Sharing large (multi-Gb) files with clients

Posted by Tim Long on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by Tim Long
Published on 2012-02-07T15:02:30Z Indexed on 2012/03/19 2:06 UTC
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I wasn't sure if this was the best place for this question, but I think it is squarely in the realm of the IT admin so that's the reason I put it here.

We need to share large files (several Gigabytes) with external clients. We need a simple way of reliably and automatically publishing these files so that clients can then download them. Our organization has Windows desktops and a Windows SBS 2011 server.

Sharing from our server is probably suboptimal from the client's perspective, because of the low upstream bandwidth of typical ADSL (around 1 Mbps) - it would take all day (9 hours for a 4Gb file) for the client to download the file.

Uploading to a 3rd party sever is good for the client but painful for us, because we then have to deal with a multi-hour upload.

Uploading to a third-part server would be less problematic if it could be made reliable and automatic, e.g. something like a Groove/SharePoint Workspace, simply drop the file in and wait for it to synchronize - but Groove has a 2Gb limit which is not big enough.

So ideally I'd like a service with the following attributes:

  • Must work for files of at least 5Gb, preferably 10Gb
  • Once the transfer is started, it must be reliable (i.e. not sensitive to disconnections and service outages) and completely automatic
  • Ideally, the sender would get a notification when the transfer completes.
  • Has to work with Windows based systems.

Any suggestions?

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