The long and short of this is that Norton is steadily reclaiming its position at the top of the internet security ladder, but that the online storage just isn't worth the added price.

In effect, Norton has bundled online backup software with its internet security suite. In principle, it's a nice step, especially since online backup can be an extremely important component when it comes to protecting digital photos/video, documents, etc. The primary issue is that 25Gb of storage just isn't very much in this day and age, and with business such as Amazon and Google offering unlimited online backup space, Norton's place in this world isn't clear. The response might well be that "I only want to backup docs, so I don't need unlimited storage," but my answer would be to point the user to Dropbox's free 2Gb or Microsoft's SkyDrive. Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Dropbox all have better, more robust, more user-friendly options when compared to Norton (and if you need *full* system backup, Code42's CrashPlan can't be beat, imo).

So if Norton's online feature isn't that effective, what reason is there to buy this? My gut is to say "there isn't one," but that's not entirely true. You are, after all, getting norton's excellent internet security suite, which has really made a turn-around since the bloatware of just 5 years ago. In this respect, Norton is still top-notch. In that respect, this could well be worth it if you were to find it on sale (or perhaps wanted an online storage option for a business that kept personal accounts like DropBox free of clutter).

All told, I honestly can't rate the online backup option very highly, but because it comes bundled with Norton's internet security, I can't rate it low either. I settled on 3 stars because the online storage adds to the price, dropping things down from 4 stars.
The long and short of this is that Norton is steadily reclaiming its position at the top of the internet security ladder, but that the online storage just isn't worth the added price. In effect, Norton has bundled online backup software with its internet security suite. In principle, it's a nice step, especially since online backup can be an extremely important component when it comes to protecting digital photos/video, documents, etc. The primary issue is that 25Gb of storage just isn't very much in this day and age, and with business such as Amazon and Google offering unlimited online backup space, Norton's place in this world isn't clear. The response might well be that "I only want to backup docs, so I don't need unlimited storage," but my answer would be to point the user to Dropbox's free 2Gb or Microsoft's SkyDrive. Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Dropbox all have better, more robust, more user-friendly options when compared to Norton (and if you need *full* system backup, Code42's CrashPlan can't be beat, imo). So if Norton's online feature isn't that effective, what reason is there to buy this? My gut is to say "there isn't one," but that's not entirely true. You are, after all, getting norton's excellent internet security suite, which has really made a turn-around since the bloatware of just 5 years ago. In this respect, Norton is still top-notch. In that respect, this could well be worth it if you were to find it on sale (or perhaps wanted an online storage option for a business that kept personal accounts like DropBox free of clutter). All told, I honestly can't rate the online backup option very highly, but because it comes bundled with Norton's internet security, I can't rate it low either. I settled on 3 stars because the online storage adds to the price, dropping things down from 4 stars.