(Archived) Evernote better than Dropbox

[harryg 0]

I just started using Evernote. I really love it. I think the best part is that it has thumbnails so that you can find your files many times just by seeing it. I hope to use Evernote to store our receipts and scans of paper lying around our home and office. Stuff that I might need later but don't need it sitting on the coffee table.

I also looked at Dropbox. I cannot for the life of me figure out why someone would use Dropbox due to no OCR, or visual thumbnails of files. Isn't Dropbox essentially the same thing as keeping a thumbdrive in your computer. Yes... I know you can access your files across the cloud with dropbox. But, you can do that quite well with Evernote.

So.... someone make me feel better that I've made the right move to using Evernote as my one-stop place to store my scans, receipts, and misc important papers as opposed to using Dropbox.

Thoughts?

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

There are a few threads on the topic including this one. No reason you can't use both. I definitely use EN much more than Dropbox. But Dropbox is nice to use, instead of a thumb drive, when transferring files. IMO, it's better at that than EN b/c it's simply a part of the file system.

[harryg 0]

Thanks Burgernfries.

(BTW... That's the best username I've ever seen).

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

Thanks Burgernfries.

(BTW... That's the best username I've ever seen).

You're welcome! And thanks! I've actually been a vegetarian for 28 years so I guess it really should have been VeggieBurgersNFries.

[harryg 0]

I'm hooked on Evernote. Just the fact that everything is so easy to search and find in Evernote makes it a great choice. Can't wait for our little mobile scanner to show up via Fedex to get started filling some notebooks.

[gatorbrit 70]

I use both Dropbox and Evernote heavily. But they are very different. For example, I use dropbox for storing data and spreadsheets that are used in my work. The seamlessness of the syncing to my hard drive means that I no longer carry around a thumb drive.

I use evernote for everything else.

[cgknight 2]

Different usage scenarios as far as I can see. Evernote requires you to upload material - with dropbox I simply start a project within it and then it's all done with no user intervention.

Having said that - I'm curious, how do you edit .ppt and .docx in evernote? Does it open then and then automatically update then when you've finished?

[jbenson2 2,149]

I tried Dropbox, but found it lacking in a few areas. Most of its selling points are already addressed by systems I am already using.

• Backup by using Carbonite
  Spreadsheet / Presentation editing by using Google Doc
  File transfer by using Google Doc

[TechBarber 100]

I'm a little different in the way I use both services I think.

I view Dropbox as a file repository for my work and for important files. Any Excel, Word, PDF or other kinds of "workable" files I save into my Dropbox folder. Examples of this would be school assignments, documents pertaining to the selling of my house (real estate/lawyer etc). Real, meaty, important files.

I use Evernote for, and I don't mean for this to sound bad because I love EN - but I use it for the little scraps of my life. Examples would be pictures of my utility meter so I could give the meter number to my lawyer, grocery lists, to do lists, web confirmation pages - that kind of thing.

I just find Dropbox aligns more with the way I think of storing files. Maybe because that's what I'm used to working in Windows and Mac.

I guess the best way to summarize is by saying Dropbox is the electronic file cabinet in my life, while Evernote is the electronic pad of post-it notes beside my desk.

[cgknight 2]

I use Evernote for, and I don't mean for this to sound bad because I love EN - but I use it for the little scraps of my life. Examples would be pictures of my utility meter so I could give the meter number to my lawyer, grocery lists, to do lists, web confirmation pages - that kind of thing.

That's pretty much what I do - I use it for a cookbook (however I'm starting to migrate to springpad simply because of the free off-line android synch).

[logandb 229]

Different usage scenarios as far as I can see. Evernote requires you to upload material - with dropbox I simply start a project within it and then it's all done with no user intervention.

Having said that - I'm curious, how do you edit .ppt and .docx in evernote? Does it open then and then automatically update then when you've finished?

That's right. Any file that is editable by double-clicking (in Windows, at least) is automatically downloaded to the 'Attachments' directory within the Evernote folder while editing. Once you save the edited document, it is automatically updated in Evernote.

I have observed, however, that if I open a .jpg using a different application to the default ('Open With...'), this automatic update does not happen and I need to upload it manually.

[harryg 0]

also... if you open a file from within the web app, it opens as read-only. No editing seems to be possible on notes unless you are on the computer you used to upload it to the cloud.

[cgknight 2]

Different usage scenarios as far as I can see. Evernote requires you to upload material - with dropbox I simply start a project within it and then it's all done with no user intervention.

Having said that - I'm curious, how do you edit .ppt and .docx in evernote? Does it open then and then automatically update then when you've finished?

That's right. Any file that is editable by double-clicking (in Windows, at least) is automatically downloaded to the 'Attachments' directory within the Evernote folder while editing. Once you save the edited document, it is automatically updated in Evernote.

I have observed, however, that if I open a .jpg using a different application to the default ('Open With...'), this automatic update does not happen and I need to upload it manually.

That's interesting - I didn't realise that was possible with Evernote and if I had known at the time, I might have tried premium but now it's a bit late.