Microsoft Goes to 1GB, Google Ups Gmail to 4GB

By BetaNews Staff, BetaNews

October 12, 2007, 11:41 AM

Microsoft late Thursday announced its Windows Live SkyDrive service was being upgraded to support 1GB of file storage - double what was previously available. Meanwhile, Google on Friday said it would "speed up" the counter increasing storage available to Gmail users, reaching 4GB by the end of the month.

Microsoft's SkyDrive will receive a number of other new features as well, including subscribing to a user's public folder via RSS, seeing who uploaded a specific file in your public folder, and more integration with Windows Live Spaces and Messenger. Windows Live SkyDrive is only available in the United States, UK and India for the time being.

Add a Comment (45 Comments)

BetaNews reserves the right to remove any comment at any time for any reason. Please keep your responses appropriate and on topic. Foul language and personal attacks will not be tolerated.

Name (required):

E-mail (required):

Enter Your Comment:

By raymondo74

edited Oct 26, 2007 - 10:30 AM

Jigarme,

You are clearly defunct of any sense whatsoever. Hotmail's interface is quite terrible. Yes, it's improved, but you can't load any images as standard and have to hit Show Content each & everytime. And what about the Junk Mail filters ? Gmail's is the most superior I have ever seen. Google will one day take over Microsoft on every level, most of the Google Labs are far better now anyway. So, please kindly stick your love for Mr Gates where the sun doesn't shine

Score: 0

By Sarg

posted Nov 4, 2007 - 5:23 PM

I find the Gmail spam filters to be pretty crappy. I get lots of junk mail with subject lines including the words viagra, loans and sex. Out of all my email accounts, Gmail is the only one that still lets crap like that get through.

Score: 0

By ZenWarrior

posted Oct 15, 2007 - 12:27 PM

{yawn}

Score: 0

By jigarme

edited Oct 15, 2007 - 11:24 AM

Hotmail is already 5 GB at the time when gmail was still with 2.8 GB.. And why do we make so much hype for just 4 GB (which is going to be in future, right now its still 3.1 GB), there are email providers like Yahoo who has highest penetration in entire US who has broken all the barriers of space!! They are already giving umlimited space which I think gmail will never go!!

Score: 0

By rsx508

edited Oct 14, 2007 - 8:13 PM

zzzzzz.... boring. What happened to all the really innovating stuff at Google? Seems like everything there is slowing down to... MS pace. Oh yeah, that's right, they hired away a bunch of MS folk. No wonder. I am surprised that MS is pushing SkyDrive without having been taunted by Google doing something first. That's a bit of a shock.

Score: 0

By womfalcs7

posted Oct 14, 2007 - 5:39 PM

To those complaining about attachment size, why not use file uploading services?

Score: 0

By imafurby

posted Oct 14, 2007 - 4:14 PM

The idea of these ever growing electronic landfills all over the place is quite disturbing.

Score: 0

By yokozuna

posted Oct 14, 2007 - 6:51 AM

The news are not precise. According to: http://tinyurl.com/2w7d9z

Gmail's Storage Increases, 6 GB in January 2008

Gmail will increase the free storage gradually in the next days. On October 23, you'll get 4321 MB of storage, then the growth will slow down until January 4, when you'll have 6283 MB of storage. From January 4, you'll receive 3.3 MB every day, that's 10 times bigger than the current rate of growth.

Another good news is that Google Apps mail accounts will have the same quota as standard Gmail accounts, while Google Apps Premier Edition will have 25 GB mail accounts. Previously, Google Apps accounts had 2 GB of storage, while the business edition offered 10 GB per account.

Gmail didn't abandon the paid storage option, but you'll get around 50% more storage for the same price: 10 GB for $20/year, 40 GB for $75/year, 150 GB for $250/year and 400 GB for $500/year. The paid storage will probably become more attractive when Google adds more services, like Google Docs, JotSpot or GDrive.

"In April 2005, we started increasing Gmail storage as part of our "Infinity+1" storage plan. At that time, we realized we'd never reach infinity, but we promised to keep giving Gmail users more space as we were able," explains the Gmail Blog. Meanwhile, Yahoo and Microsoft also increased the storage (Yahoo even claims to offer "infinite" storage) and Gmail became the top webmail service with the least amount of free storage.

Score: 0

By horsecharles

posted Oct 13, 2007 - 4:13 PM

I initially took Ms to task for the puny 500 mb size.... but this ain't that much better-- esp. when others can share/add....

all in all, a step in the right direction nonetheless.

Score: 0

By bobthegoat2001

posted Oct 13, 2007 - 12:54 AM

I still like Inbox.com the best. 5gbs email plus you can use it as storage too.

Score: 0

By Alex Stevens

posted Oct 13, 2007 - 12:17 AM

Skydrive is not email, what does it have to do with Gmail?

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Oct 15, 2007 - 9:10 AM

Nothing. Nothing at all. Other than the fact that they both upped their service levels around the same time...

Score: 0

By vyrwz

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 3:23 PM

if you want a Great mail-application
with gmail's featutes
3GB storage
and best of all
UNLIMITED FILE ATTACHMENT SIZE!!

try lycos.mail

i have both gmail and lycos,
i use lycos for attachemtns

Score: 0

By dex23462

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 8:40 PM

An irrelevant comment for an irrelevant article – not only does Gmail have nothing to do with SkyDrive, Lycos has nothing to do with either. Find somewhere else to spam.

Score: 0

By horsecharles

posted Oct 13, 2007 - 4:09 PM

Actually, if unlimited attach size is true, Lycos is a huge winner then.... & it is relevant, irregardless.......

Score: 0

By jwalantsoneji

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 10:42 PM

not really unrelated, gmail has been counted by google as one of the places where u can store data and really skydrive is one of the efforts ms doing to cope up with increasing google phenomenon, and both are on to provide interlinking of apps.

Score: 0

By DudeBoyz

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 1:38 PM

The ATTACHMENT SIZE needs to increase to make this stuff useful.

Let's say that I have 100 meg of digital photos to send. Would like to be able to attach them as a single RAR or ZIP instead of having to break it down into 7 meg segments or what not.

Score: 0

By GoodThings2Life

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 1:08 PM

Yeah, despite the fact that no direct comparison is being made, documenting two completely different products like this is confusing to people who can't read.

The article shouldn't mix a single statement about GMail into two paragraphs about SkyDrive.

Perhaps the article should have read:

"Microsoft late Thursday announced its Windows Live SkyDrive service was being upgraded to support 1GB of file storage - double what was previously available. Additionally, SkyDrive will receive a number of other new features as well, including subscribing to a user's public folder via RSS, seeing who uploaded a specific file in your public folder, and more integration with Windows Live Spaces and Messenger. Windows Live SkyDrive is only available in the United States, UK and India for the time being.

Meanwhile, Google on Friday said it would increase GMail storage to 4GB by the end of the month. This brings the company closer to the 5GB mark that Microsoft began rolling out to Windows Live Hotmail users in August."

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 2:10 PM

confusing to people who can't read.

Imagine that...

So BN should start wording their articles for people who can't read?

I don't think my browser can handle that many pictures...

Score: 0

By dn2004

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:53 PM

xxdesmus has a point.

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 2:09 PM

Not really. He didn't read the article. It's kind of required if you actually want to know what you're talking about...

Score: 0

By zridling

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:51 PM

Once again, Microsoft comes up short, showing they're not serious. Besides, other than a $1billion of patent ripoffs a year, when's the last time Microsoft ever did anything original?

Google welcomes this race, and will win it until Microsoft is buried.

Score: 0

By GoodThings2Life

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:59 PM

Once again you impress us with your inability to actually read the article.

Google GMail = < 3GB
Windows Live Hotmail = 5GB
Yahoo = Unlimited

If anyone is coming up short, it's Google.

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 2:08 PM

Zaine...read articles...

I'm having trouble keeping the laughter within the bounds of sanity here...

Score: 0

By nikia25

posted Oct 13, 2007 - 9:26 PM

I CAN RECALL WIN BETANEWS WAS AN INTELLIGENT FORUM NOT A PLAYGROUND FOR IDIOTS!

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Oct 15, 2007 - 9:09 AM

CAPSLOCK IS CRUISE CONTROL FOR COOL!!!

"When" man, "when". Not "win"

Perhaps you should seek a 4th grade education before complaining about other's intelligence. Hmmmmm?

Score: 0

By Paul Skinner

posted Oct 15, 2007 - 11:46 AM

Maybe he's South Ifricun.

Score: 0

By siryak

posted Oct 14, 2007 - 9:18 PM

I'm sorry I can't resist...If you are calling somebody an idiot you might want to get the word usage right "when" you do it. *wink*

Score: 0

By Whatever1

edited Oct 12, 2007 - 12:29 PM

Please pull this article. You practically copied it from TechCrunch and the idiot at TechCrunch does not know what he is talking about.

Windows Live SkyDrive should be compared to Google Drive. SkyDrive is available to anyone who wants to try it right now. GDrive is a limited invitation only and they have not update their blog about the product in awhile.

Gmail offers almost 3GB right now. Windows Live Mail says 2GB on the home page, but as your account gets migrated to one of new datacenters MS built you get 5GB.

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 2:06 PM

Please refer to my reply to the other superhero who can see the invisible comparisons in this article...

Score: 0

By Alex Stevens

posted Oct 13, 2007 - 12:23 AM

"Microsoft Goes to 1GB, Google Ups Gmail to 4GB"

Come on, you can't seriously say that headline isn't trying to compare the two. It's practically flame bait. There was no reason for the two completely different services to be written about in the same article. He's right also, Betanews has obviously got this from Techcrunch.

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

posted Oct 15, 2007 - 9:08 AM

Some people find flamebait wherever they want to, I guess. We call them trolls.

Score: 0

By Mystiqq

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:29 PM

4GB for email... Who needs that kind space for email?

Score: 0

By GordieT

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 1:32 PM

I find it good for email backup. I have my own mail server and every email that hits it gets a copy sent to a gmail account. I go in once in a while and clear out some of it but can't be bothered most of the time.

Score: 0

By GoodThings2Life

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:54 PM

Packrats... why did it have to be packrats?!

Score: 0

By netean

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:17 PM

since when does windows live give you 10gb... my windows live and my hotmail both give me 2gb each.

Score: 0

By xxdesmus

edited Oct 12, 2007 - 11:56 AM

Dear god, what is wrong with you people? Are you really this stupid? TechCrunch, Mashable, and now you guys...

Gee, lets see here…

Gmail - mail application.
SkyDrive - not a mail application.

Why the hell are you comparing these two things again?

Oh right, because you don’t want to compare Gmail’s 2.9GB to Windows Live Mail’s 10GB …right, that’s the reason.

Did Microsoft steal your girlfriend or something? You clearly can’t write an article that actually makes a fair comparison. This is completely ignoring Yahoo’s unlimited storage…

Score: 0

By PC_Tool

edited Oct 12, 2007 - 12:15 PM

lmao...

I really don't see them comparing the two. Nope, not a single comparison (other than yours).

Two services upped their storage space around the same time. Might as well make a single story of it.

Techwriters run over your dog this morning??

You clearly can’t write an article that actually makes a fair comparison.

Again, show me where they make a single comparison. :)

Hope the rest of your day goes better. Sorry about the dog, man.

Score: 0

By siryak

posted Oct 14, 2007 - 9:21 PM

Exactly. All they did was combine 2 small articles into 1. It would have been a pretty short article without putting the 2 together. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to see why they are combined.

Score: 0

By fernz33

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 2:06 PM

Beta"News" at it's finest.

Score: 0

By GoodThings2Life

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 1:00 PM

Meh, if he's smart he'll just play country music backwards and it'll all come back! :)

Score: 0

By DotNet_Coder

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:35 PM

*laughing* damn that was good... brutal, but good...

Score: 0

By mocha

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:05 PM

Wow, no kidding. It stuns me that a tech writer could put out such a brutal "story".

Score: 0

By Das mod

posted Oct 12, 2007 - 12:13 PM

Score: 0

By horsecharles

edited Oct 14, 2007 - 6:19 PM

Ditto Das mod.

Score: 0