iDisk. But to get more than 2GB free a month, which I would definitely need, it's $9.99/mo for 50GB so the cost is actually more than MobileMe at $119.99/year and 50GB is more space than I need. And that's all it is...space. And I can bump up to 40GB on MM for $150/year but I don't need that.
I'm not knocking the alternatives, I just wanted to actually compare. At the end of the day, it seems using either method works similarly and setting it up is not complicated or "cobbled" together...really just 2 pieces rather than 1. It just depends on what your personal needs are.
But I also don't use push for email unless absolutely necessary (when I'm working on a job and I'm on location, etc) so it's not worth it for me to loose the exchange setup just for GMail.
As for DropBox, I've been hearing so many good things I decided to check that out as well. Very nice service. Syncs well & integrates well. It does a good job of replicating iDisk. But to get more than 2GB free a month, which I would definitely need, it's $9.99/mo for 50GB so the cost is actually more than MobileMe at $119.99/year and 50GB is more space than I need. And that's all it is...space. And I can bump up to 40GB on MM for $150/year but I don't need that.
I'm not knocking the alternatives, I just wanted to actually compare. At the end of the day, it seems using either method works similarly and setting it up is not complicated or "cobbled" together...really just 2 pieces rather than 1. It just depends on what your personal needs are.
Paid maybe $30 - $40 for a one year subscription and won't be renewing come March 31st, 2010.
iDisk is extremely slow and much less dynamic than Dropbox, the Webmail is antiquated in comparison to Gmail and I found push to be little to write home about.
The straw that broke the camel's back, however, was that Apple refused to consolidate my iTunes and MobileMe accounts. If you want me to pay top dollar for your web service don't force me to keep open my free (and superior) Gmail account.
Now if only Dropbox would offer a $4.99 /month, 15 - 25 GB account.
iDisk is extremely slow and much less dynamic than Dropbox, the Webmail is antiquated in comparison to Gmail and I found push to be little to write home about.
The straw that broke the camel's back, however, was that Apple refused to consolidate my iTunes and MobileMe accounts. If you want me to pay top dollar for your web service don't force me to keep open my free (and superior) Gmail account.
Now if only Dropbox would offer a $4.99 /month, 15 - 25 GB account.
Now if only Dropbox would offer a $4.99 /month, 15 - 25 GB account.
Well if they had that, I would consider the switch!
I renewed yesterday.
I have to be honest, one of the main reasons I keep it is because I like my e-mail address to end in @mac. Something about using free webmail (especially Hotmail for instance) that makes me take the person less seriously. Probably because that is what I had when I was younger, and my parents who have more recently obtained e-mail addresses have too.
Syncing contacts is useful, as is Find My iPhone. Office or home; where did I leave it?
I have to be honest, one of the main reasons I keep it is because I like my e-mail address to end in @mac. Something about using free webmail (especially Hotmail for instance) that makes me take the person less seriously. Probably because that is what I had when I was younger, and my parents who have more recently obtained e-mail addresses have too.
Syncing contacts is useful, as is Find My iPhone. Office or home; where did I leave it?
When it comes to dropbox and you want to do the 50GB, you can pay $99 for one full year if you pay yearly.
I had a MM (then .Mac) account for a long while and didn't renew after the botched 'MobileMe' launch last year. I signed a new account early '09 after much of the problems were addressed and the service stabilized.
I've temporarily switched back/forth to Gmail/Google Sync a few times to get a feel for it, and each time I go back to my MM account. It's not b/c Gmail is bad (it rocks, actually) but I don't particularly care for their IMAP implementation, nor do I like advertising (no matter how unobtrusive). Google Sync works beautifully with the iPhone, and is probably the best alternative to MM for iPhone users.
Calendar and Contact sync on MM is unparalleled. Calendar syncs ALL categories while Google Sync only does 'supported' categories (I have a lot of custom ones). Google Calendar requires you to set Delegates (which makes iCal look cluttered/ugly). Yahoo Calendar is probably the best alternative; no delegates, but no push support for iPhone (only e-mail).
iDisk sync works beautifully, only gives me an occasional issue when I'm on wifi at my University. It keeps all of my docs in sync between my home Mac and MBP, as well as my bloated Endnote database (which shares between the Macs great).
Next to Gmail, MM mail never gets spam....at all. It lacks a lot of the nicities of Gmail (ie. server-side filters for starters) but is simplistic and functional. I've had issues w/ it in the past (ie. SMTP timeouts) but for the most part it has worked well as a traditional IMAP server. Push has been reliable as well. I was using Gmail for a while but have slowly moved back to MobileMe....I just like not having any ads in my webmail experience. I was a paying Y!Mail customer for this very purpose for a few years but finally gave up b/c of the tons of spam I was (and still am) getting.
Is MM worth $99/yr? Probably, if you're going to use all the features (esp. if you're an iPhone owner).
I've temporarily switched back/forth to Gmail/Google Sync a few times to get a feel for it, and each time I go back to my MM account. It's not b/c Gmail is bad (it rocks, actually) but I don't particularly care for their IMAP implementation, nor do I like advertising (no matter how unobtrusive). Google Sync works beautifully with the iPhone, and is probably the best alternative to MM for iPhone users.
Calendar and Contact sync on MM is unparalleled. Calendar syncs ALL categories while Google Sync only does 'supported' categories (I have a lot of custom ones). Google Calendar requires you to set Delegates (which makes iCal look cluttered/ugly). Yahoo Calendar is probably the best alternative; no delegates, but no push support for iPhone (only e-mail).
iDisk sync works beautifully, only gives me an occasional issue when I'm on wifi at my University. It keeps all of my docs in sync between my home Mac and MBP, as well as my bloated Endnote database (which shares between the Macs great).
Next to Gmail, MM mail never gets spam....at all. It lacks a lot of the nicities of Gmail (ie. server-side filters for starters) but is simplistic and functional. I've had issues w/ it in the past (ie. SMTP timeouts) but for the most part it has worked well as a traditional IMAP server. Push has been reliable as well. I was using Gmail for a while but have slowly moved back to MobileMe....I just like not having any ads in my webmail experience. I was a paying Y!Mail customer for this very purpose for a few years but finally gave up b/c of the tons of spam I was (and still am) getting.
Is MM worth $99/yr? Probably, if you're going to use all the features (esp. if you're an iPhone owner).
Misplaced my iPhone during a road trip. We covered over 500 miles and stopped numerous times and had NO idea where I left it during those 500 miles. I had MobileMe with the awesome "Find My iPhone" feature. Pulled out the Mac, found a WiFi spot and searched for my iPhone......350 miles away. I called it, but no answer. Text it....no answer. Found out it was at the Diner that we ate at that morning. Called the diner, advised them where I was sitting and they found it and held it for me until the return trip home.
For that VERY reason alone, I will keep MobileMe services. The peace of mind of being able to remotely-wipe my phone if needs be, and being able to track it is worth it IMO.....not to mention the vast amount of other features it has.
And all for CHEAP! Seriously, it "seems" expensive being $99 for a year and you pay it up front.....but come on people, do the math! $8.33/month.....it's WELL worth it for the Find My iPhone feature alone! You will spend almost a dollar more for a number 5 at Whataburger!
For that VERY reason alone, I will keep MobileMe services. The peace of mind of being able to remotely-wipe my phone if needs be, and being able to track it is worth it IMO.....not to mention the vast amount of other features it has.
And all for CHEAP! Seriously, it "seems" expensive being $99 for a year and you pay it up front.....but come on people, do the math! $8.33/month.....it's WELL worth it for the Find My iPhone feature alone! You will spend almost a dollar more for a number 5 at Whataburger!
Maybe it's changed since my free trial in the summer, but it didn't do that for me. I even came onto these forums moaning about the fact it wouldn't auto-update files on iDisk and was shot down in flames!
Also don't like @me.com as the domain for the email address.
I've found people are often confused by the name (as opposed to @gmail.com, which is practically email vernacular) and in my opinion it's a be narccistic sounding.
I asked Apple if they could change my address to @mac.com, which they agreed to do, but it was an empty promise.
I've found people are often confused by the name (as opposed to @gmail.com, which is practically email vernacular) and in my opinion it's a be narccistic sounding.
I asked Apple if they could change my address to @mac.com, which they agreed to do, but it was an empty promise.
Thats my single gripe with MobileMe.... they allow a custom domain name so you can host a site with mobileme using your own domain but you can't use it for email on same domain name ..... if they could add this feature they're onto a winning product ... until then its just an also ran
I'm just starting a 30day GoogleApps trial so i can have ActiveSync mail/calendar/contacts through google (at £20/year cheaper than MM which will go towards hosting site at the same place its registered) but have my own personal email address with it.
I don't know if the .mac email address are still available but I use my old .mac instead of .me. Personally I hate the .me and I would be tempted to cancel/drop it if apple decided to stop supporting/allowing me to use my old .mac account.
If I have to go through the pain and hassle of telling everyone my new email address, I'll use one that I like not .me.
If I have to go through the pain and hassle of telling everyone my new email address, I'll use one that I like not .me.
Same here, I was paying $130 a year to host my website at another site, and said let's get rid of that and move it all over to MobileMe. Gmail hadn't really come out with push, and I REALLY wanted to be able to delete or have an email marked as read on my phone and have that synced exactly to my computer back home and the cloud.
iDisk has really come in handy every so often (sometimes for work when our FTP goes down and the higher ups flip out). I think with Apple's giant Database warehouse they're building they are expecting HUGE things for their MobileMe.
Find my iPhone is a great feature, and the ability to lock and wipe the phone post-theft/loss is nice. Not that I have any confidence that if I left my iPhone at a bar late at night the battery would survive to me finding it though.
Plus my email is just my full name, no . - _ characters, and no abbreviations or extra numbers. I couldn't believe it, and I have a REALLY common name!
My biggest beef is the web interface. It's slow and when I search emails I have no idea if it's actually searching or not. Plus it locks up firefox all the time with bad scripts.
I switched from the iphone to the motorola droid so mobileme isnt as useful anymore.
the syncing between my macbook, iphone and mac mini was awesome but now that i have switched to the droid and the only mac i use is my macbook pro i get less use out of it.
the calendar and contact syncing were the features i used most.
I rarely used the webspace for pictures or site hosting and i never used the email. it was nice to know find my iphone was available in case something happened to the phone.
Now i use google for all my stuff, makes sense since im using an android phone. the google services are much better on the motorola droid than on the iphone. im pretty sure if i still had the iphone i would still be using mobileme. the free alternatives on the iphone never worked well for me. I did not like google sync and since i used my company exchange email i could not use both at the same time.
That said i would always recommend mobileme to those who have an iphone and another mac machine. I would like to see the price come down a little. i got mine on ebay for ~$55 which is much closer to what i think apple should be charging.
the syncing between my macbook, iphone and mac mini was awesome but now that i have switched to the droid and the only mac i use is my macbook pro i get less use out of it.
the calendar and contact syncing were the features i used most.
I rarely used the webspace for pictures or site hosting and i never used the email. it was nice to know find my iphone was available in case something happened to the phone.
Now i use google for all my stuff, makes sense since im using an android phone. the google services are much better on the motorola droid than on the iphone. im pretty sure if i still had the iphone i would still be using mobileme. the free alternatives on the iphone never worked well for me. I did not like google sync and since i used my company exchange email i could not use both at the same time.
That said i would always recommend mobileme to those who have an iphone and another mac machine. I would like to see the price come down a little. i got mine on ebay for ~$55 which is much closer to what i think apple should be charging.
Well I decided to go with the Droid. So happy with it. But I do like the simple interface and lack of advertising. However 99 dollars a year is not worth it to me. And I prefer not to buy on Ebay. If Apple were to reduce the price to $49 a year I would keep it.