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Good news: Microsoft is doubling your OneDrive storage for more than double your money
Make room! For a fee...
Microsoft has finally begun rolling out the updates it promised OneDrive users back in June in the form of the Personal Vault and desperately needed additional storage.
The company trumpeted the imminent arrival of extra capacity earlier in the summer, finally responding to years of user pleading for a little more space by promising a doubling of the existing 1TB limit.
In June, Microsoft reckoned that the additional cloudy storage would be available in 200GB increments, with the first costing $1.99 per month, going up to $9.99 per month for the full additional 1 TB.
UK users will therefore be unsurprised to learn that the kindly software giant has adopted a 1:1 exchange rate, with 200GB coming in at £1.99 and rising to £9.99 for the meaty 1TB.
If you're thinking those prices seem a little steep, you'd be right: Microsoft's own Office 365 Home subscription, which comes with licences for the company's Office apps and 1TB of storage per user (for six users), comes in at £7.99 per month. The same cost as buying just 800GB of extra storage.
Google will charge £15.99 per month for 2TB of space on its servers, while Apple seeks a mere £6.99 from its fanbois. Microsoft, of course, will point to the added value of its desktop apps, although Google's productivity suite continues to win fans.
Google will also allow well-heeled users to blow through that 2TB limit if they wish. We asked Microsoft if it would follow suit, and if any discount could be secured by paying a year upfront à la Office 365 Home, but have yet to receive a reply.
Storage aside, the company has also rolled out the Personal Vault to its cloudy service for UK users. The feature is simply a special folder in OneDrive, protected by an additional layer of security, where users can drop sensitive files such as a passport scan.
If not used, the Personal Vault locks itself after 20 minutes on the web or three minutes on a mobile device. Authentication can be performed using a fingerprint, a code sent by text or provided by Microsoft's own authenticator application (unsurprisingly).
It will need setting up on each device the user needs, and Microsoft warns that disabling the feature will delete any files left in it. Forever. ®